Fourteen years ago, Rabbi Gavriel and Rivkah Holtzberg, directors of Chabad-Lubavitch of Mumbai, were killed during a horrific terrorist attack. In the year following the tragedy, it was a hakhel year, traditionally when all the Jews would go to Jerusalem to hear the Jewish king read the Torah.
In light of the tragedy, and the following hakhel year, Rabbi Moshe Levin of Bais Bezalel Chabad in Pico-Robertson started a new project to spread light and Jewish teachings around the world.
He created One Minute Daily Torah Thought, a robocall that people could receive and hear the rabbi teaching Torah for a minute. That morphed into a podcast that listeners from all over the globe tune into every day.
“My listeners will call me and ask me for advice,” said Levin. “I feel very close to them.”
The rabbi tries to fill every moment of his day doing mitzvot, and he makes Torah teachings as digestible for people as possible. He wants to ensure it’s easy for other Jews to perform mitzvot as well.
He starts his days teaching a class in Hasidic philosophy to his congregants and students.
“I wouldn’t miss that for anything,” he said. “That gives me my inspiration.”
After the morning prayers, he carpools his kids, and then he teaches Torah to students who don’t go to Jewish schools. During the lockdowns, a lot of public school kids were home, and their parents were looking for something for their children to do in between Zoom classes. Students would go to Bais Bezalel, take their classes on their laptops and learn Jewish heritage in between their lessons.
“Parents thought this was very special,” Levin said. “They never thought Jewish school was an option for their children.”
Levin also spent the pandemic starting the Jewish Family Library of Los Angeles at the shul, which provides books to Jewish children of all different backgrounds. He is usually on-site to help families in between arranging food for people in need and putting tefillin on Jewish men and boys throughout Los Angeles. His philosophy – and the Chabad philosophy in general – is that doing just one mitzvah can be transformative.
“Years ago, I met a man at the Grove when I was giving out menorahs,” he said. “He told me he didn’t want a menorah because he knew that one mitzvah would lead to another. He said, ‘I know where this is going.’”
More recently, a friend of the rabbi made a business deal with another man, and as part of the deal, the man would have to put on tefillin three times with Levin.
The man had no interest in doing this, but once he started, he wanted to keep on going.
“He said, ‘I don’t know why. I cannot explain it, but I don’t want to stop,’” Levin said. “We have an inborn connection to God. Everyone has that yearning to learn about their Judaism and discover their personal connection to God.”
Levin comes from a legacy Chabad family. His great-grandfather, who would pray four hours a day, was incarcerated for teaching Torah in Soviet Russia.
The previous Lubavitcher Rebbe, Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn, sent Levin’s grandfather to serve the Worcester, Mass. Jewish community. He worked there for over 70 years.
“There was nothing going on there before he came,” said Levin. “He did everything from scratch. He built a day school, a mikvah and a high school for girls. He was really an inspiration to me.”
Levin grew up in Worcester, and decided to follow in his grandfather’s footsteps. Nineteen years ago, he moved to Los Angeles to teach at Yeshiva Ohr Elchonon Chabad, but realized that teaching on a full-time basis was not for him. When the previous rabbi of Bais Bezalel, Rabbi Binyomin Lisbon, was leaving to focus on his career in kashrus, he asked Levin to take over.
No matter what Levin is doing in his day-to-day activities – whether it’s helping students learn about Judaism, wrapping tefillin on men, recording his podcast or teaching his class – he knows his role is to keep igniting Jewish souls.
“We just need to provide a match so every person’s fire can rise on its own.”
“The fifth Chabad Rebbe, Rabbi Sholom Dovber Schneersohn, once said that every Jew is meant to be a lamp lighter,” Levin explained. “We have to kindle each other’s souls and create a fire in another person. The fire is there. We just need to provide a match so every person’s fire can rise on its own.”
Fast Takes with Moshe Levin
Jewish Journal: What is your favorite food to eat during the High Holidays?
Moshe Levin: Whatever my wife makes. She puts love into it. It doesn’t matter what it is.
JJ: If you weren’t a rabbi, what would you be doing for work?
ML: I don’t think the word “rabbi” has a one-size-fits-all translation. Whether I’d be in a congregation with a community or not, the role of being a Jew who inspires another Jew is the role of every person in our entire generation. It’s not unique to being a rabbi. Every soul is empowered to inspire other souls.
JJ: What is your favorite thing about Sukkot?
ML: After Yom Kippur, when God cleanses the soul, you have a new kind of attachment to God. While in the sukkah, we experience God’s love. I like being in that holy space. It’s very meaningful.
