Alexandria rabbi enjoys her new role at temple where her family has strong legacy

Rabbi Judy Caplan Ginsburgh is enjoying her role as the new spiritual leader of Congregation Gemiluth Chassodim in Alexandria. And she hopes she can be the rabbi here for a long, long time.

This Jewish temple is one of the oldest in Louisiana. Her family has a long legacy here. A legacy that is one of the reasons she became a rabbi.

“My great-grandfather was a member of this temple,” said Ginsburgh of the congregation founded in 1859 by Jews from the Alsace region of France and one of the original founding members of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, now known as they Union for Reform Judaism.

Her grandparents and parents were also members of this temple. And this is where she married her husband Bob.

“I had my wedding here almost 45 years ago,” said Ginsburgh who assumed the duties of the temple’s spiritual leader July 1.

As the spiritual leader of the temple, she does all life cycle events like births, deaths, weddings, services, worship and healing.

“Counseling to a point,” she added. “We're very well trained on when to send them to someone else.”

She is proud to say she grew up here in this temple that she loves. She knows a lot about the history and the family legacies. She loved Sunday school and she loved Rabbi Martin I. Hinchin who was her rabbi growing up.

“I loved studying about Jewish things,” she said. “I was the person at camp that only wanted to do the study stuff and not the camp stuff.”

Prior to becoming the rabbi here, she was the part-time rabbi at Temple B'Nai Israel in Monroe where was given her first real pulpit and gained a lot of experience. She and Bob lived in Alexandria while she traveled back and forth for eight years.

“I grew a lot there,” she said. “I learned a lot there. I know that I made a difference.”

Ginsburgh made a lot of friends that she talks with regularly and she plans to visit since they don’t have a rabbi yet.

“You can't just leave somewhere and forget about them,” she said. “They know I'm here for them if they need something. But my obligation is here now, at home.”

Ever since she became a rabbi, her goal was to be the rabbi of Congregation Gemiluth Chassodim.

“Because we had had two rabbis who had been here for over 30 years,” she said of Hinchin and Rabbi Arnold Task. “Rabbi Hinchin, who passed away last year at the age of 103. He was my rabbi. And then Rabbi Task. They were both here for a very long time.”

Once Rabbi Task left, Ginsburgh said “that's when the whole world started seeing a shortage of rabbis.”

“There were not enough rabbis to go around, and most of them don't want to come to a place like Monroe or Alexandria,” she said.

Ginsburgh is a professional singer who specialized in Jewish music.

“They say that if you if you're a rabbi who can sing well and you play the guitar, which I do all three, you have the trifecta,” she said. “That was a statement I heard once. So, I bring the trifecta to this congregation.”

She had been going to pulpits all over the place that didn’t have a rabbi.

"I was the spiritual leader leading them in prayer and life cycle events,” she explained. “Basically, doing what a rabbi I did.”

When Rabbi Task retired, Ginsburgh spoke with him and other rabbis about going to rabbical school to become one because she didn’t want their congregation to be without a rabbi. Other congregations needed rabbis, too, and her main motivation was to be a rabbi at a small Southern congregation near Alexandria. She knew they were going to struggle to get one.

“This is really what I was meant to do. I really wish I had done it sooner, but it wasn't anything I thought about,” she said.

She never grew up seeing a woman serve as a rabbi. The first woman rabbi was ordained when she was in high school.

Ginsburgh just “kind of fell into doing Jewish stuff quite by accident” when she was an adult.

"But I've been involved in teaching Jewish things since I was 15,” she said. “I taught in Sunday school here from the time I was 15 years old, and I taught when I was in college.”

She also taught Sunday School at the synagogue at Indiana University where she was a student. So she’s always taught and learned.

“I’ve always, always studied. I never stopped studying,” said Ginsburgh.

Now that she is the rabbi, one of her main goals is to increase participation and build a community within the temple and the broader community.

Since the COVID 19 pandemic, people have not returned to worship services at the temple or churches, so she faces the challenge of finding out what people want and offering it.

“We've always been community builders here,” said Ginburgh. “I want to continue to do that, to be a vital part of this community, and a place where people are comfortable coming and sharing.”

Shabbat services at the temple are open to everyone in the community, added Ginsburgh. Those wanting to attend need to call the Temple at (318) 445-3655 ahead of time since the Temple has security and a gate.

According to the Temples website, jewishtemple.org, services are at 6 p.m. on Fridays with an Oneg or social following.

Since teaching is one of her favorite things to do, she wants to teach people about the synagogue and Sunday school. Her plans include teaching an Introduction to Judaism class at least once a year.

“We had over 100 people come to the one I taught in the spring. I don't think anyone had ever done anything like that here,” she said.

She loves to teach people who aren’t Jewish about Judaism.

“I want them to be properly informed and I want them to have a way to ask questions,” she explained. “Some people think they don't want to ask because it's stupid. There's no stupid question. The more we know about each other, the better off we're all going to be. It's all about understanding one another. And then there’s less hate in the world.”

This article originally appeared on Alexandria Town Talk: Alexandria rabbi enjoys her new role at temple where her family has strong legacy