Rabbi Chaim Dovid Zwiebel is a man who needs no introduction — he’s already received hundreds of them during his tenure as Agudath Israel’s executive vice president. But while the public figure named Rabbi Zwiebel is a familiar one, the same can’t be said for the private man — until now.
Rabbi Chaim Dovid Zwiebel is today executive vice president of Agudath Israel, the highest executive position within the organization. While Agudah is governed by a board of trustees, to whom he is directly accountable, the members of the Moetzes Gedolei Torah are the final arbiters of Agudah policy. He is in frequent contact with them, especially with the Novominsker Rebbe, who carries the title Rosh Agudas Yisrael.
In addition to the central office located in Manhattan, which has approximately 20 employees, there are Agudah offices around the country that are involved in government advocacy and social services for the community.
It’s a job that is full-time and then some. And in some ways his position is more difficult than it was for his predecessors. Rabbi Sherer left a golden legacy as a leader, diplomat, and statesman, respected even by those camps within Orthodoxy that saw him as too far to the right, or to the left. But that was when the world was still normal. There was no Internet and no blogs and no open forum where people could join together, without risk of exposure or humiliation, to mock and malign the very fundamental upon which the organization was built: respect for gedolei Torah.
In a sense, Rabbi Zwiebel has been left holding the bag in an era of unprecedented vulnerability, when the organization’s unyielding, unapologetic allegiance to its rabbinic leaders has left it swimming against the tide. Yet his mandate is to keep the organization relevant and respected, without a website, Twitter feed, or Facebook page. How does he deal with today’s challenges?
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