Unstoppable Father-Son Act

Washington Jewish Week

At the start of their careers, young Chabad rabbis and their wives typically set out for a wilderness to be tamed: a Jewish area lacking a Chabad presence. There they drive in their stakes and go to work. As they push back the frontier, other, younger couples arrive to continue the expansion. That’s what Chabad emissaries, or shlichim, do.

Then there’s Rabbi Sender Geisinsky. He grew up in Montgomery Country, where his parents, Rabbi Bentzion and Rebbetzin Zlata Geisinsky, had been dispatched as a young couple. In 2000, they left their work at the Chabad center in Potomac, to found Chabad of Bethesda-Chevy Chase.

On Rosh Hashanah, father turned over the keys to the synagogue to his son.

“Growing up, this was the only thing I could imagine doing,” says Sender Geisinsky, 29. “At 6, 7 years old, I already knew what I wanted to do.”

He now oversees the Bethesda-based center that offers worship services, a religious school, a camp and adult education. (A Kabbalah series is underway.) He says the nature of the community makes it especially ripe for expanding adult learning.

“This is a very educated area and while there may be some reservations about our traditional approach to Judaism, everybody wants to learn more,” he says.

“The potential for outreach is endless,” adds Bentzion Geisinsky, 53. “There are so many things that can be done here. We have singles, retirees, the intelligentsia. We have the ability to teach some of the more mystical and advanced Torah learning. It’s very exciting.”

Sender Geisinsky’s goal for the year is to set up an adult education center. “Anybody who has what to share will be considered a potential speaker or instructor,” he says.

“We’d like to get this going for the next new Jewish year.”

Adds Robert Hedaya, board president of Chabad of Bethesda-Chevy Chase, “As with a college, there will be a catalogue of all offerings for the year, which will range from Hebrew, Kabbalah, and Talmud classes to cooking classes. Individuals will be able to create for themselves a personalized curriculum … or enter a structured course of study.”

While his son runs the center, Bentzion Geisinsky has taken on an umbrella role, in which he will work to expand Chabad in his Bethesda-Chevy Chase territory, and eventually open a separate Chabad center in Chevy Chase.

“I will be introducing some communitywide activities, [including] a major seniors program for both Bethesda and Chevy Chase,” he says. He hopes to establish an institute of advanced Torah studies for women, to be called Machon Zlata.

And there will be fundraising. For that purpose, the current center and the one to be developed will do business under the name Mercaz Menachem Chabad, he says.

Chabad’s operations are different from that of most synagogues and religious organizations.

“Chabad is a unique entity. It’s a network,” Sender Geisinsky says. “And it’s rather ephemeral in how it will manifest itself in any given situation. It really depends on the couple, who arrives on the scene and takes stock of what’s needed.”

“Normally you want fresh young energy, young ambition,” Bentzion Geisinsky says. “Younger couples are in touch with their peers around the world – the new technology, the new fads that make it more attractive.”

Sender Geisinsky and his wife, Nechamie, have been on the staff of Chabad of Bethesda-Chevy Chase since 2008, as assistant rabbi and program director, respectively.

“In an area that’s rather sophisticated, it’s helpful to have a more seasoned hand,” Bentzion Geisinsky says.

Board member Michael Diamond says that’s important because a high percentage of Jews in the area are already affiliated with a synagogue.

“So the draw has to be that the Chabad center brings something new to the table. I believe the Geisinsky family brings a rare combination of gifts to benefit this particular community. As committed as they are to their traditional way of living, they are equally committed to being part of the greater world community.”

Diamond became involved with the center about four years ago, when he attended an adult class at the suggestion of a friend.

“I was fully expecting to be underwhelmed,” he says. “I got so much more than I bargained for.”

He began hosting a study group, then helped set up a morning minyan at work with Hedaya. “Then Reb Sender and I both lost our mothers a week apart [in 2010], so we basically went through the whole year of mourning together.”

Both Diamond and Hedaya credit the rabbis and their wives with introducing something important into their lives. The “secret sauce,” Hedaya says, is “warmth, joy, wholesomeness and acceptance.”