H eadlines
Synagogues Close to Finding New Rabbis
L OCA L
JARRAD SAFFREN | JE STAFF
TWO AREA SYNAGOGUES
— Temple Beth Hillel-
Beth El in Wynnewood and
Congregation Beth El in
Voorhees, New Jersey — have
reached the final stage of their
searches for new rabbis.

Both Conservative congre-
gations will welcome their
final candidates for Sabbath
weekends in January. The
prospective rabbis will mingle
with congregants, look at the
temple’s religious schools,
attend services and deliver
sermons. To be fair to the
candidates, synagogue leaders
did not want to mention their
names. Rabbi Neil Cooper, 68, is
retiring from Temple Beth
Hillel-Beth El in June after
three decades as synagogue
leader. Rabbi Aaron Krupnick,
60, is stepping down in the
summer after 27 years of
guiding Congregation Beth El.

Regarding their decisions
to retire, both men pretty
much said what Cooper said in
August: “It’s time.” Krupnick
further explained that, at 60,
he didn’t feel like he could see
the future of Judaism like he
could in his 30s.

“Jewish life needs to evolve,”
Krupnick said then.

According to Beth Hillel-
Beth El President Barbara
Bookman, one of the challenges
moving forward is figuring
out the new, post-pandemic
normal. How
much does
a synagogue do in person versus
over Zoom? Also, how much
of its programming can be a
combination of the two?
These are questions that will
help drive Jewish life in the
next generation of rabbinical
leaders. “Things are different. We’ve
had a Zoom minyan where
that’s been very successful,”
6 JANUARY 6, 2022
Congregation Beth El in Voorhees, New Jersey
Courtesy of Congregation Beth El
Bookman said. “I’m not sure if
it’s going to be as easy for the
morning minyan to get people
to come back in person, instead
of over Zoom.”
Stuart Sauer, the president
of Beth El, echoed a similar
theme. During the pandemic, the
Voorhees temple used virtual
services and programs to
remain accessible to congre-
gants who had moved to
Florida or the Jersey shore.

Based on that success,
synagogue leaders see Zoom
as a part of Beth El’s future.

Every rabbi they inter-
viewed, over Zoom, naturally,
agreed. “All the candidates felt as
though Zoom was going to be a
major part of spiritual services
for the foreseeable future,”
Sauer said.

One rabbinical candidate
visited Beth Hillel-Beth El in
December. The other two final-
ists are coming in January.

Beth El also is using the first
month of the new year for the
final step in its search process.

At both places, the candi-
dates who made it this far
showed a combination of
old- and new-school priori-
ties, according to synagogue
leaders. “Relationships
and building relationships were
really important,” Bookman
said. “Getting to know people
and families.”
But Bookman said that
rabbis expressed unique ideas
she hadn’t heard before, like
forming groups around congre-
gant interests and study groups
that grew because they focused
on whatever the groups were
interested in.

No matter how unique
those ideas were, though, they
still came back to the oldest
and most important rabbinical
priority: listening to people.

Sauer said that, during
Beth El’s interview process, he
looked for that quality more
than any other.

Tone of voice, mannerisms,
eye contact with the camera,
direct answers to questions.

“We asked a question, and
we got an answer,” he said.

Sauer explained
that synagogues are still relevant
because people depend on them
for baby namings, bar and bat
mitzvahs, weddings and funerals
— the big life cycle events.

In many cases, Jewish
people talk to their rabbis
about more intimate subjects
than they do to their friends.

Therefore, without the ability
JEWISH EXPONENT
to listen well, no candidate can
move on to the final round.

“You want them to have a
connection with you,” Sauer
said. In 2022 and beyond,
building a connection also
means bringing people and,
in particular, younger families
back to the synagogue. Not just
virtually, but in person, too.

Sauer wants his new rabbi
to offer young parents the
democratic and transparent
qualities that younger genera-
tions value. He said they have
to feel not just like part of the
synagogue, but like part of the
process of building social and
educational programming, too.

“The growth of the
synagogue is dependent on
young families coming in,”
he said.

While that’s true, both Beth
Hillel-Beth El and Beth El are
in good shape at the moment.

Beth Hillel-Beth El has about
700 families in its congrega-
tion; Beth El has roughly 825.

The synagogue leaders hope
to complete their searches by
February and begin the transi-
tion process that will culminate
in the summer.

“We’re optimistic,” Sauer
said. l
jsaffren@jewishexponent.com; 215-832-0740
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM



H eadlines
Cantor, Musician Paul Frimark Dies at 69
OB ITUARY
JARRAD SAFFREN | JE STAFF
FORMER OHEV SHALOM
of Bucks County cantor and
Jewish musician Paul Frimark
died at his Langhorne home on
Dec. 24. He was 69.

Frimark died from large
B-cell lymphoma.

The Bucks County resident
served as cantor of Ohev Shalom
for 18 years but played in Jewish
bands for longer than that. His
groups, N’shamah and Shir
Chadash, performed thousands
of times between 1971 and 1998,
according to a bandmate.

Frimark also was a devoted
family man, leaving behind
a wife of 39 years, Arlene
Frimark, and two daughters,
stepdaughter Kim Whitman
and Bara Frimark. People who
knew Frimark repeated the
same theme about him. When
someone dies, it’s easy to forget
all of their negative character-
istics. But with Frimark, there
truly weren’t any to harp on.

“He was a first-class mensch.

What you saw was what you
got,” Ohev Shalom Rabbi Eliott
Perlstein said. “He liked people.”
In the 1970s and ’80s,
Frimark worked day jobs as
an accountant, including as
a controller for the Jewish
Exponent at one point. But at
night, he would lead his band
around the region for gigs.

Frimark was a singer and
keyboard player. He could both
hear music and then play it
back and read music.

The future cantor, though,
didn’t just focus on the tunes.

He served as band manager,
booking agent and, as his friend
and bandmate David Seltzer put
it, “schlepper,” meaning he lugged
the equipment around, too.

Through hustle and energy,
N’shamah and then Shir
Chadash grew into “the preem-
inent Jewish simcha band” in
the Philadelphia area, according
to drummer Fred Z. Poritsky.

The group played annually
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM at the Soviet Jewry Rally at the
Philadelphia Museum of Art
and at the Israel Independence
Day parade on Independence
Mall. It also performed at
weddings, b’nai mitzvahs and
other Jewish celebrations.

By the end of its run, the
band was traveling as far north
as Massachusetts and as far
south as Virginia.

Yet through it all, despite
the extra work he did, Frimark
insisted that band members
take the same cut for their gigs.

“He was just completely
selfless,” said Seltzer, who lives
in Huntington Valley. “He
could handle a multitude of
tasks and personalities with a
great deal of grace.”
Despite his band’s success,
though, Frimark suffered
from a midlife crisis about not
fulfilling his childhood dream
of becoming a cantor.

Already an Ohev Shalom
member in the early 1990s, he
was a regular part of a men’s
group meeting with Perlstein.

One night, the rabbi asked the
men what dreams they had.

“Paul said to become a
cantor,” Perlstein recalled.

At the time, Frimark’s
musical ability made him quali-
fied enough to fill in as cantor
whenever Ohev Shalom needed
someone. But Perlstein never
knew the desire ran so deep.

“We had never had a conver-
sation where he told me he
wanted to become a synagogue
cantor,” the rabbi said.

Just months later, Ohev
Shalom’s cantor left, and
Perlstein asked Frimark to
fill in on an interim basis. He
already knew all the Shabbat,
holiday and High Holy Day
melodies and thrived in the
new role.

After a few months, Ohev brass
made the no-brainer decision to
bring Frimark on full-time.

From 1993 to 2011, he
helped Perlstein lead services;
he helped kids become bar or
Cantor Paul Frimark helps a bat mitvzah girl. 
Courtesy of Ohev Shalom of Bucks County
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JANUARY 6, 2022
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