Slice of LIFE
The Pioneer of the Jewish Internet
Rabbi YY Kazen (1954-1998)
~ Part 2 ~ Continued from Last Week
Kazen began a listserv, sending out regular email blasts with insights from the Torah portion. He treasured the personal connections he forged with people on the other side of the world, as they did with him. Perched on an ergonomic backless chair in his Brooklyn office, Kazen exchanged emails with and advised scientists in Antarctica, students in Australia and professors in California. In time, these emails became part of the first and longest-running “Ask the Rabbi” service on the Internet.
This calling, of helping people one at a time, serving them according to their needs, was at the heart of Kazen's work.
In a tribute penned not long after Kazen's untimely passing, a professor from Germany wrote that he'd been in touch with the rabbi since 1995 on behalf of his remote Jewish community around the U.S. military base in Garmisch, Germany. “For... years, almost on a daily basis, we turned to him for information, clarification and advice on a variety of halachic and community issues,” he recalled. “I always received [a] response within a few hours. He guided all of us with patience, tolerance and great love for the Torah and the Jewish people. ... We are all indebted to Rabbi Kazen.”
In the summer of 1996, Chaim Boehlje was on a work assignment in Kansas, 150 miles from the closest Jewish community, when he got the devastating news that his son had passed away. Craving Judaic advice and a modicum of comfort, he turned to the Web. “The search engines and internet was not as refined as they are now, but I was led to Chabad's web site. I emailed 'ask the rabbi' that night for advice in my situation.” Boehlje did not expect a rapid response, and went to sleep. When he woke up the next morning he checked his email. “There it was, a ray of hope, a friendly voice advising and consoling.” It was YY, who remained in touch with him throughout the grief, mourning, and beyond.
“[Kazen] rarely slept. He lived and breathed Torah, his family, and Chabad.org,” recalled Jane Davis, one of the rabbi's regular online pen pals. “He sparked something in me that made me crave learning more and more. And this was his dream to share this kind of Torah enthusiasm with everyone he could, no matter the time of the day or night. Sometimes we would connect at 2 or 3 AM. We would be online at the same time, taking advantage of this unique medium that knew no time and never closed. This was the unique beauty of cyberspace. I would bring him the world in ways he would never experience. He would interpret that with a Torah teaching. He was relentless in his enthusiasm for teaching Torah.”
Today, Kazen's son, Rabbi Choni Kazen, a Chabad emissary in Montreal, serves as a member of the Ask the Rabbi team, fielding questions and providing Torah information and guidance just like his father before him. And like his father, he is on call to help people at all times of night and day.
For someone like Aharon, a disabled veteran living outside Salem, Oregon, the service has been a lifeline. His home is remotely located, and while he appreciates his connection with a local synagogue, living far from Jewish resources like kosher supermarkets and Judaica stores can be a challenge.
Aharon goes to Chabad.org for everything from the Hebrew Word of the Week to the Kosher Cooking minisite to the Shabbat and Holiday Times app. But what means the most to him is that he can connect with a rabbi, anytime—just as Kazen envisioned 30 years ago.
“As a senior citizen and a disabled veteran, I live on a very fixed income, and Chabad.org has been a wonderful resource for me,” Aharon said. “I can write in or ask for a rabbi to call me. If I have to have counsel with a rabbi—maybe my rabbi is out of town and I need counsel—well I've got counsel. The rabbis get back to me in short order, they always answer my questions, and I really appreciate that feature.”
None of this would have happened without YY.
Demystifying Mysticism
When Chabad.org went live 30 years ago, it received thousands of visitors. Within three years, that number had blossomed to more than 60,000 unique visitors a week, along with another 30,000 weekly email recipients.
The site also generated considerable interest from the media. It was the subject of a New York Times cover story under the headline “The Computer Age Bids Religious World to Enter.” As the Times would later note, Chabad.org “served as a model” for other sites across the web.
“When you go to the Internet and you read about Judaism ... the stereotypes fall away,” Kazen told the Times. “This is not an 18th-century guy on the street. It's Judaism in practice.”
For many people, Chabad.org would create a positive interaction with Judaism, one that has led to many embracing Jewish life and practice themselves.
One such individual is Howard, or Henoch, Duboff. Duboff had grown up in what he describes as “a somewhat religious household,” a proudly Jewish family that went to services on holidays and occasionally Shabbat. But Duboff found the Jewish life he'd been exposed to was lacking “spark.”
In those early days of the internet, before Google and even browsers, there was a lot of information online, but it wasn't always simple to find.
I don't recall exactly how or why I decided to search for information about Judaism, but I wound up finding messages posted by a Rabbi Yosef Y. Kazen,” Duboff wrote in a tribute to Kazen. “Rabbi Kazen would post the text of various weekly publications (such as 'L'Chaim Weekly') for others to read. Rabbi Kazen would include his contact information at the end of the publications, signing off as 'YY' from Chabad-Lubavitch in Cyberspace.”
In an age before the wide popularization of the internet, Duboff was struck by the idea of a black-hatted, long-bearded rabbi sitting at a computer. “Modern technology mixed with those old-fashioned rabbis!”
It was more than just that, however. Duboff was intrigued by Kazen's simple but profound responses to the questions he saw posed by others. Despite his years of Hebrew school, this was his first exposure to fundamental Jewish ideas as illuminated by the light of Chassidus: It was via Kazen's messages that Duboff learned of the Jewish soul, the importance and impact of each individual mitzvah, and the concept of Moshiach.
At first he thought “YY” was a pseudonym, but eventually he learned the rabbi on the other side of the computer connection was very real indeed. On one occasion, Kazen mentioned to Duboff that he'd printed out one of his emails and read it at the Shabbat table to his children. “I was astounded that this person took such a personal interest in my spiritual growth.”
Neither did Duboff's connection with Kazen remain virtual. Duboff became a regular at the Kazen home in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn, more than once spending the entire Sukkot and Passover holidays with them. So deep was Kazen's impact on him, that after the rabbi's passing Duboff named his first son “Yosef Yitzchak.”
In embracing the cutting edge of technology to share Jewish knowledge and practice, Kazen built something that would continue to impact the lives of countless individuals long after his own passing.
Early logo of Chabad Lubavitch in Cyberspace.
