Rabbi Jordan Pearlson Was My Rabbi

Rabbi Jordan Pearlson was my rabbi. I feel lucky and proud to be able to say so. He was a mentor to me, a teacher, and a role model. I was not of the generation of Temple Sinai members who had him as their confirmation teacher, but I still had the privilege of learning from him as he spoke from the bimah, interacted with my family, and led us in prayer.

While I was in rabbinical school, he handed me a document that he had written some years earlier. (It is not dated, but was printed on a dot-matrix machine, so we know the era!) The document is entitled “So you’re leading the service today:” and outlines instructions and pointers to leaders of morning minyan in the (now named) Rabbi Jordan Pearlson Chapel. In reading over his instructions, we gain a glimpse into his approach not only to leading prayer, but to his role as our rabbi, in general. In looking at these pointers, we can all be reminded of the goal of prayer, and our challenge as worshippers. Here are some highlights:

1. Don’t “perform.” Do pray. Lead by example rather than theatrics.

2. Don’t get between those you lead the One they pray to.
a) Every eye contact between you and them is a distraction. It is not their approval you are praying for.
b) Lower—don’t raise—your voice during joint readings. Let them feel their own strength.
c) After the Amidah, while you are waiting for others to finish, sit down.
There should be no distracting presence standing between the congregants and the ark. Body language is another way of putting yourself between them and the One they pray to.

3. Your greatest measure of success is when they are strong and you are almost invisible. Your triumph occurs when they follow you into prayer with enough intensity to pass beyond you. The less you do to put yourself in their way, the greater is your achievement. It is not the reader they come to worship.
Indeed, Rabbi Pearlson lived by these simple rules. He led by example and encouraged us to surpass him. He realised that his role as rabbi was to help us connect to God rather than to him and he did not get in the way of that. He let us feel our own strength and learn and grow from it. His humility was a measure of his wisdom.

Rabbi Pearlson ended his instructions with this note to the readers: “My pride in our team of readers is great and grows greater as their skills and sincerity rub off on those whom they lead in prayer. You are one of the great ones. Thank you for the teaching you do by the example you set. Temple could not be what it is without you.”

Jordan, Temple Sinai could not be what it is without you. You were truly one of the great ones. Thank you for the teaching you did by the example you set. It lives on in this building; it lives on in the lives of all that you touched. And it continues to be passed down through the wisdom you shared and instilled in us.

Rabbi Erin Polonsky