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Rabbi
Arthur Schneier (right) with Leon
and Elsie Levy
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PARK
EAST SYNAGOGUE
Happy Birthday,
Rabbi Arthur Schneier
By
TIM BOXER
ENJAMIN NETANYAHU
was a surprise guest at the 110th anniversary dinner of
Park East Synagogue and70th birthday of its esteemed rabbi, Arthur
Schneier. Bibi said that when he was Israel’s UN ambassador,
one responsibility was to spend a lot of time in the synagogue. “I
chose my synagogue very carefully. I logged a lot of time at Park
East.”
Israel
Bonds president Gideon Patt
and wife Anne |
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Bibi recalled another Park East Synagogue dinner in the early ‘80s
when a member of the administration in Washington spoke. The
non-Jewish gentleman, reading from prepared notes, concluded,
“Arthur, yasher coach!”
The worthy gentleman must
have thought the congregation looked
like a baseball franchise.
The recent dinner at the
Waldorf-Astoria was an appropriate occasion to mark the beloved
rabbi’s 70th birthday. The tributes came from several
high-ranking dignitaries, including the Most Rev. Theodore
McCarrick, archbishop of Newark.
“To
be blessed,” the archbishop said, “you should count among your
friends a brilliant, lawyer, a skilled physician and a good priest.
Every congregation deserves the rabbi it gets. You must be a
wonderful congregation.”
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Revlon
Group president Bruce Slovin
and Holocaust author Fanya Heller
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Marc Feuerstein,
who just finished a film with Mel Gibson titled, What
Women Want, said he got his start in an amateur talent contest
at Park East. He had his bar mitzvah there and remains a devoted
member.
“Park East Synagogue,”
he said, “has fortified our Jewish existence. It holds a lot of
memories for me.”
Israel Meir Lau,
Israel’s chief rabbi, praised Schneier for being among the first
to fight for the right of Soviet Jews to emigrate.
“For Rabbi Schneier,”
Lau said, “’Let my people go’ was not just a slogan but became
a reality.”
Bishop
Dimitrios, director of
Ecumenical Affairs of the Greek
orthodox Achdiocese of America,
with Rabbi Arthur Schneier |
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Schneier took his activism
worldwide when he founded the Appeal of Conscience, an ecumenical
organization that seeks to preserve religious freedom on a global
scale.
Schneier’s son, Rabbi Marc
Schneier of the Hampton Synagogue, remembered fondly the daily
walks he used to take with his father in Central Park. His father, a
Holocaust survivor from Vienna, would often stop to watch the kids
play baseball.
“Hitler took away from my
father a normal childhood,” Marc said. “He knows nothing about
sports.”
One day Hank Greenberg
came to Park East and brought along Sid Luckman, the greatest
Jewish quarterback ever to play the game.
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Rabbi
Israel Meir Lau, chief rabbi of Israel,
with Rabbi Arthur Schneier and wife Elisabeth
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Rabbi Arthur Schneier and former Israeli
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
with Rep. Benjamin Gilman (center)
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The elder Schneier
announced proudly, “This Shabbat we’re honored to have with us
Sid Luckman, one of the greatest quarterbacks in baseball.”
“Actually,” Schneier
said, “I played soccer in Vienna until they put up signs ‘Juden
verboten.’
“Both my grandfathers
were consumed by the furnaces of the Shoah. Hashem tried me, tested
me. I came through the furnace and I never lost faith.”
As
a token of gratitude, synagogue president Michael Scharf
presented Schneier with his own personal Torah.
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