Tales of the Village Rabbi
by Rabbi Harvey M. Tattelbaum[ Biography ]
In the late fifties and sixties, Greenwich Village was the quirkiest, most charming, jazzy, eccentric and urban of environments, the center of all that was both quaint and "cool": brownstones and beatniks, coffeehouses and college students, folksingers and freethinkers, poets and "prophets." Into this fascinating mix of cultural archetypes came a young rabbi, Harvey M. Tattelbaum, who became known as the Village Rabbi of the Village Temple. The spirit of Sholom Aleichem infuses his Tales of the Village Rabbi, a touching and laugh-out-loud funny memoir of his tenure at a small synagogue in the heart of Greenwich Village. Though his years in this magical place were productive and soul-filling, rabbinical training hadn't exactly prepared him for the bikers, thieves, ex-cons, eccentric old ladies, drug-users, cleavage-baring brides and other Village denizens he encountered while serving the congregants of his spirited little temple. Rabbi Tattelbaum shares his insider's tales-both downtown and uptown-of wayward weddings (and funerals), contentious Temple boards, irreverent interfaith shenanigans, heartaches and triumphs. But the Tales also reveal a deep personal struggle with some of the most profound philosophical problems of ancient and modern religion and are filled with a warm, humane and rational approach to spirituality and religious meaning.
Introduction
It was not a town in the Ukraine or Belarus, nor a shtetl in Poland or Lithuania, nor a shtiebele in Russia or Azerbaijan.
It has been a bustling, thriving village on the Island of Manhattan for over three hundred years. Its settlers and occupants were from all the nations of the earth.
As the population of the whole island grew, a line of demarcation became pronounced. It had no Yiddish, Hungarian, Russian or Polish tones to it--simply "14th Street"--the northern boundary. The southern boundary was vague and darted in and out of lower Manhattan, a boundary that touched Chinatown, Little Italy, the Lower East Side, the wholesale meat district--all venues of crowded, busy and unrelenting vitality.
Many who settled here felt a certain pride of residence--a pride that often kept them below 14th Street, if possible. A pride that allowed them to respond without any self-effacement to the question, "Where do you live?" and the quickly forthcoming answer was "Greenwich Village."
Land values in "The Village" have skyrocketed. Apartments are being rented or bought for prices that surpass the levels of many comparable Upper West Side and Upper East Side dwellings in Manhattan.
My years as part of "The Village" community were among the most exciting of my life. Many descendants of the ancient house of Israel settled there. Among the families I knew, some claimed residency back two or three or more generations (one, even back to the time of the Pilgrims of the 17th century).
The pride of being part of the inner and immediate life of "The Village" was an integral part of the worldview of many of my Jews. One found an easy acceptance among denizens of all that made "The Village" famous throughout the world: the art shows; the gay rights parades; the outrageous adult Halloween processions; the dousing in the fountain of NYU graduates at commencement-time; the community battles to keep NYU from expanding its libraries and learning centers; the illogical pattern of crisscrossing charm-filled streets; the crowded stores and eating places; the constant hordes of tourists and passers-through; the beggars and homeless; the high-cost brownstones and the imposing new apartment buildings; St. Vincent's Hospital; the Fashion Institute; the New School and the private schools; the centuries-old fabulously wealthy churches; the old clubs--and for me, above all, the gathering places of the Jewish community. One, in particular, on 12th Street between University Place and Broadway: Congregation B'nai Israel of Greenwich Village. Though not the only synagogue in the area, under its better-known title as "The Village Temple," it enabled me to claim the title of "Village Rabbi." That was where I explored, served and led for an era of my life that I cannot ever put out of my mind.
That was where I worked--and these are some of my stories.