Is Rabbi Yehiel Kalish's short-lived political experience a portent for the future of religion in an increasingly progressive America?
None of the marbled, vaulted grandeur of the Illinois state capitol, completed in 1888, makes a major impression on State Representative Yehiel Mark Kalish, an ordained rabbi from the Skokie yeshivah and the legislature’s only Orthodox Jew. Rabbi Kalish’s one and only term in office is winding down, but when he seeks true inspiration, he draws it from a special location some 200 miles northeast of Springfield. His longevity at the amud at Congregation Shaarei Tzedek Mishkan Yair in Chicago has far surpassed his brief term in public office.
“I’ve been the chazzan there for 18 years on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur,” said Rabbi Kalish told me early one morning between davening and the start of his morning learning seder. “I’ve always said my favorite place on earth is that amud on Kol Nidrei night, and there’s no emotional high like Ne’ilah. When we finish Ne’ilah and start singing ‘L’shanah haba’ah b’Yerushalayim,’ it takes me hours to get back to an even keel.”
One year, in a quest for extra inspiration, Rabbi Kalish approached Rabbi Reuven Gross, the shul’s rabbi, as the baal korei recited the Mi Shebeirach for the ill.
“I asked the rabbi, what’s going on in the kehillah? What should I be davening for? It’s now become a yearly question. Without naming names, the rabbi shares some of the challenges the kehillah is facing so I can represent them properly. It’s my way of showing achrayus to the tzibbur.”
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