For much of the Jewish world, Rabbi Moshe Kotlarsky, whose first yahrtzeit (27 Iyar) is Sunday, May 25, is probably best known as the booming host of the International Conference of Chabad Lubavitch Emissaries. With obvious delight, he would call out the roll-call, reading off an ever-growing list of countries where Chabad has a permanent presence (currently all 50 states and more than 100 countries).
Many also knew him in person as the globe-trotting emissary who would take exhausting trips around the world on behalf of the Chabad-Lubavitch World Headquarters, seeking opportunities to enhance Jewish life and observance, and when appropriate, lay the ground for a permanent Chabad presence.
With an uncanny ability to connect with people, he was equally comfortable with billionaire benefactors and struggling community members. In the words of his longtime friend and philanthropic partner George Rohr, he “oozed charisma from every pore.”
And those who knew him well remember him foremost as a dedicated footsoldier in the army of the Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, of righteous memory. “What drove him every day was fulfilling the Rebbe's wishes—giving the Rebbe nachas,” Rohr says.
Rohr recalls that he first met Kotlarsky in 1979, in what he calls “the early years” of his family’s “love affair with Chabad.” He was twenty-four years old and fresh out of graduate school, when his father handed him the Kotlarsky home phone number with a simple statement: you have an open Shabbat invitation.
“We connected right away over his tremendous zest for life and unique sense of humor. I felt extremely welcome, and in a sense, I never left,” Rohr recalls. That first Shabbat in the Kotlarskys' welcoming home “opened up my eyes to an entire world of Chabad.”
Only a few years his senior, Kotlarsky was something of an avuncular figure for Rohr back then. Rohr recalls the rabbi as constantly encouraging him to find his life-partner and start a family. When things got serious, he insisted on meeting the future bride and urged them not to drag out the courtship but to get married as soon as possible.
A Unique Partnership
“I learned from him how to seize opportunities,” says Rohr, citing how the rabbi partnered with the Rohr family in expanding the Chabad presence in Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union, elsewhere around the world, and on college campuses.
“Ours was a partnership like no other,” Rohr reflects. “We’d talk openly and often about any aspect of the work. For many months after his passing, whenever an opportunity or challenge arose relating to the work of the Chabad emissaries we are privileged to support, my natural reflex was to reach for the phone to call him.”
Over the course of five decades of frequent marathon trips (sometimes spending nearly every night in a different city for weeks at a time), Kotlarsky encountered thousands of people, serving alternately as rabbi, fundraiser, and friend—and sometimes as all three at once.
Many of the rabbi's early trips were in the American South, which historically lacked the infrastructure of the Northeast.
Whenever he was in the area, he’d make sure to swing by his friend from yeshiva days in Montreal, Rabbi Moshe Stern, who served as spiritual leader of Knesseth Israel Congregation in Birmingham, Ala. Stern recalls how they would drive around town together, visiting people, uplifting their spirits, and encouraging them to grow in their Jewish observance.
In one instance, the duo visited a hardware store owner who shared that he’d just had his tefillin stolen. While Judaica goods could be ordered from Boston, it would take weeks for them to arrive. “Rabbi Kotlarsky asked us to wait just a second and ran out to his suitcase in my car. He came back with a pair of tefillin, explaining that he always traveled with extra pairs for people who may need them.”
Characteristically, he refused payment, arguing that it was his honor to be able to facilitate another person’s mitzvah observance.
Stern says that despite Kotlarsky’s heavy travel commitments, he and his wife made sure to attend Stern family weddings, bar mitzvahs, and other family events. When each of the Stern boys turned 13, the Kotlarskys hosted a celebration in their home in Brooklyn. The highlight of the trip was when Kotlarsky would escort the boys to services at Lubavitch World Headquarters, where they were called up to the Torah in the presence of the Rebbe.
“My boys still talk about the experience,” says the rabbi, now retired and living in Israel.
When asked what made Kotlarsky special for him, Stern lists several points: His sense of humor, his gentle personality, his love of people, and above all, his ironclad devotion to the Rebbe’s mission to bring every Jew closer to Judaism.
Lifelong Friendships
It can be said that this devotion made him a central figure in the life of Ivan Silverman, who today lives in Woodmere, N.Y., but grew up in the South.
Originally from Nashville, Tenn., the Silverman family increased their Jewish observance through the guidance of the late Rabbi Zalman Posner. Recognizing the need for a Jewish high school for their daughters, the family sought the advice of the Rebbe. In a letter, the Rebbe counseled them to move to Memphis, which boasted a more established Jewish presence, and assured them that things would work out well for the family.
As they established themselves in Memphis, Kotlarsky was an encouraging figure for the family.
“He facilitated my late father meeting the Rebbe twice,” says Silverman, “and he was at his bedside during his untimely passing in 1976—after flying to Memphis from Brooklyn on the intermediate days of Passover with matzah from the Rebbe in hand.”
He remained a strong presence for Rose Silverman and her children as they learned to live without their breadwinner. And as the young orphan navigated his way through Jewish overnight camp, yeshiva, college, marriage, parenthood and beyond, he says Kotlarsky was a constant support and mentor.
More recently, when Rose was not well, Ivan wished to go to the Rebbe’s resting place, the Ohel, to pray for her. There he was met by Kotlarsky, himself battling a serious illness, who helped him formulate his petition and accompanied him into the Ohel to pray.
In his words: “My family is who they are today largely because of his strong influence and love.”
In a world that often celebrates the grand gesture, Rabbi Moshe Kotlarsky’s success can perhaps be attributed to his lifelong drive to be the Rebbe’s footsoldier—to emulate the Rebbe’s teachings and personal example to treat every individual, every opportunity, and every mitzvah as if it were the most important in the world.
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