Jeanette Friedman

Jewish Standard: Jacob Benaroya Sephardic Center dedicated at Ahavath Torah

Apr 16

Jeanette Friedmanlocal stories/community No Comments

The Shul Within A Shul
by Jeanette Friedman

The chants of morning services led by Cantor Ya’akov Cohen filled the new Sephardic sanctuary at Cong. Ahavath Torah in Englewood on Sunday as congregants slowly filled the synagogue and the women’s balcony. They were coming to celebrate the dedication of the Benaroya Sephardic Center, a project that took root in a neighbor’s basement 27 years ago and came to full fruition last weekend.

Rabbi Shmuel Goldin, who presides over one community with four separate congregations under the Ahavath Torah roof, noted in his homily that the completion of the Sephardic Center and sanctuary also completes the vision of a diverse, yet unified, Jewish community.

Linda Benaroya, who greeted many of the women by name as they entered the ezrat nashim, the women’s section, said that “perhaps the best way to describe what we have here, multiple synagogues under one roof, is to call it a synaplex. We really appreciate our community’s uniqueness as a melting pot.” There had been some thought of building a separate Sephardic shul in another location, she said, but “Ahavath Torah had been our home, almost from the beginning, and we didn’t want to leave. This is a special place with beautiful, positive energy.”

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