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Valley the day he was offered a job a mission, really to open a new Jewish center in Sirnsbuty. Not any kind of center though. Samuels, an observant Jew from Chabad-Lubavitch, a R Brooklyn, N.Y.-based Orthodox sect of Hasidic Jewry, had known from at least his teenage years that one day he would be a a rabbi. But he never imaged his o r synagogue, would attract Jews b scattered throughout nine or ten rural and semi-suburban towns b who, like most of their Christian and otherwise secular neighbors, i were more ensconced in everyday society. They valued good jobs, M quality public schools, nice houses, Western culture and cone sumerism. Most were uninterested in a style of strictly observant Jun daism that focused on God, studying Torah, daily prayer and living d according to halacha, or all of Jewish law. e Samuels was 28 when he arrived in Simsbury in February 1998. A l curly red beard framed his face. He wore a long black coat, black S slacks, white shirt and tie. A wide-brimmed black hat almost always a topped his head. Like many young Hasidic Jews, he was already marm ried and the father of three children, all boys. He had no funding supu port from headquarters in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, and no list of e Jews clamoring for his new center/synagogue. All he had was a mesl sage from a 50-something man named Mitchell Glick of Burlington, s who was divorced and mostly living alone. He had never had a bar h mitzvah, but was interested in attending a Jewish class or program if a one were offered in the Farmington Valley. dSamuels called Glick and invited him to his house the next Friday night for Shabbos dinner. When Glick arrived, Samuels asked him if n he'd join in Sabbath evening prayers before dinner. Glick consented e and Samuels led him to his basement, where a makeshift synagogue, v complete with a mechitza, or divider separating men from women e during worship, was set up. Glick wondered who else was coming. r h'They're coming," Samuels insisted. "Soon they'll come. Not yet." For 20 minutes, Samuels prayed, chanting in a full, deep voice when e appropriate, silently davening in Hebrew at other times, Glick his a only congregant. Afterward, they climbed the stairs. Samuels' wife, r Blumie, had a traditional dinner ready: gelte sh, freshly baked d challah, roast chicken, chicken soup. Glick left that night stuffed, o f t Rabbi Mendel Samuels, spiritual leader of Chabad of the Valley In h Simsbury, sits beneath a portrait of the late Rabbi Menachem e Mendel Schneerson of Brooklyn, N.Y., founder of the Chabad F movement. The late and revered Rabbi Schneerson is often a referred to as the Rebbe. Samuels holds his14-month-old son, r Schneur. Above, Samuels is assisted by his father-in-law, Rabbi mMoshe Smith of Brooklyn, left, during Purim services In March in i the Hopmeadow Street synagogue. n g t o n
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but not before Samuels asked, "Mitchell, I don't like to eat alone. Would you come for Shabbos lunch tomorrow?" "What time should I come?" said Glick. "About 10 a.m.," Samuels said. Glick came. Samuels did the Saturday morning service with Glick and then they ate lunch. To nd more Clicks, Samuels turned to the nevtspaper's weekly listing of home sales, scanning for Jewish names, sending them welcome packages. He scoured the telephone directory like a detective and made calls. Once, unaware, he contacted, the president of the only other synagogue in Simsbury, a Reform temple, and word spread for a time that the new Chabad rabbi was stealing members. Slowly, over weeks and months, couples and their kids began hanging out at the Samuels' house Friday nights and Saturday afternoons, adults schmoozing one moment, engaged in challenging spiritual discussions the next, children running about. A Hebrew school for children was started, with Samuels and Blumie teaching. Samuels offered Jewish education classes, led services
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Rabbi Samuels, center, prepares to read from the Torah during a Purim service in March. Joining him, from left, are Bruce Friedland of Simsbury, Rabbi Moshe Smith, Samuel? father-in-law, and Rick Blum of Burlington. They wear talit, or prayer shawls, and telin, a leather pouch bound to their heads and arms, containing scrolls of Torah passages.

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and counseled couples going through marital difculties, other adults coping with the loss of parents or jobs. He met with teenagers grappling with drug problems. In sheer numbers, Chabad of the Valley was never going to be confused with the phenomenon of megachurches or even the draw of the few large Reform and Conservative synagogues in nearby West Hartford, each with more than 1,000 families as members. But gradually, rst to the 20 or soregulars and now the 100 or so, the Hasidic rabbi and his brand of Judaism was becoming a subtle force in the lives of Jews who never would have dreamed they'd be going to a Chabad House. (The word is a Hebrew acronym for wisdom, comprehension and knowledge.)

Chabad's presence was not new. W The state's rst Chabad House i t h i n H a r t f o r d ' s J e w i s The rabbi hosts "Talmud and Pastrami," a night of food, fellowship and teaching. Joining him from left h are George Haas, Dr. Brad Newman, Dan Novarr and Andy Lieberman. c o is outreach, and so, like Chabad of the Valopened in West Hartford in 1977, when m Rabbi Joseph Gopin (always dressed in ley, many of its followers are far from observm wide-rimmed black hat, black suit and long ant. I f they're thinking about becoming beard) and his wife, Miriam, rented an u more religious, they often remain skeptical, n apartment off Farmington Avertue. Rabbi bouncing between two worlds. iGopin used his kitchen as his ofce. Three Chabad of the Valley's opening was signifyears later, Gopin bought a small house on t icant. The Farmington Valley had become Farmington Avenue as his shit& and eight the fastest-growing region of Greater Harty years later he raised enough money, largely ford's Jewish community, climbing from 10 , through the donations of afuent local Jewpercent to 17 percent of the Jewish populaish businessmen, to build a synagogue on tion between 1982 and 2000, according to a Albany Avenue. 2000 study. (Jewish residents comprise In 1995, a satellite Chabad center was about 4 percent of Hartford County's populaunched in New London. Two years later lation, or about 32,000 people.) Gopin's Chabad House in West Hartford, the heart another opened in Litcheld; two years after that, Samuels arrived in the Farmingof the region's Jewish life, made sense. But ton Valley, then another opened in Glastonstarting a Chabad House in Simsbury "Who would come?: several members of bury. Last winter, the latest Chabad House Chabacfs West Hartford board of directors opened at the University of Connecticut in Storrs. 'there are more than a dozen Chabad argued. houses in the state, according to the Chabad 'The Jews living in Simsbury are living website. In Jewish religious circles, it bethere to escape from Yiddisitheit," Alec Bobrow, a West Hartford resident and former came a phenomenon not unlike Starbucks.

Instead of coffee and pastry, they served ka&intik, or Jewish mysticism and Talmud and Hebrew classes, all under the rubric of a fundamental Judaism that existed in Russia and Eastern Europe 250 years ago. (Lubavitch is the name of a Russian town where the movement was based for more than a century.) Chabad today is international in scope with outposts dotting the world map from Israel to Russia, the U.S. to Katmandu, the result of the late Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson (often referred t o as "the Rebbe"), who, in the wake of the Holocaust and what he sawas a threat from secular society, began sending emissaries, or shliehitn, to rekindle the spark of Jewish life. At last count, more than 4,000 shtichint were running 3,300 Chabad centers around the world, and its website, www.chabad.org, is often considered the most comprehensive among all Jewish movements Though rooted in Orthodox Judaism, Chabad's mission

Chabad board member told Gopin, using the Yiddish term to connote an emotional attachment to the Jewish lifestyle. These were mostly successful, assimilated, secular Jews, said Bobrow. Gopin, knowing what the Rebbe, who died in 1994, would say, shot back: "That's exactly why we need Chabad there, to wake them up." Initially, Samuels had arrived from Brooklyn as a new rabbi for Gopin, whose center was offering classes and prayer services, lectures and dinners something virtually every day and night of the week. But Samuels couldn't nd an affordable house to rent within walking distance of Chabad a key requirement for observant Jews who never drive on the Sabbath or Jewish holidays. 'What about Simsbury?" Gopin said to, Samuels. 'What, are you kidding?" replied Samuels, whose cadence and wit is like comedian Jackie Mason without the insults. Gopin persisted. Samuels looked for houses to rent and found one, which included a basement he could useas asynagogue. A new Chabad Housewas born.

Chabad headquarters at 770 Eastern B Parkway, Samuels' family moved when o was barely a toddler to Miami, then to Sehe attle r and later to N Illwatikee, all because his n parents were Chabad emissaries. When he was 9, a few years ahead of schedule, his i parents sent him to begin serious study of n the C Torah and the Talmud at a yeshiva, or academy in Detroit. At 16, alsoa little ahead r of schedule, he went to the Rabbinical Colo lege of America in Morristown, NJ., where w his n grandfather, like his father, also was a rabbi, and was dean of the school. By the H time Samuels arrived in Simsbury, he had e spent two years in Caracas, Venezuela, in i effect as a rabbinic intern, then sold goods g in Manhattan for almost seven years beh cause he wanted to make some money bet fore working as a rabbi. He found little s meaning in the work, never made the kind of , money he had hoped for and nally realized n time had come to fulll his destiny. the o A month after Samuels moved to Simst bury, he began planning his rst big event f a Purim party, commemorating a mirac a ulous turn of events in ancient Persia (modr em-day Iraq) that saved the Jews from annihilation. In Chabad circles, it is one of the f r rowdiest holidays, with vodka and other drinks owing freely. Samuels was sure his o Bob m White Way house would be too small, so he rented the cafeteria at Henry James School. Five people showed up, two of whom were his in-laws. Samuels didn't despair about the future of his mission, even as most of the people he met explained that they were not religious, and, with all due respect, Chabad was probably the last place they would go for religion. It was too strict for their lifestyles, all this

keeping kosher, not driving on the Sabbath, too fanatical. It treated women as secondclass citizens. Its Hebrew prayer services were too confusing. In short, it was out of touch with the modern world. Yet gradually those who came discovered quite the opposite. Although women, many from high-powered corporate settings, may have initially questioned what at best looked like "separate-but-equal" status, most who stayed bought into the 'whole package. I f they lived a good part of their lives in a postfeminist world where virtually limitless possibilities were open to them, they came to terms with the idea that other mind-sets, at least in their newly adopted religious world, might also be valid. Like other women, Rita Brownstein, a former magazine art director, for instance, came to appreciate teachings from Samuels who maintained that, according to Torah, women were actually on a higher spiritual plane than men. They found comfort in sitting among other women during services, the better, another woman said, to focus on why they were there: to pray to God. And they began to drop feelings of being slighted when Samuels would not shake their hands after he explained that it was out of respect. "It's for the same reason I wouldn't shake the Queen's hand or why I never shook the Lubavitcher Rebbe's hand," says Samuels. In fact, he says, 'We believe that women are at the very epicenter of Judaism." Samuels soon grew ensconced in the Farmington Valley. Everywhere he went, and he was hard to miss wearing his widebrimmed black hat and black suit, Samuels' charm, wit, intellect and nonjudgmental style disarmed Jewish residents.

his gums; he had not seen a dentist in 0 20 Sunday, Sarnuelsbeen referred to ne years. He had awoke with pain in Bruce Komarow, an Avon dentist, but Komarow was playing golf. "I prayed to God," recalled Samuels, "and I don't know what, but it started to rain," which forced Komarow home, where he got the rabbi's message and saw him that day. Komarow was shocked at the condition of Samuels' teeth and gums, but, more to the point, Samuels exacteda deal: He promised to see the dentist regularly, and Komarow would visit shut more than once every 20 years. By autumn 1998, 80 people attended Rosh Hashana services for the Jewish New Year, held at the same elementary school where only ve people had shown up for the Purim party. Some came because, unlike most synagogues that require paid-up annual membership dues to attend Rosh Hashana services, Chabad's services are free. Others camebecause through the grapevine they'd heard about Samuels, "a real character," and yes, it I'as Chabad, but there was something about the rabbi and the atmosphere that made it, well, "different." There was at once an air of informality and serious-

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ncss about his services. Congregants would raise their hands when confused, shouting out, "Rabbi, I don't understand this prayer." And Samuels would stop and explain, extrapolating from ancient Jewish texts until his unlikely ock got it. I le would joke during services and, the way PBS announces its sponsors, he wouldn't hesitate to urge congregants to support each other's businesses. "Remember," hesays often in the middle of services, referring to Andy Lieberman, a 43year-old marketing director for the auto service company, Valvoline Inc., "they put the tube in Lubavitch." By the end of his rst year in town, it was clear the 20 or so families regularly attending were outgrowing the rabbi's basement. Even the pitchitza, separating men from women during worship services, symbolically cried low-rent. Instead of a nicely designed wood panel extending the length of the room, they used a shower curtain. To Valley Jews, who believed they knew how to spot success, the basement synagogue just wasn't cutting it. "People weren't coming back," said one member. Then, as Samuels and even some of his most ardent skeptics tell it, a miracle occurred. Samuels had been eyeing a building on Hopmeadow Street not far from Route 44, a main artery in the Farmington Valley, but it was too expensive. One day Samuels heard that the building had suddenly become available and at a much lower price. Samuels and Gopin scurried to raise enough money from donors for a down payment. But on the day of the closing, March 31, 1999, Samuels was still $20,000 short. By mid-day, he was $10,000 short. He and Gopin worked the phones frantically; if they could not raise the balance by the end of the business day, they would lose the building. Their lawyer, Jeff Tager, a member of the congregation, was dumbfounded as he watched the day unfold, reach a fever pitch and end in a schnapps toast in his ofce. The following Shabbos, Tager, a burly' man who has long described himself as "barely Jewish," walked into his new synagogue with tears in his eyes. t's an amazing place," says Orit Tager, 45, an MCI marketing manager who 6 I was named for the Hebrew word during Hanukkah. The daughter of a Holol caust survivor, she was raised in Miami i Beach and attended an Orthodox Jewish g day school. Yet except for the kosher h kitchen Orit maintains (a link to her mother, t shesays),she stopped living her life accord, ing to traditional Jewish practices years ago. " That is gradually changing. s "If you had said we'd be going to shui and i the rabbi's house every Friday night for dinn ner, I'd say you'd be nuts," she said over cofc e s h e w a s b o r n i n D e c e m b e r

fee in her kitchen one night. Indeed, many of her friends are learning that she won't go to a restaurant or to the movies on Friday nights anymore. The same holds for the Tagers' 16-year-old son, Adam, a sophomore at Simsbury High School, who takes it for granted that he won't make plans with his mostly non-Jewish friends on Friday nights. And Orit, who routinely used her Saturdays as catch-up days for laundry, errands and shopping, now avoids such "work," choosing to follow the mitzvah, or commandment, to set aside the day to rest. Instead, she'll often spend the afternoon at the rabbi'Shouse, schmoozing with him, Blumie and other Chabad friends. Friends like the Brownsteins, who lived on the Upper East Side of Manhattan until they had kids and moved to Connecticut. 'They were proud of being Jewish, but they

tional and mystical Judaism. 'Thursday nights would blow me away," said Salzberg, who found shewas spiritually moving from liberal or Reform Judaism. "It completely spoke to me. I walked on air. I would come home to my husband excited about what I'd learned." Adults weren't the only ones affected by Chabad's move into the Farmington Valley. Newman's daughter, Allison, a student at Avon High School, transferred last year to Beis Chana Academy, an all-girl's Lubavitch school in New Haven. Sam Lieberman, 9, pushed his parents, Lauren and Andy, to start keeping kosher. It started last summer when the Liebermans enrolled Sam in a regional Chabadrun summer day camp at Camp Can Israel One day Samasked: "Can we keep kosher?" Lauren, who grew up a Reform Jew in %V est

Likem n babyb o esparticularlythosewhohadtasted ay o m r, alevelofprofessionals c e stheyhaddiscoveredthatsomething uc s, w smissingfromtheirlives.Andw e theyrealizedthat,their a hn souls,althoughtheym ynoth v articulated it thatw yearlyon, a ae a b g ntorespondtowhatS m e w steaching. ea a ul a s
were far from practicing Jews. Rita, 52, the former magazine art director, and Michael, 57, a physical therapist who grew up in Hartford, used to love Yom Kippur, the most solemn day of the Jewish year, because it was the day they could get on the tennis courts. Now Michael won't drive on Shahhas. He also won't eat out unless the restaurant is kosher, a rarity around Simsbury. He wears tzizit, or fringes, at the bottom corners of his shirts as a reminder of the Torah's commandments. "Our social life took a huge hit," observes Rita, who's not nearly as observant and has taken to meeting her friends for lunch to ll her need to dine out. The Brownsteins' neighbor Beth Salzberg, 49, like Michael, also has become shomer Shabbos, meaning sheobserves the Sabbath laws, and will only walk, not drive, when attending services* (Other Chabad members, like Rick Blum of Burlington and Pamela Newman of Avon, live too far to walk, so they either miss services or arrange to stay close to Chabad over the Sabbath.) Like many of Samuels' followers who have become more observant, Salzberg's journey was gradual. A Brooklyn, N.Y., native and former non-practicing Jew, Beth had enrolled in an adult bat mitzvah class at the local Reform synagogue (Farmington Valley Jewish Congregation-Emek Shalom) where her family belonged, a few years before Samuels had arrived. About the same time, she met with seven or eight women every other Thursday night at Rita Brownstein's home, where a Chabad rabbi from West Hartford was teaching them about tradiHartford, couldn't think of a reason to say no. After all, she reasoned, there were worse things a kid could ask for and the nearby Big Y supermarket in Avon now stocked kosher meats and lots of other kosher products, thanks in part to Samuels. The next day, she emptied her refrigerator and cupboards of all non-kosher foods and began for the rst time in her life the process of following Jewish dietary laws.

these lifestyle and belief-system shifts, O the question for friends of the Lieberf mans and Salzbergs and Tagers and Brownc steins, their Christian friends and especially their Jewish friends, was what gives? What o was attracting these otherwise secular Jews u to a life shaped increasingly by observance r to asystem of rules they had never accepted s before? e , The short answer is that a mix of factors were at play: Like many baby boomers, part ticularly those who had tasted a level of proh fessionalsuccess, they had discovered that e something was missing from their lives. And u when they realized that, their souls, aln though they may not have articulated it that d way early on, began to respond to what e Samuels was teaching. But it was more than r that. l Some actually belonged to synagogues, y Reform and Conservative, but somehow i that brand of mainstream Judaism hadn't n fullled them spiritually. ("It was like the g synagoguewas where you went for religion, q compartmentalized from the rest of your u e s t i o n a b o u t

life," said Salzberg.) What was attracting them to Chabad was the idea that religious practice could actually be meaningful, and that it could infuse every moment of their lives. The rabbi himself would say he was available 24/7, his cellphone with him always, except for Shabbos and other Jewish holidays when its usewas prohibited. Equally important, many found a sense of community within Chabad that had eluded them when they moved to the Farmington Valley. ("You'll never confuse this street with a neighborhood," Andy Lieberman said one Sunday afternoon on his backyard patio. You could hear a brook gurgling and see the evergreen trees separating their yard from that of neighbors they had yet to meet.) But within Chabad of the Valley, families cook meals and look in on each other when someone has surgery, and teenagers babysit for younger kids. "It's like 'A Prairie Home Companion'," said Andy. There is yet another, equally abstract but vital element that may be at work. "It's a kind of belief that these folks are doing the real thing and that this is a kind of authentic Judaism that will last," said Mark Silk, director of Trinity College's Center for the Study of Religion in Public Life. As a result, he said, Chabad has people who support the organization with money who don't actually attend services or programs, but rather do so because they believe in the project of Jewish continuity. Chabad also draws because it is often seen as different from any of the other movements of Judaism, exotic even, observed Richard Freund, director of the Center for Judaic Studies at the University of Hartford. 'The goals are always to lead people to practice more and more religiously," said Freund, who teaches about Chabad and Hasidism in his lectures on Jewish mysticism and modern popular religious movements. "Since this work is so personalized, often unafliated Jews respond in ways that traditional modem Reform-ConservativeOrthodox synagogues with more formal structures cannot respond adequately to."

Simsbury would seem a contradiction, A until you realize that Chabad's mission ts to attract the disaffected, non-practicing i f less observant Jews and show them how or i much their religion has to offer. r Samuels offers classes for women and another for men, every Tuesday night, called s Talmud and Pastrami. "It's like a poker t game without the cards," one frequent b member explained. The rabbi supplies a l platter of kosher deli meats, rolls, chips and u soda for the 6:30 p.m. start. The men s often a dozen or so, sometimes fewer h banter with the rabbi about current events. , t 54 h e l i f e o f a H a s i d i c r a b b i i n

As leader of Chabad of the Valley, Rabbi Samuels regularly visits area nursing homes. In March he was joined by his son, Srull,11, at Arden Courts of Avon, an Alzheimer's assisted-living facility, where Samuels entertained residents with a funny story. Outreach is part of the Chabad mission.

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Tiger Woods winning the Masters one week, Tern Schiavo, Michael Jackson, basketball. Then for 30 or 40 minutes, it's the rabbi's turn, as he pulls lessons from the Talmud or from the Rebbe. One night the topic is about when it's permissible under Jewish law to lie: often to avoid hurting someone's feelings or to preserve peace within your household. But, Samuels points out, it's a slippery slope. To follow Samuels for a day is to observe the often-subtle ways he touches people's lives. On this day in late March, it is Purim, his eighth in Simsbury. Last night's party drew 80 people. (Last year's Rosh Hashana service drew nearly 200 people) This morning's Purim service on a Friday at 6:30 only 'attracts 16, including ve teenagers. By 8:30, he is in his car, a worn 1997 Taurus sedan, stopping at the Big Y to shop for his wife and their ve children two more, also boys, were born since they moved to town a n d the unknown number of guests they will host over Shabbos. His cellphone rings regularly. The rst call is from Mark Butler, a US Airways pilot, and congregant. "So what's going on? Are we going to see you on Shabbos, God willing?" Samuels says. Butler tells him how he's standing his ground at the airline. They want him to y on Saturday, but he's told them he will not work o r y on the Sabbath. "God bless you," Samuels says. "I'm proud of you, Mark." Back home to deliver the groceries, the house is a hubbub of activity. Blumie is twisting bread dough for challah with the speed of a pizza maker. The rabbi eats a quick bite of scrambled eggs Blumie has whipped up, before which he quickly pours water over his hands and says a prayer, after which he recites another set of prayers of gratitude for the sustenance. Blumie is up at 7, bathing and dressing her boys and driving all but her toddler to Hebrew Academy, an Orthodox school in Bloomeld. If she's not running errands for her household or for Chabad, she's cleaning or preparing for the next meal, and not always for her family. When other families in the Chabad community facea death or celebrate a birth, Blumie cooks or arranges for food to be supplied to those families for the week. She teaches Hebrew at Chabad Tuesday afternoons and Sundays. By Wednesday night she's already baking for Shahhos Her major shopping is Thursday before she begins cooking enough for all who will descend on her household Friday evening and all day Saturday. She laughs at the suggestion that she might feel isolated in the suburbs, largely because she and her husband have surrounded themselves with new friends in the community they've created.

."A quiet Shabbos, if no one came, would be boring," she said. Although Blumie hardly rests on the Sabbath, an ironic fact of life for a rabbi and his spouse, she holds dear one moment every week as her own. It's when she lights the Shabbos candles before sunset each Friday, when, according to tradition, the heavens open up to women. "That's my time with Ha-Shetn," she said, using a Hebrew euphemism for God [it literally means the Namel. In those quiet moments, her eyes closed, candles shimmering, sheasks that her family remain healthy, that those she knows who are ill recover speedily and then she reects on her week. For her, for those few moments, time is suspended. Back in her kitchen that Purim day, Blumie's husband dashes back to his car after eating. At a nursing home, he tells 24 Alzheimer patients about Purim and sings a few songs. Told later that only three of the patients are Jewish, he says he knew that, but it doesn't matter. "For one, I would come," he said. Back in his car, he talks about his challenges. "Religion is a scary thing, especially if it means changing [your] lifestyle. At the holiday season, I get calls from Jewish parents alarmed that their kids had to sing 'Jingle Bells' in school. In all my years, no one left Judaism because they sing 'Jingle Bells,' but thousands leave Judaism because the parents don't give their kids a Jewish education or provide a Jewish lifestyle, a Jewish identity." At Yachad, a Greater Hartford Jewish community high school, where teens go one night a week for about two hours of Judaic studies, Samuels teaches a class. He begins each year by making a deal with his students. If they can answer two questions correctly, he'll suspend serious study for the semester and devote the class to fun and games. The teenagers are all for it. "Who can tell me who Jesus' mother was?" heasks. The question is too easy. They are halfway toward coasting through the semester. Ninety-nine percent of the students know the answer is Mary, and they're feeling good about their chances of acing the next question: "Now, who can tell me who Moses' mother was?" Usually, said Samuels, no one can answer him, and these are all students who went through Hebrew school, some of whom studied at Solomon Schechter Day School, a Conservative movement-led school, which offers a dual curriculum of Judaic and general studies. "It's shocking," he said of the ignorance.

Blumie Samuels, the rabbi's wife, holds her youngest son as she prepares her table in March for the weekly Sabbath dinner.

Rabbi Samuels explains to his disappointed 5-year-old. Levi, why he cannot join him for Sabbath services and must stay home with his mother.

dispelling myths about the Judaism he I practices and reigniting the religion f among non-practicing Jews, his other, like S a m u e l s ' m a j o r c h a l l e n g e c e n t e r s o n

that of many spiritual leaders, is nancial. Because paying dues could deter some from joining Chabad, rabbis must ask for donations. "I'm not a good fundraiser. That's not who I am. My personality is that of a very American polite boy," he says. Which has meant that, despite spiritual success stories, raising the nearly $200,000 annual budget to run Chabad of the Valley remains a struggle even in a region ush with wealth. Checks have bounced and many times, utility companies have turned off Chabad's lights, heat and telephone service. Even at Samuels' home, his lights have gone off and the oil tank has run dry. Despite his often-desperate state of fundraising, Samuels believes a larger building may ultimately provide a solution to those woes. It would allow him to open a Jewish child-care center, something he claims the Farmington Valley would easily support and which would go a long way toward funding Chabad's programs and operating costs. Then, he said, he could concentrate on the job he was meant to do, the job he says the Rebbe taught him and all the other emissaries around the world to do: "going out and helping other Jews come closer to God." In an age where anything goes and everything is possible, whereagrowing number of modernJews along with their Christian. Islamic and even secular brethren are reacting to what Indian novelist Arundhati Roy calls "the Styrofoamization of civilization," Cha-

bad represents a value system that is not ethically relative and that attempts to address a need for some sort of connection to the sacred. And yet, judging by those walking through Rabbi Samuels' doors in Simsbury, this is not aJewish version of Christian fundamentalism, even though Chabad begins with the premise that the Torah came from Mount Sinai, that everything ows from that point and that the laws received therein are commanded by God. Rather it says,come at whatever rung on the spiritual ladder you are, do what you can.

now II, will leave home and begin yesh5 oon, Samuels said,York. Samuels,Sruli, iva study in New his oldest son, now 34, and Bionic, celebrated their 13th anniversary in June. At home late at night, surrounded by bookshelves full of texts mostly in I lebrew or Yiddish, and paintings of the last Rebbe, Samuels collapses anytime between II p.m. and I a.m. He usually wakes about 2 in the morning and reads until he falls asleep again about 4. He's up for good by 5:30 because, as he begins a new day in his new homeland, "There's always something to do." D
Leonard Felson, a former Courant reporter, is a Hartford-basedfeelance writer. His work has appeared in The New York Times, The Boston Globe and The Jerusalem Report magazine.

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