A Long-Distance Calling : Brooklyn’s Controversial Rebbe--Who Some Believe Is the Messiah--Makes an Impact on Jews in County

A week before her bat mitzvah, Neely Katzir went to New York to seek a special blessing from the rebbe--a powerful 89-year-old spiritual leader who has shaken up the Jewish world by advising his followers to prepare for the imminent arrival of the Messiah.

Neely, a 13-year-old from Costa Mesa, made the trip to Brooklyn last month accompanied by her father, Haim, and their rabbi. It was the highlight of her bat mitzvah--the Jewish ceremony marking a girl’s passage into womanhood.

“It was kind of scary because people say that the rebbe can see everything that you did before when he meets you,” Neely said, recounting her visit. “He said that I would be very successful, that I would multiply and that everything would be good at my bat mitzvah.” The rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson, is the controversial chief rabbi of the Lubavitcher movement, an ultra-orthodox Hasidic Jewish sect whose members still retain 18th-Century European dress and many of it customs. From his headquarters in Brooklyn he oversees an empire of Jewish mysticism worldwide and commands about 200,000 followers--many of whom believe that he is in fact the Messiah.

Neely’s pilgrimage to the rebbe’s headquarters is just one testament to Schneerson’s influence in Orange County, home to an estimated 1,000 Lubavitchers.

When the rebbe suffered a stroke three weeks ago, more than 300 students at Hebrew Academy in Westminster wrote cards wishing him a speedy recovery and promising to work harder to become better followers of Jewish religious laws. A recent auction for the Jewish Federation of Orange County began with a prayer for the rebbe’s health. And, next month, a delegation of Jewish leaders from Orange County will travel to Washington for a 90th-birthday celebration in the rebbe’s honor.

The rebbe, however, is not expected to attend the event. With the exception of periodic visits to a Queens cemetery to commune with the spirit of his father-in-law the late rebbe and another brief trip to the Catskills, he has reportedly not left his Brooklyn neighborhood in 44 years. Still, his influence extends around the world, as evidenced by the presence of a flourishing Lubavitcher community in Orange County.

“The uniqueness of the rebbe is that he cares about people--we’ve all seen it,” said Rabbi David Eliezrie of the North Orange County Chabad Center in Yorba Linda.

“Much of traditional Jewish life in Orange County was created by his emissaries to this community,” said Eliezrie, who plans to attend the rebbe’s birthday celebration.

The Lubavitcher--or Chabad--movement is a system of Jewish philosophy based on the principles of wisdom, comprehension and knowledge. The initials of these three words in Hebrew form the word Chabad.

Men wear dark felt hats and long beards. As part of their religious rituals, members are required to periodically purify themselves in a special cleansing pool known as a mikvah.

For more than a century, the movement was based in the Russian town of Lubavitch, which means “the city of Brotherly Love” in Russian.

The Lubavitchers began settling in Orange County in the late 1970s with the establishment of the Hebrew Academy in Westminster. At the time, the academy was the only K-through-12 Jewish day school in the area and soon began attracting Jewish families from throughout Orange, Los Angeles and San Diego counties. A string of Chabad temples later followed in Irvine, Yorba Linda, Los Alamitos, Huntington Beach and Laguna Beach.

Today students at Hebrew Academy are among thousands of children worldwide who are participating in a massive project initiated by the rebbe’s followers after his recent stroke. The children fill out printed forms expressing sympathy for the ailing rebbe and stating how they plan to become more devout Jews. The forms will be mailed to New York to be compiled in a manuscript.

One student, Shoshana Yudim, a fifth-grader from Huntington Beach, wrote: “My bat mitzvah is in April, the second Seder of Passover, so my resolution is very strong. I’m going to say my personal verse and give charity every day.”

Moishe Y. Engel, assistant dean at Hebrew Academy, said that the children taking part in the project are not limited to Hasidics. They range from the non-practicing to those from ultra-orthodox families.

“The rebbe’s influence is much greater than to Hasidim,” Engel said. “The rebbe didn’t send the few followers that we have in Orange County to make a school for Hasidim. The specific purpose was to create a school for all Jews to be educated.”

In Orange County, the rebbe’s powers are legendary. Many have written to him for advice about personal problems. His followers say they always receive a prompt written response.

Eliezrie said he once wrote to the rebbe for advice about purchasing some investment property. He decided not to buy it when he received a letter from the rebbe.

“It was a piece of property that was very cheap and I thought I could make a great deal,” Eliezrie said. “He wrote me back saying that it would be a quagmire, and sure enough, the property just finally sold the other day.”

Janis Wilk, who is Jewish but is not a Lubavitcher, said she once wrote the rebbe for advice about personal difficulties.

“To my surprise, I received a three-page letter in response to the one that I had written to him that really helped me,” said Wilk, a Fountain Valley resident whose 13-year-old daughter attends Hebrew Academy. “I was not even a member of his movement.”

Messianic fervor has swept many Hasidic communities due to the rebbe’s pronouncements that the Messiah is coming. Some followers have even erected banners saying, “We want Messiah now.”

In Orange County, however, Lubavitchers have remained relatively low key about speculation among their faith that the rebbe actually is the Messiah. According to Jewish tradition, every generation produces an individual believed by many to be the Messiah.

“Nobody knows exactly who the Messiah is, but the events over the last two years seem to be fitting in line amazingly with the prophecies,” said Rabbi Aron Berkowitz of the West Orange County Chabad in Huntington Beach. “If the (Messiah) were going to come today, no person seems to be a better candidate than the rebbe.”