By Moshe New, Crown Heights Chabad.org
Trois-Rivières is a historic city in Quebec, Canada, about halfway between Montreal and Quebec City. The city gets its name (“Three Rivers” in English) from the three channels formed by islands at the mouth of the Saint-Maurice River, on the banks of which it sits.
The city of around 140,000 residents has a notable but intermittent Jewish history. In fact, the earliest known Jew to settle in Canada was Aaron (Moshe Uri) Hart, who made Trois-Rivières his home in 1761. Hart’s son Ezekiel made history when he refused public office because it required that he swear an oath as a Christian. Ezekiel later won election—this time achieving office without the oath, helping establish the precedent that Jews could serve without taking the oath. He was perhaps the first elected official in British Empire history to do so.
Fast-forward 300 or so years, and there is a new Jewish Aaron in town. This time, he’s a rabbi. Rabbi Aaron and Amanda Spiro, natives of Montreal, have officially established Chabad-Lubavitch of Trois-Rivières, along with their three children.
The city once supported a synagogue, with early-20th century city records showing a meeting to establish a “shtiebel.” However, economic opportunities in Montreal gradually drew many Jewish residents away, and by 1959 the community declined to the point that it was almost gone. In the late 1980s, even its cemetery was relocated to Montreal.
Today, while the legacy of this earlier Jewish community is preserved in city landmarks like the Aaron Hart statue downtown, the Spiros are effectively re-establishing organized Jewish life in Trois-Rivières from the ground up. Their recent Rosh Hashanah services marked the first locally organized minyan in roughly 70 years.
One attendee at Rosh Hashanah services this year was Montreal resident Levana Toledano, who together with her daughter Sarah Levy—a physiotherapy student at the University of Trois-Rivières—was on hand to witness the milestone.
“Quite fortuitously, my daughter was teaching tennis lessons to Aaron and Amanda’s son,” Toledano told Chabad.org. “It wasn’t long before they struck up a relationship. My daughter calls Amanda her ‘point person’ for all things Jewish in Trois-Rivières.”
She added: “You walk in there and you feel the love. The space is beautiful. It’s big and spacious and lit nicely. The Spiros are truly lovely people. The rabbi gave a speech, we heard the shofar and enjoyed a wonderful holiday meal.”
‘NOT YOUR AVERAGE COUPLE’
Aaron Spiro grew up in Montreal in a secular Jewish family. Amanda did, too, attending synagogue service once a year for the High Holidays.
“I was always searching, even when I was younger and disconnected from my Jewishness, I was a searcher,” Amanda said. In 2007, at the age of 21, she faced her greatest challenge yet when she was diagnosed with cancer. But this period, as dark a time as it was, was also the time that her life changed forever. It was after receiving her diagnosis that Amanda met Aaron; it was also the time that she really connected with her spirituality.
“Even through my challenges and pain, Hashem [G d] has been very kind to me. I saw His hand in everything, and I was introduced to the teachings of the Rebbe [Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, of righteous memory] whose teachings strengthened me then and have continued to this whole time since,” she explained.
After she’d recovered, she moved to Israel to study in university there. Aaron did the same, and both simultaneously began attending supplementary yeshivah and seminary programs. Aaron learned at Aish Hatorah and Amanda at The Mayanot Institute of Jewish Studies. They spent three years there learning and immersing themselves in Jewish life and practice, during which time they got married.
The couple then returned to Montreal, where Amanda quickly connected with Rabbi Moishe and Nechama New—directors of the Montreal Torah Center (MTC)—and started working at the Friendship Circle and giving classes at the Chabad seminary.
It didn’t take long for Aaron to get involved, too. “I quickly got acquainted with Rabbi New and the rest is as they say ‘history,’” he said.
At that point, Spiro was working as a tax consultant and looking for ways to engage in more facets of Jewish life. He jumped at the opportunity to volunteer in Montreal Torah Center’s “L’Chaim Project,” whose goal is to give opportunities for businesspeople to be involved in Jewish communal leadership.
