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My name is Joshua furman. I'm the curator of the Houston jewish history archive at Rice University. Today is april 26th 2021 I'm here with Rabbi Jack Siegel, Rabbi emeritus of Congregation Beth You Sharon in Houston. Right, Rabbi, how are you? Pretty good, thank you. Excellent. Let's

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start by talking about your childhood. Tell us where did you grow up? And what was your jewish education like? I grew up in Brownsville, not Brownsville texas, but uh Brownsville Brooklyn, Which was probably, I don't know, 90% Jewish. It was a very Jewish area. In fact,

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most of the people there was no, I shouldn't say most of people. Very high percentage of people were orthodox. My parents were modern Orthodox people and my grandparents, they were actually my father's grandparents. They were came from Hasidic group B E. L. P. Er City of

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Bells. And I grew up there as a youngster. I went to yeshiva Rabbi Haim Berlin which was, there were two major yeshivas in Brooklyn at that time. One was a block away from my home which was a rabbi from Berlin. And I went to school there

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from grade one, no kindergarten from grade and no pre kindergarten and I went to school there for eight grades and I graduated from there. Then I went to the city robert chamberlain, which was not too far from there, about a mile away. And I used to

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walk over there every day and I went there from grades 9 10, 11 12. There was no midsection at that time either went to grade school and high school and I graduated from there. I was about 16.5 when I graduated from there and we should back

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up a second. Tell us when you were born April 18, 1929. This past week was 92 years that I was born. Happy Birthday. Thank you. Thank you so very much until 120. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so very much. Tell us about your parents. Tell

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us about your father and your mother. My father was from Austria. He was born in 96, and he was a member of the Austrian Army during World War I. He was inducted into the Army in 1915 and served service for 34 months in the military and

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22 months in the front lines. He was a member of, he uh he was part of a cannon group. He was with the Howards or something like that and he was wounded once. He had a piece of shrapnel in his head. But thank God it was

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just superficial. Then in 1922, which was four years after the Armistice, after Austria gave up and Germany gave up uh he went to the United States to Rochester new york. He had two very wealthy uncles who had lived in Rochester since the days of Methuselah a

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long long time ago. They were brothers of my father's father And my father worked there for one year, 1920-1923 until his uncles told them they said Henry, we want you to know that in Rochester, there isn't a very large Jewish population at that time. And we

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want you to get married to a Jewish girl. So the best thing for you to do is to pack your bags in the very, very near future and moved to new york city and that's what my father did. He moved to Brooklyn. My mother, her, her

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mother had passed away And she was pretty young. She was in her 40s, she had cancer and she died. But her father, Judah beanstalk, B I E N S D o C K, Judith beanstalk. He was originally from Russia when he came here from, he came

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here at a young age and he lived in Brooklyn. By coincidence, he lived on the same block that we lived in Brooklyn and my father's parents also lived on the same block. It may have been intentional. I, I don't recall, there may have been intentional and

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I went to the sheep and what we did is we used to go to school six days a week. Sunday, monday Tuesday Wednesday thursday friday friday was a half a day. We only went to school from 9 to 1, but the other days and sunday was

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a three quarter day. We went to school from nine in the morning until six in the evening. And the rest of the day is the other four days, we went to school from nine in the morning till 6 30 in the afternoon or the evening, 6

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30 the jewish subjects that we started. This was the Yeshiva. We went from 9 to 3 and english, we called it english subjects, not secular, but english subjects. We went from 3 30 to 6 30 who were our teachers, our teachers with teachers who taught in

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the public schools of new york. But what happened is they would get off at three o'clock. So by 3 30 when we started our secular subjects, they were free. So they worked pretty hard and the reason they worked pretty hard, it was, it was the days

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of the depression and they wanted to make a living for their family. So we learned that we started from the alphabet and we went into finally, I mean, not real soon, but we went into Gomorrah finished, we had homage, We had naveen. Um, we did everything.

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That's what my jewish background or I should say religious Scholarly background. And were you, were you a good student? I mean, did you really take, that was pretty good student, Jewish studies and everybody, I think everybody in my class, we only had 12 of my class

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or 11. I don't remember. They were all pretty good good students. We had good teachers. We had good teachers and they were my teachers were, I remember them as compassionate, understanding teachers. And we lived just one block away from yeshiva for the first eight years uh,

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elementary school and then the other four years, about a mile away an avenue in Stone Avenue, which was also I think considered the Brownsville area of Brooklyn. And when we had three tools in our block. So you grew up in a very jewish environment with a

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rigorous jewish education. I didn't think there was anybody else except jews to be very right. The only place a block away from us was what we call the market. They had, I don't know, you're too young for this, but pushcarts they used to have and the

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next block and that block was today, they call them african americans, then they were called black people. They lived on that block and about a half mile away on pacific street was the italian neighborhood. So, but basically it was a primarily jewish neighborhood. When when did

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you first start to have ideas about becoming a rabbi as a career. Oh, I don't know. I just kept going, what happened was I went elementary school, then I went to high school, then I went to college at night. I went by Subway. I used to

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college at night and the reason I did that because I went to yeshiva during the daytime, most of my friends were doing the same over here. I don't think I thought too much about this to be very honest with you and this is what I did,

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basically. I don't think I thought too much about a career until later on. Right. Although at one point didn't you get a degree in physics and advanced degree? Yeah, well I had, I went to college, so what that I do, I had a major in something,

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so I majored in english in the beginning, I couldn't read that much. The assignments were, there were so many, so I figured I had to do something, which it's not the multitude of activity that you can do in school, but it's your brain work. Do you

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know how to do it or don't? So I figured, well math and physics are pretty good. So I majored at N Y U. I was going to college at night, so what I did was I made it in physics there. I graduated with a degree in

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physics after I graduated from there and I was still going to the ship and I was ordained. I went to a little town called Homestead pennsylvania, it's right across the street, it's like Bel Air is to to Houston here, right across the street. So there it

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was Homestead, across the street from Pittsburgh. And what I did was I attended the University of Pittsburgh and I majored in mathematics, mathematics and physics. They're like brothers and sisters, you know what I mean? It's very close to each other. So this was your first pulpit

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now in in homestead Pennsylvania is correct. Right, my synagogue was not a gigantic got 70 families, 70 families over there. But they're extremely nice people. And I was sort of quote adopted, unquote by a family there who had a son who was drafted. I don't know

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if he was drafted or he enlisted in the military, but he was a second lieutenant and about three or four days after d day 1940 for in june he was shot and killed in in France, he was killed. So what they did is it was of

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course a very traumatic Experience. So what they did is they adopted, the young rabbi was 25 years of age and they adopted quote unquote me as their son. I used to go there for lunch all the time. I used to walk over there on Chavez to

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their home for for lunch after sure. It was extremely interesting. Do you know just as an aside, I mean what, what is there still a Jewish community there in homestead Pennsylvania. The synagogue of Homestead was eventually, I don't know how many years ago sold to a

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black church and as I visited 15 years ago owns the Pennsylvania, I could see still keamy Torah on the outside of the synagogue, but black baptist church in the city in the city of Homestead. I don't think there are any jewish people left, but it's right

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across the bridge from Pittsburgh, it's not far from from the reception of Pittsburgh. Very good. And then so how many years were you in Homestead? And what was the next Instead? I was two years then I went one year to Nikki to McKeesport pennsylvania. McKeesport pennsylvania

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is approximately 10 miles southeast of Pittsburgh pennsylvania. And I went there for one year. I met my wife there. And just for the heck of it, I applied to medical school. I had enough credits, had enough credits. I didn't have much guidance. I had enough credits

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in chemistry and biology. I had credit school law, I think I told you to bachelor's to master's to doctorate. So I enjoyed going to school. It was, it was a great interest to me And I decided I was 28. Then I decided I didn't want to

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spend so much more time going to to school. I wanted to get married. So what I did was I accepted a position which was offered to me in Portland Oregon in Portland Oregon, where my wife and I were for four years and we had two Children

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in Portland Oregon. So wait, so you applied to medical school but you elected not to go or you know, I was accepted. It was accepted at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. It was, I wouldn't say it was near my house, it was a couple

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of miles away. But you're graduated from the University of right, but your whole life could have been different. You could have been, you know doctor Dr Siegel Medical doctor. Well I have a doctor or a doctorate but not a medical, I have two kids who got

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medical degrees. So did you go wanting a medical school also? But unfortunately I think I told you last time he was involved in a terrible accident he was shot. Could not talk about that a little bit later. So you elected not to go to medical school

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even though you were accepted because you had a job in Portland or because you decided medicine was married, people get married and go to medical school. I just didn't do it. Very good. Tell us a little more about about how you met your wife, what were

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what were the circumstances under which how you you met your wife in met her actually. But I was up in the hospital visiting a patient whose parents belonged to my congregation and she came there to that room to visit her friend. It was her friend. And

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what I did is I asked her would you like to go play tennis tomorrow? Said of course why not? Unfortunately she never played tennis before. It was lucky that we got together. Maybe it was better. So we didn't play tennis and we spend time with each

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other and we got engaged two months later and two months after that we were married, wow beautiful. So she's not a tennis player. She's never played tennis after that. And before that I can assure you she never played tennis before. So you and Toby went out

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to Portland and you said you were in Portland for four years and that is correct. We're in Portland for years and what was that community like and what happened was a good community and I in the sport had about 140 families in Portland, I had about

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225 families in my synagogue now in Portland. People I was very fortunate. I had synagogues were the people in A. B. C. All of them and especially here in Houston were super nice, they were not nice, they were super nice. All of them have been very

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nice to us, really very nice to us, you know Gary Schwartz, he brings me chopped liver every month. We just finished it all the time and people were I mean I'm not giving that as an example but I mean people were extremely nice to us, they

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were extremely nice to my wife and they were extremely nice to my Children and my grandchildren always went through our day school that my kids actually graduated in the day school and my grandchildren now they're not graduates of the day school because I mean they're still

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students there in the 2nd and 4th grade's. I mean I have two of them in the school. Tell me about the circumstances that caused you to leave Portland. Oh I left Portland because my synagogue and the there was another conservative synagogue decided to combine to unify

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to amalgamate And it was going to become one synagogue. The I had been there for years. The other rabbi had been there either 14 or 16 years. I don't remember exactly and I felt it was only justice. He had been there so long that he should

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be the one to take over the synagogue. He was well liked and I was well liked. I didn't want this to become a fight. So I decided I was going to leave the synagogue over there, which I did. I told him, I guess you call it,

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I designed from the synagogue, my synagogue ended its existence and the it was mine was innovate, said Dick and his was over bache alone. So the synagogue became the official o is what it became. I think I think I've been there. Is that the one that

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has like a gigantic 10 Commandments on the facade that I don't know, that might be a different. Not sure that the Reform temple. No, I think it's a Conservative one. Conservative synagogue was also there was an Orthodox synagogue a couple of blocks away and the conservative

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Syndergaard reform temple was, I would say a mile a mile and a half away, but it looks like the old synagogue, you know, big dome, that was the big dome was the style. That's the reform. I don't know if it had a Big 10 commandments on

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them. So in a minute we'll talk about how you, how you came to Houston before we do that though. There's something interesting that I want to mention, which is that your schooling and your ordination was very much in the Orthodox world. Right. Very traditional. But in

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Portland's now you were the rabbi of a conservative congregation. So how and when did you make a shift into serving conservative congregations? And what was that transition like I was going in that direction anyway. So it wasn't very difficult for me. It was not very difficult.

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Remember my Russia yeshiva, I don't know if you ever heard of him and I used to write questions to them all the time, but it never ain't, never answered, never, never really answered them. So I answered them myself. You know what I mean? I answered them

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myself. Mhm. And so did you did you feel that you know there needed to be some kind of balance between Judaism and modernity or you know what I did. Yes, I did. I did feel that way. I felt that times have changed. They've always changed all

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the time. And Judaism has always marched along for the times. And so that's why the conservative movement became attractive. And then I was offered a position here at beth Esurance. Not as the senior rabbi. We had a rapper's name is William mail if Bill Malloy, they

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called him L A M A L E V. And I became his associate rabbi. We had, he had once or twice for short periods of time, maybe a year or so. Each one assistant rabbi. But I became the title associate rabbi. So I took it. But

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you almost never, almost never came to Houston. Right. Isn't there another? There was another congregation in phoenix that had made you an offer. It was a synagogue. I had three synagogues that I went to one Louisville Kentucky. I wasn't too happy with that money and maybe

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one of the reasons was it was pouring cats and dogs on the shoppers that I went there and it was, I got soaked when I went to the synagogue. But that wasn't the reason. I mean I just, I just didn't want to go to Louisville Kentucky

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and phoenix. Arizona. I went in the beginning of August, I think it was 104°. They told me this is one of our cool days and I was staying at a hotel and I put my foot down near the pool. You know, I burned my fourth, you

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know what I want. But that had nothing to do with it. It was a very nice synagogue and I accepted the position. But then the next day I called them and I told him you have to give me a little time. I feel I'm being rushed

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into this because I still gave a promise to a synagogue in Houston texas that I would go there for an interview to Houston texas. And I don't like to break my word over there. I must do that before I accept the decision that I've already accepted.

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Please. I never had a contract at any of the synagogues that I went to. The only contract I had was it was an oral one. I told them I only wanted an oral one, which was a six months contract. If you don't want me, I don't

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want you will give each other six months notice and that's about it. You could let me go in six months or I could let the synagogue go in six months. Thank God I've never had to use any of these quote contracts unquote over here. I've been

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here since 1965 which is a long period of time. So you told the congregation in phoenix, let me just fulfill my promise. And then you came to beth you Sharon. And what what what what changed your mind? What changed your life? Quite frankly, I like the

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people here were astounding. That's the way I felt it. And I told my wife that saturday night and I told her sunday, I told either the people here are good actors and they're fooling me with their exceptional people over here and I'm going to take the

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position over here. Now, what they do is they have the wife come and the Children come. You know for everybody who's interviewed. we didn't do that in those days. It was just the one seeking the rabbinic position. He was the one who was interviewed. I still

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remember one the woman said, what will your wife do at the synagogue? Was a joke. I said, I didn't know she was applying for the position over here. I don't think she'd like that. I wasn't here. That was do you do you remember some of the

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first people you met at Beth you Sharon? Oh yeah, they're not here any longer. But that's okay. People like to hear names and was one of them. He was an exceptional person. David Bard B A R. G. He was also, they were leaders. Eventually they became

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presidents of the congregation also, but they were also good friends of mine, they were good friends of mine, wonderful. And their Children are still very much here and the synagogue, if they live in town, some of them have Children, kids move away. I even have one

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son who moved to north Carolina, Greensboro, north Carolina. So you came to Houston in 1965 to be the associate rabbi with under Rabbi tell us about Rabbi. He was by mail. It was a I think he was really a reconstructionist to be very honest with you

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and I once told them, I said rabbi, I will never speak from the pulpit on the subject that you have already spoken about and I will take the opposite position over here. I'm not here to argue with you now. It's true. We may differ on many

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positions, but I will be the one who speaks on its first and you have to be the one to publicly disagree with me. But I will never publicly disagree with you on the subject that you have already given your opinion for A and I will say,

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nay, it's B you see what I mean? Yeah, I did that all the eight years that I was with him, he passed away. I mean On that eight years we were here in the synagogue asked me to take over. Right, that was in 1973. It's interesting

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that 73, that was that you you talked about his um affinity for reconstructionist Judaism and I've seen that in his writings and in classes that he taught very much enamored of mortified Kaplan and that whole that is that is correct approach dr dan musher. His grandfather

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was mortified capital. That's right. I know. And then musher is an exceedingly terrific person. Not terrific, exceedingly terrific person and a good story. I mean, he's a stupendous And the sun is the same as daughters. two daughters with the same also. Yeah, did trying to think

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of how to phrase this question. So you obviously respected Rabbi may live always and did not contradict him and let him contradict you never know, contradict me to do whatever you want. This is your synagogue. I'm here to help you? This is what it is. I

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am not here to hinder you. I want you to know that and I will observe those rules of action all the time and I did all the time. The eight years that I was here together together with, we differed on many, many, many subjects. I mean

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there was no two ways about it. We did, but it was always heat. In fact, people told me they used to like to come to beth Esurance to hear A and B. They knew after I spoke on a the next week was gonna be, B was

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going to be talking about about the right. Yeah, that's interesting. What do you remember about that period before you became senior rabbi. What were some of the first programs or classes or initiatives that you started to try to make your mark on beth Yeah, sure. And

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while you were still the associate rabbit, well, we had, I was in charge of the adult education, I sort of changed it from just a few classes. What we would do is we would have like, let's see from about 6 30 to 7 30 we have

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10 or 11 classes. I have a lot of people teaching in it and 15 minutes later we would have another 10 or 11 or 12 classes over there. In the beginning. It was very popular. We were in the beginning we were getting some 700 people coming

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down. But you know everything in the beginning, you know is extremely popular after a while you know it wasn't is this what would become the Akiba institute? That is correct. I did gave it that name was Akiba was already 40 years of age, you know when

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he first got involved in Judaism, things like that. So I gave her that name. I also was in charge of the youth activities and we had a lot of youth activities. I used to have, I used to take him on both our minds if you're good,

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if somebody was good, really good in class. I used to teach a lot in the school in the afternoon school which I called the religious school, not the Hebrew school. I don't know why I didn't like the name Hebrew school, I called the religious school were

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not a language school, were religious school and I would take three kids along with me. We had a jewish country club over here and I would take them as my guess. I didn't have to pay anything in the beginning. The most I ever had to pay

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was I think 15 $20 a year, something like that. But I would I would take the kids as my guest and I would I was I was a good swimmer. What I would do is I would go on the diving board. The high diving board walk

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on my hands to the end of the diving board and flip off. And the kids and Rabbi Segal, did you see what he did. This is something that they enjoy. It must have been quite a sight to see on the diving board. Right. I get to

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meet a lot of people that way. I also had programs I wish I would have written them down out of them. But I had many programs for the kids quizzes. The winners would get Hershey bars. We had a man over there used to give me £270

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of Hershey bars every every year and if I needed more just call it um His name is Milton Levitt. Unfortunately he died in the synagogue one Friday night. He was sitting in his chair and he got a severe heart attack and he died, I was sitting

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right there. He had five positions over there, including two cardiologists but it was a severe heart attack and he died, we had to move the people into the other sanctuaries. He was also a super individual, not just an individual. He was a super, We had loads

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of good people over there. No doubt about that. I wanna I wanna ask you in a minute about when Rabbi Miller passed away. But before that there's so many programs that you initiated at beth you sure and that you're famous for the most famous one of

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all is probably the reenactment of the exodus. It was on time. What I would do is we got loads of kids and we had some parents who come along also probably have well over 100 kids, 125 kids. We'd march along the bayou from beth assurance to

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the JCC jewish community center and we would march along. We we we consider this. The exodus march was a march out of Egypt. We're trying to show how it felt when they left. Egypt and we had that every year we had that every every I don't

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know how many times we have that here of the where did that idea come from? No, it's great. And I've seen pictures of it and many people have wonderful kids would like to participate in it. It was a participatory act of the synagogue rather than just

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a study of the synagogue. Nowadays. We call it experiential education correct. That's that's great. Something that I know. So what do you remember about when Rabbi Malik passed away and the discussions that took place about about you becoming senior rabbi was very fast. It was really

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very fast. But he asked me if I would take over. They had been there eight years already and they asked me would I be willing to take over the position of senior rabbi of the congregation. And the answer was even faster yes, it was yes. As

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I told you, I didn't have any contract or anything with them. We didn't write any contract that for two years or four years. Success had to be renewed all the time. It was a six month contract which I had stated once before. If I want to

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leave I have, I have to give you six months notice. If you want me to leave you have to give me six months dollars. It shouldn't be anything that should be very quick. But rather it should be something that I respect you and you respect me

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six months. You could get somebody in six months, I could get another position but we never had to exercise that particular suggestion. There are besides the exodus march, so many other programs that you created. So tell me about TNT and S. O. S. T. N. T.

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S. O. S. V. I. P. Very interested. This was every sunday morning what we would have before the kids would go to school at 11 o'clock from 9 30 to 11. We had a brief service, I would speak to the kids on a historical or religious

00:37:46.110 - 00:38:10.640

theme and then we would have a bagels and lox breakfast. Also what I would do is I we have a program every so often, maybe every six weeks or so in which I had somebody who is deeply involved with the sports world in Houston and he

00:38:10.640 - 00:38:36.840

would bring a popular a sports person to Betty Suren and I remember once we had the chinese pig team coming through Houston. You know the top of the top and the worst of the chinese people, they were five of them, the worst. Said he would challenge

00:38:36.840 - 00:38:51.220

me to a game when I say he was the worst. I'm telling you if you have never seen anybody so good. So he challenged me and what was my hands? He says, well I mean through a translator, he had a translator with him. He said would

00:38:51.220 - 00:39:07.240

you accept my challenge? I said are you kidding? Of course I will. I couldn't get a point from him, I was so nervous, man was shaking and he beat me 21 to 0 this fellow, the last thing he let me get one point. So it was

00:39:07.240 - 00:39:31.240

21 to 1. I think it was out of courtesy. That's just about, that was number one. We also had football players coming over there that everybody wanted to meet the football players and the basketball players and everything. This was a way to draw, It wasn't my

00:39:31.250 - 00:39:51.480

Torah talks that I gave to the kids, but in order to in order to participate in this program, they had to have to come to the service also. And I used to give away prizes all the time when you come in, you get a little ticket

00:39:51.590 - 00:40:16.420

and we withdraw the tickets and those whose tickets were drawn, they would actually get some kind of a prize and I get people giving me pricing records in those days instead of videos. We used to have records, records and We have those and kids. Everybody loved

00:40:16.420 - 00:40:35.000

to win a prize no matter what everybody likes to enterprise. We have loads of prize. We have probably 20 prizes every single, every single week. People would donate these prizes to me. People tell me things that don't move in my business, you can have his prize

00:40:35.000 - 00:40:58.590

is uh this is what they would do. And then what about what about trips? You also became known for taking trips trips. I took three groups in Mexico. I remember the first one at 36 kids, 2nd 1 47 and the last one at 58 kids on

00:40:58.590 - 00:41:19.290

it. And I would take them by bus to tour Mexico. And what we would do is we would have one hour, just one hour of study during the day and we would study for example some part of the navy in, we would study each year. We

00:41:19.290 - 00:41:44.070

would we would study this thing. So I would take groups there. I would also take, I also took 17 groups of adults or adults and families to Israel. I called it the Astros adult synagogue trips. Religiously oriented or take them and they were very lively trips

00:41:44.080 - 00:42:07.920

and everybody enjoyed those trips. We went, we had the same Guide for everyone except one. They always seen any very good good trips. Now I wanna talk about your relationship with some of the people you worked with for many years, Tell me about Cantor Wagner. Cantor

00:42:07.920 - 00:42:32.940

Wagner was a nice fellow. Really nice chap passed away many years ago but he was a man with a good voice, good musical background and he was just a nice person. He was a nice person. He was divorced while here at Beth and he married later

00:42:32.940 - 00:42:53.210

on a much much younger woman. But both of them were very nice. I mean they were nice people. We did not go out socially but but I mean at the synagogue, he was my friend, I was his friend. We worked together in harmony. We had a

00:42:53.220 - 00:43:14.640

very good relationship with each other. Very good. I was very fortunate that I had a good relationship with the entire staff and I have a very good relationship with the people who are the members of the congregation. Tell me about rafi, a field officer, was a

00:43:14.650 - 00:43:45.130

very competent adult education leader. I think he was very active nationally also as a adult education teacher and leader. Let me put it that right. And he did that until he retired. He moved to I think to Israel if I'm not mistaken. But he was nice

00:43:45.130 - 00:44:11.960

for he and his wife Barbara. They were nice people. He had a son who became a professor at the medical school and I don't remember it was Iowa I don't remember where it was but he married also a girl who was a doctor also who taught

00:44:11.960 - 00:44:40.710

at the medical school also. I think he was an ophthalmologist. If I'm not mistaken. I have one son also my youngest son who is also an optimal. So the period of your revenue in Houston beginning in the sixties is a time of great social turmoil and

00:44:40.720 - 00:45:10.920

upheaval also with the black community to I was very active with the black community. Can you talk about that? Ah I I would have every year a seder not on time but a seder For the black community. I would invite 125 from a church to come

00:45:10.930 - 00:45:30.960

to our synagogue. And we would have if I had 100 and 25 from that church at 125 from our synagogue. What we would do is one sit here once it here, once it here, once it here, so we get to meet each other. And we had

00:45:30.960 - 00:46:00.060

a very good relationship. I also had the then governor of texas, can't remember her name. She was a female who who appointed me to a committee to try to develop other relationships between whites and blacks in the state of texas. So I was active in that

00:46:00.070 - 00:46:22.510

also, I tried to be active and I was active in uh we had a thanksgiving service. We would have for jews and christians, we would have a one hour service. It was a it was like a secular service, but we had we had once at beth

00:46:22.900 - 00:46:47.810

but we had a I was active in that also. So it was active not only in blacks and whites, but jews and christians, we have no Muslims at that time. Now Rabbi Stephen morgen is active in the jewish muslim relationships. Very active. Tell me more about

00:46:47.810 - 00:47:11.560

this seder with the black community that you would do. What do you think? Uh I don't have it. I think it's flooded during harvey from that mistake and all my copies, but I we use that all the time and I have statements from the thomas from

00:47:11.570 - 00:47:37.730

all over, from jewish writings and also from secular writings about how people should get along with each other and it was very well accepted. What what do you think? The members of the Houston african american community took away from that experience. Well what I saw as

00:47:37.730 - 00:47:54.810

they enjoyed it very much, they really enjoyed it. They felt that somebody was stretching forth an arm to welcome them all the time, not to push their two ways. One, you can do it this way to push somebody away. And the other way is this way

00:47:54.820 - 00:48:14.960

to bring somebody close to you. I think they felt that Betty Suren and I was doing it every year. I did it every single year. We call it the the I would say that was the africa didn't call out for murder, I think it was called

00:48:14.960 - 00:48:35.400

the white dish black, something like, I don't know what we called it, I can't remember But I say that and it was something I would tell them about who she is for example, you know, the Ethiopian wife that moses had not brushes interpretation saying that she

00:48:35.400 - 00:49:04.130

was a beautiful woman, told him that she was a dark skinned woman. And I spoke to them about if you look at you see God created man in his like God, that means the character for example, not what he looked like. And I spoke to him,

00:49:04.140 - 00:49:25.210

we have references from the bible that I had in this thing. It was a one hour say that with half an hour of it. I was having dinner and half an hour. Was the reading of the seder itself and everybody. I think they all really enjoyed

00:49:25.210 - 00:49:44.410

it. We did it with the same church time after time. We must have done it. I don't know how many times we did it 12, 15 times. We probably did you build a long meaningful relationship? We had a very good minister's name was Bill Lawson. L

00:49:44.410 - 00:50:09.390

A W S. O. N. Okay, sure. Of course he's retired now. Bill Lawson was with his church and I had a very, very good relationship with Bill Lawson and this woman had a very, very good relationship with his church. Yeah, I want to ask you now

00:50:09.400 - 00:50:35.320

about some of the changes in conservative Judaism from the 1960s to the 1990s, especially Egalitarianism and giving more opportunities to women in the service because all of that happened at beth you sure in more or less under your senior revenue. I was in favor of this,

00:50:35.400 - 00:50:52.290

but I did it slowly. I didn't do it in one night, did it very slowly a little today and tomorrow. It's like the ones told them. I said if you take a little ink and you put it in water for example, one droplet at the time,

00:50:52.290 - 00:51:08.940

you don't even see it. But if you put it for example, an entire bottle of ink at one time, you'll see it. There's no two ways about it. And this is what we did. We did it very, very slowly. I still remember, I don't know if

00:51:08.940 - 00:51:27.980

I told you, I told somebody else. Dr Hurwitz, he had a daughter and when he had a son, they he got Malia the Torah and he named the boy fine. And when they had a daughter, I told him you know we do, let's do the follow

00:51:27.980 - 00:51:48.370

me. Why don't you come get leah for your daughter and named the baby, you know during the creator Ron. And then right at the end of the service, when we're concluding the service, you and your wife come with your daughter in your hands and recite this

00:51:48.370 - 00:52:05.850

prayer that I have for you naming naming your daughter once again over and we did that and everybody took to that, they all like this. This dual act over here one the traditional one and one a more modern one. This is one that we have and

00:52:05.850 - 00:52:27.640

then from that, you know, once you start something, it sort of goes and this is what we have. There's a very interesting dynamic at Beth You Sharon, which makes it very different I think from most other conservative synagogues. And that is that Beth You Sharon since

00:52:28.450 - 00:52:52.570

The merger in 191946 has had a sanctuary service and has had a chapel service. Tell us about the chapel service. The reason we did this chaplain service is traditionally Orthodox service. They use an Orthodox prayer book or at least they did before. I don't know if

00:52:52.570 - 00:53:16.220

the one they use right now. I think it's and so I I don't know if it's if it's acceptable to the Orthodox, take a look at it, but all I can say is that it's a Orthodox type of service service says is a regular service, go

00:53:16.220 - 00:53:45.040

into an Orthodox synagogue. You would see the exact same service that you have in an Orthodox service. Uh just trying to think if it says it says Israel, the sacrifices that they brought, maybe have them again, which you have an unorthodox service. I don't know if

00:53:45.040 - 00:54:14.170

it says so in the said that that they use in the chapel. I don't know if it says those words right before the fire burning, the fire burning. I don't know if it's in there ah but men and women sit together at the service. Women generally

00:54:14.170 - 00:54:34.420

in our that was during my time. Also women got when I came here. The only thing that women had was the bat mitzvah which is girls. I used to do the Torah is what they did and from there on we sort of if you can do

00:54:34.420 - 00:54:56.250

it, you can do it. This was my my ruling eventually or practice. If you know how to do something, you're able to do it. I did not differentiate between male and female. At the convocation. We had those who wanted an Orthodox type service to go into

00:54:56.250 - 00:55:19.550

the chapel of the synagogue. Those who wanted a more conservative type of service can go into the sanctuary of the synagogue itself. We had we had vanilla and chocolate at Betty Sure, you can't tell me that You feel unhappy at Beth because there's only one type

00:55:19.550 - 00:55:41.960

of service. We have everybody over here if you want. Yeah. So having the chapel service as a more traditional option. That is correct. It could potentially have helped and donated $10,000. This was years and years and years ago. I think it was probably 70 years ago,

00:55:41.970 - 00:56:09.600

1946. They built the chapel At Becky sure. In a man donated $10,000. Now, I don't know how much of that to donate to build a chapel. And we had there for that type of service and the sanctuary for different. Tell me now about what happened to

00:56:09.610 - 00:56:33.270

your son Michael In 1981. Michael was a pre med student, University of Texas was a very good student and he wanted to be an orthopedic surgeon. And one day his one night he was in the library with his girlfriend. And she said that who later became

00:56:33.270 - 00:56:48.890

his wife. She said she hadn't examined 8:30 AM. She wanted to go home. So he took her in his car on the way home. But he said he doesn't have any, it's on e it's empty. He said he had to step off for some years. He

00:56:48.890 - 00:57:10.480

said I don't even have any money. She said she has $2, And he went inside And he saw nobody there, there's nobody inside. It was about 12 o'clock at night, one of these places that's open all night. So he walked over to the cash register and

00:57:10.480 - 00:57:31.860

he saw a strange thing. Cash register was open doing no dollar bills or anything like that in the Cash register so foolishly should have gotten out. He said, is anybody here? And three people came out to with revolvers, 38 caliber revolvers. And they said give me

00:57:31.860 - 00:57:44.670

your money. He said here, he said it's only two bucks over there said that's all I have to give me a wallet, I don't have a wallet. All I was my license. That's just about all. They said. Get into the freezer. They took him into the

00:57:44.680 - 00:58:03.410

freezer, lie down, lie down. And one fellow said waste the dude, those are the only thing. The last thing that he remembered. Waste the dude shoot him, kill him. Guy took his revolver, put it to his head and pulled the trigger, pulled right into his brain.

00:58:05.460 - 00:58:22.950

They left him for dead. They filled up with groceries, walked out. His girlfriend saw the three guys walking out with each one carrying two big bags of groceries and they skedaddle the, well the way the police within seven days, I know how they did it, but

00:58:22.960 - 00:58:40.750

you know, the police are good. I don't care what they say defund the police. Uh, if you defund the policing and I have left in this world over there, it would be terrible. Oh yeah. And what happened was they caught All three fellows. They called all

00:58:40.750 - 00:59:00.690

three of them. The shooter was sentenced to life in prison. Another one Who did not have a gun was sentenced to 25 years. Another one was sentenced to, I think 40 or something like that. They're all out on parole right now. But at least the shooter

00:59:00.700 - 00:59:19.700

was in jail for 32 years. He was environment my son Michael said said at least we kept him off the streets for 32, 32 years and they were just murderers. That's just about it for no reason at all. For no reason to sell them to kill

00:59:19.700 - 00:59:41.210

him. That's just about. they all walked out of the uh it wasn't a supermarket was like a grocery store, a little all night place laughing, smiling after they shot him already. Each one carrying two big bags. Michael was four months in the hospital, four months when

00:59:41.210 - 00:59:58.390

we came there, we drove up that night. The the doctor told us at six o'clock in the morning he didn't operate because he didn't think he would make it. He could not make it. But he said he would operate. It was a four hour surgery and

00:59:58.390 - 01:00:17.490

he said he was strong. He said he didn't make it. But it was, it was a tough situation. It left him with, he lives on his right leg, doesn't have motion of his right arm over here. But a year and a half later he went back

01:00:17.490 - 01:00:45.560

to school and he graduated phi beta kappa. He was he was a pretty smart fellow. He had a tutor for him. But roger Reagan incredible story. That's right. And the mother of the shooter will never forget the complaint was she's taken to the A. C. L.

01:00:45.560 - 01:01:08.360

U. Because the police would not let or allow her son the shooter to watch the Dallas cowboys football game on sunday over there. He was in jail for murder and they wouldn't let him watch the football game and that's the only thing that bothered him. Mhm.

01:01:10.080 - 01:01:39.190

But you have to live for tomorrow, not for yesterday. There's nothing you can accomplish yesterday, incredible story of survival and strength and perseverance. And he's now tell us about what he's going on to do. Michael is going on two. He finally went back to the University

01:01:39.190 - 01:02:04.730

of texas, graduated phi beta kappa and but he couldn't be premed anymore, it was too much. And he went to graduate school, University of Houston for social work. And he works actually, he has an article, I just went over with him this week. He writes for

01:02:04.740 - 01:02:26.630

what's this magazine? This is a book, it's called, it's called. I can't think of the names of the books, the whole series of books he has and 12 of them. He has articles And this one, what he does is he developed, he works now at Ben

01:02:26.630 - 01:02:54.380

Taub Hospital for the last 10 years and he nice life, happier for the patients, he says. And there as a social worker and but he does over there, he has like a he finds out who has a birthday and what they do is they have a

01:02:55.450 - 01:03:21.670

ah cupcake they bring them when they have somebody coming to sing, happy birthday, have a card that they're given and they have like a birthday party for people who are suffered traumatic incidents and they're in the hospital had been in motorcycle accidents shot in the head

01:03:21.680 - 01:03:48.030

and things like that. And he does that right now for Ben tom hospital, he does that and he gets it right up every year. His write ups are 12345 stars. He gets almost always total five stars, patients love him. Peps up their spirits over the because

01:03:48.030 - 01:04:03.520

he tells them my story. If I can do it, you can do it also. He says I was dead and you can do the exact same thing. You can put yourself up by your bootstraps. This is what you can do before we move on to a

01:04:03.530 - 01:04:31.300

few more topics. I should ask you about your other Children. Michael is my second son. My oldest son, Jeffrey lives in Greensboro north Carolina. He went on as a young student, he was fair, but then he's sort of blossomed and he became really super student. He

01:04:31.310 - 01:05:02.680

got all the awards in medical school all over, he was getting all the awards and he went on to become a neurosurgeon. Ah he worked in California in indiana Greensboro north Carolina now and He has two Children and one life, Michael, I told you his wife

01:05:02.690 - 01:05:22.830

Sharon, she stood by him all the time even after he was wounded and hurt. And her family also did the likewise same thing. Her parents now, both passed away. Her mother just passed away. I'd say about maybe a year and a half ago. Father died at

01:05:22.830 - 01:05:55.670

a young age, my daughter lisa. He's married to matt that's an eminent attorney here in town. He went to south texas College of Law and texas and lisa is one of the top real estate agents in Harris County. There are I think in 5,000 6000 agents

01:05:56.190 - 01:06:21.600

in Harris County and she was Number seven and number five of of all that she does very well and she's a beautiful girl also. And my son Scott is married to Dina. They have two Children in the 2nd and 4th grade day school and scotty is

01:06:21.600 - 01:06:57.640

a opthamologist. He went to medical school here at the University of texas in what he called, not in Houston. And where do we have you? TMB University of texas medical branch. He went to school and he took his residency. So um you are you are known

01:06:57.650 - 01:07:20.530

for many things but one of the things that you're known for is sayings or aphorisms and one of them is focus on the bagel. Not on the whole, tell us about that. That was the name of my second book I wrote six books. One of them

01:07:20.540 - 01:07:39.310

is Two Roads to God moses wrote, jesus wrote, which is the differences between Judaism and Christianity. The other five books have to do with titles I left it on, you know the sheets that I gave. You have to do with short stories, 56 pages long, seven

01:07:39.310 - 01:08:01.150

pages long which tells stories which have good endings to it most stories and you're weeping, you're crying pretty sad. You don't feel good. These have good endings to them and focus on the bail, not on the whole, those who concentrate on the whole can't eat the

01:08:01.150 - 01:08:19.860

whole, but if you focus on the bagel you got at least like on television, they say use your bagel and schmear it with philadelphia, cream cheese. They even use the Yiddish word, schmear it, that was spread across it. Same thing here, you focus on the bagel,

01:08:19.860 - 01:08:41.300

you get a good meal, focus on the whole, you're gonna get a lot of air and you're gonna burp all the time. This is what's going to happen. Yeah, that was my second um tell us about mile by mile. Mile by mile. It's a trial yard

01:08:41.300 - 01:09:00.920

by yard now, inch per inch. It's a cinch, which means if you try to do something mild in a mile, you'll never do it. I mean somebody jumped, for example, a mile at a time, that's gonna be very hard. You try to do something, you try

01:09:00.920 - 01:09:21.220

to bite off a gigantic thing that's pretty hard. Even yard by yard, it's a little smaller but it's still very difficult but inch per inch. It's a cinch. If you try to do things slowly, small bites at a time we'll be able to achieve it. That

01:09:21.220 - 01:09:48.110

was the yeah, I know that philosophy has helped. Lots and lots of people over the I think it's true actually. It's not always true, but at least it helps people to achieve something. It helps people to achieve something very good. There's a lot of uproar today

01:09:48.110 - 01:10:10.330

or hand wringing about conservative Judaism. Conservative Judaism is in danger that it's dying out, you know, and and we seem to be living in a time when, you know, there's no such thing as the center anymore. Right? People are on the left, there, on the right,

01:10:10.340 - 01:10:29.060

it's a very polarized world that we live in. And where do you see the future of the conservative movement? Well, I hope that it's my feeling is that Conservative movement is like a sine curve. I don't know if you know mathematics, you know sine curve goes

01:10:29.060 - 01:10:48.620

like this up and down, up and down up and down. It has its ups and it has its downs. It's had a time like after World War Two, it was going to the heavens, you know, it was going astronautical. E then how high can you go?

01:10:48.630 - 01:11:05.440

You know, then you start slipping down, then you go back up again. And this is what happened. My feeling is that conservative Judaism is like the sign curve. It has its ups and it has, it sounds, it may have come down to my life when I

01:11:05.440 - 01:11:29.550

left, I came to the synagogue, We have 1450 members, 1450 members. When I left we had 2100 families, I think it was caused a lot of people were moving to Houston. That was number one by people, I mean Jewish people moving to Houston. And so we

01:11:29.550 - 01:11:49.050

had a greater number of Jews living in Houston when I came, I think there were 18,000 Jews, then we went up to close to 50,000 Jews. So we, we were lucky we participated getting members over there. I don't know how it is with the other synagogues

01:11:49.060 - 01:12:12.460

right now, but I think that um membership is not the most important thing is very important, but it's not the most important thing. It's participatory, which is probably the most important thing. How many people actually participate in the synagogue service programs and things like that? I

01:12:12.460 - 01:12:30.730

think the conservative movement will bounce back again. It's like I call it trampoline, Judaism, trampoline Judaism, you go down and you're going all the way down, but as soon as you hit that rubber, you go up again over here and I think the same thing will

01:12:30.730 - 01:12:59.170

happen with the conservative movement also. So we're starting to come to the end of the conversation. You have been in Houston now 55, Almost 60 years. How has Houston changed? Well, I think we've expanded the number of day schools over here. Number of day schools have

01:12:59.170 - 01:13:21.520

expanded people realized at a day school education for a kid is to be preferred. It's very good. I don't know if it's because maybe many of the schools top notch schools in the public school system. Always here. Also I hear the President of the United States

01:13:22.130 - 01:13:44.570

speaking always, he condemns the United States all the time. He speaks about systemic racism over here is if we hate if I ever met with the president, I would say Mr President Mr biden. I'm so sorry that you are a racist because I'm not a racist.

01:13:44.580 - 01:14:02.750

My wife is not a racist. My Children are not racist. My parents were never racist. So the word systemic, if you look it up in the dictionary, which I did means from head to toe, totally, completely. Absolutely. That means somebody has to be left in the

01:14:02.750 - 01:14:20.660

systemic racism. So must be you and your family. You must be the systemic racist over here because you always speak about no matter what happens over here, we're racist. I never thought of this. I never had thought about racism over here, but you always speak about,

01:14:20.660 - 01:14:38.920

it's like when Barack Obama became president the first time you went on a lecture tour, he went to all the arab states to remember and he apologized for the United States being a racist country. Why should I apologize for something that I'm not over here? But

01:14:38.930 - 01:14:55.910

if you're apologizing for something, it must be that a disease that you and your family actually suffer from. And I would say to him, Mr biden, I'm so sorry for you. If you'd come and spell a couple of friday night Shabbat in my home, you would

01:14:55.910 - 01:15:18.470

see that racism doesn't come up over here. On the contrary in my say there on night, I have a quotation about this size from martin Luther King, you know I had a dream, I have that over there. We say that I don't know when you do

01:15:18.480 - 01:15:35.450

in your dinner's in your house, How many christmases did you have martin Luther King's statement over there? You must be the racist that you're apologizing for. So I'd appreciate if you're saying my family and I would like to apologize for being racist over here is what

01:15:35.450 - 01:15:54.030

I'd like to tell. I would tell him that. Tell them that if you look at purity of thought that says talk is not the important thing. Lower echo L. A masa actions speak louder than words I was for Mr trump I was for I from Mr

01:15:54.040 - 01:16:10.040

trump what he accomplished. I wouldn't want him to be my son in law to be very honest with you. He's a bombastic individual. No two ways about it. But look what he accomplished in this country over there. How many jobs he brought in, how many businesses

01:16:10.040 - 01:16:26.770

he brought in over there and all they do is from the first day he came in, they cursed him and insulted him actions. Speak louder than words no matter what he did, no matter what he does today. Still being blamed over here. Mr biden. I'm so

01:16:26.770 - 01:16:47.710

sorry for you that you are a racist. I'm really sorry that you have to go along and apologize all the time. So we were talking about you know how the Houston jewish community has changed? Obviously there's more, more day schools now. More synagogues and also people

01:16:47.710 - 01:17:04.390

living further used to be. Everybody was living more or less in minor land and memorial, but now Maya Lin Memorial an air shock. I lived in air shot 9/10 of a mile from the shore. It's close by. I mean it's really right now. You have Jews

01:17:04.390 - 01:17:26.990

in the woodlands and all over. All over. All over. There's a lot of, a lot of growth. Why don't we, why don't we end? What, what would you like your legacy to be? All your years in Houston, Bethea Suren when people remember you, when they think

01:17:26.990 - 01:17:49.630

of Rabbi Jack Siegel, what would you like them to think of them? Participatory jews rather than just membership jews over that they like to participate in jewish programs. That's what I'd like to Judaism is not just something that's not just like a membership in a country,

01:17:50.870 - 01:18:14.200

but rather it's also participating in jewish religious functions. Very good Rabbi, thank you so much. I really enjoyed the conversation our time together. Was there anything that I didn't ask you that you wanted to talk about? Not really if you buzz me, you know how to

01:18:14.200 - 01:18:14.910

get ahold of me