A Crown Heights College Student Shabbaton, Hasidic Style
by Rabbi Mendy Rimler, Assistant Rabbi at Chabad At ASU
Men in dark suits brushed shoulders with jean-clad college students. Modestly dressed women strolled through aisles crowded with girls wearing sorority T-shirts and college sweaters. On Kingston Avenue in Crown Heights, Brooklyn diversity took on new meaning last weekend when 850 Jewish collegians converged on Crown Heights for the Chabad on Campus Jewish Student Shabbaton.
Before Shabbos set in, directors of Chabad at Arizona State University (ASU) Rabbi Shmuel and Chana Tiechtel clued me in on the program so I could tag along with the group of six students for the weekend.
During evening services at Chabad Headquarters at 770 Eastern Parkway, I sat with Bryc Schotz, a business major in his senior year at ASU.
We looked on as the black hats of the Yeshiva students bobbed amid the knitted, colorful kippas of the college students as the circles of dancers surged to tune of the Lecha Dodi prayer.
Bryce and I mulled over that special scene later on. “We share a strong connection,” he told me, referring to the Yeshiva students he met in 770.
“We’re all looking to connect and explore Judaism.”
After the evening services, we set off in the nippy November evening toward the home of the Smetana family in the Chabad enclave of Crown Heights for the Friday night dinner.
“I can’t image that the people in my community would take in hundreds of students who are perfect strangers into their homes,” nineteen year-old Rafael Stein told me. All 850 students had been put up at families in Crown Heights for the weekend.
On many levels, the Shabbaton presented a social and cultural exchange.
The dress code in this observant community was an eye-opener for students who live in a society where suggestive, revealing clothing are the norm.
By default, the setting for the Shabbaton changed a social paradigm for college students. On Friday afternoon, students disconnected from the virtual world as cellphones and computers were switched off before Shabbos began. The vast majority of college students engage in social media for hours every day, but over Shabbos, hundreds of Jewish students met new faces from over ninety schools.
Real people meeting in person makes for a different experience than a Facebook friend request, says Jonny Basha, 21. Representing the students, he spoke at the closing lunch and program on Sunday.
“Let’s do an eye exercise, I want everyone to take a moment and look around the room and lock eyes with someone,” he told the assembled students.
“We've all adapted so much to Facebook and texting these days, that there's something entertainingly awkward about looking into someone’s eyes without talking,” he said.
There’s strength in numbers, agrees Sivan Markowitz, 22. Emotionally, balancing Jewish life at Chabad with the secular environment at college can be tough.
“It’s such a unique experience, to see so many other Jewish students who share this challenge,” she says.
On Saturday night, I caught up with Dina Matatova as the College Carnival event was beginning to wind down. A biology major in her senior year at ASU, Matatova is about to make the move to Israel to study at the Mayanot women’s seminary in Jerusalem. Her story evokes in me a sense of pride in the work of Chabad representatives on college campuses.
“Growing up, there was a very strong cultural sense of Judaism at home, but we weren’t observant,” says Matatova, 21. But later on in her teen years, the disconnect between Jewish identity and practical Judaism began to nag at her.
Then she found the Tiechtels and Chabad at ASU, and an inspired push for more Jewish meaning in her life. One thing led to another, and then at age nineteen, Matatova began to adhere to the Halachic dress code and eating only kosher food.
“I spend Shabbos at Chabad ever since I became observant,” she explains.
She attended a three-month program at the Ivy League Torah Study Experience last year, which made for a difficult transition back into college after the transformative experience and early personal growth.
It hasn’t been an easy ride. And yet, “when you push for something in life, you know you’ll get more resistance, and that’s what makes me so much stronger.”
Late that night, I met up with Brandon Welner at his host’s home. Welner, a double major in biology and secondary education at ASU is a former student at Chanoch Lenaar, a high school in Crown Heights. We talked about this community, of a people deeply committed to Jewish ideals and values.
“When I come back to Crown Heights, headquarters for Chabad, I feel a certain familiarity,” he says reflectively. Welner is the president of Chabad at ASU.
“And back at ASU, there’s always the connection with the global Chabad community, I feel like a part of a larger community.”
Indeed, despite their dramatically different lifestyles, community members and students celebrated Jewish unity last weekend.
As hundreds of eyes of locked gazes, Basha continued his demonstration with the students at the closing event. “You have something in common with this person,” he said.
“You are both Jews.”
This article originally appeared on Lubavitch.com