Stratford's New Rabbi Hopes to Teach by Example
October 15, 2003 by Howard Blas
STRATFORD, CT — If you were looking to rent a car or truck in Toronto about 20 years ago, you might have dealt with an enterprising, customer friendly young man
named Bryan Bramly. If you were looking for Jewish life on the University of Victoria campus (a few years later), you may have come across Bramly, a political science and psychology student who was serving as lay Jewish chaplain and host of a Jewish radio program. If you were looking to purchase office equipment in Western Canada, you may have worked with him as well. It has been an evolving path from Canada to Israel, to Manhattan, a few scholar-in-residence pulpits across the United States, and finally to Stratford.
Bramly, a rabbinical student at JTS (the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York) is the new rabbi of Temple Beth Sholom, Stratford’s Conservative synagogue. And he couldn’t be happier. Not that it is easy being a pulpit rabbi, a husband to Laura and father to Ezra Academy students Rachelle (6th grade) and Benyamin (1st grade) and a rabbinical student who spends his commuting time on the Metro North train studying Talmud.
Bramly recalls the day when, as a child, pretending to be a great architect and experiencing momentary frustration while building with Tinker Toys, his empathic grandmother put her hand on his shoulder and comforted him saying, “Don’t worry, ketsil, you can always become a rabbi.” He didn’t pay much attention to her advice; he went to university, held various business jobs and was determined to go to law school. He was always interested in the intricacies of law and in history; he also loved public speaking and was
well-known among both friends and strangers for his approachability. One day, a friend called out of the blue to suggest, “Why don’t you become a rabbi?”
When more than two people offered the same sage advice, Bramly knew it was more than a coincidence. He and his wife spent the next year in Israel doing outreach to college students traveling and studying in Israel--and thinking about future directions.
“We had a very large apartment in the Jewish Quarter and our Shabbos table always had tons of guests until all hours of the night,” he recalls. The Israel experience solidified Bramly’s decision to become a rabbi.
“When I started rabbinical school, Rabbi Lebeau (Dean of the Rabbinical School) said, “To want to be a rabbi is to acknowledge that one has no desire to do anything but be a rabbi.”
He credits his grandparents with being his earliest teachers of Yiddishkeit, and Rabbi Victor Reinstein, former rabbi of Congregation
Emanu-El in Victoria, British Columbia, for “transmitting spiritual, intellectual, and thought provoking love of Judaism.”
Bramly spent the past three years working n Manhattan as assistant to Rabbi Stephen Friedman at Congregation Ramath Orah (Modern Orthodox) on the Upper West Side.
“Not only did Rabbi Friedman demonstrate how to take a shul which was unable to make a minyan five years ago and turn it into a place which now has 400 people on Friday nights, he has showed me that all the things my grandparents and Rabbi Reinstein imparted to me can be married together and are only worth anything when given back to the people.”
“Temple Beth Sholom is radiating a desire to learn and grow,” says Bramly. “This gives me my charge.” Bramly has many exciting plans for his congregants. Throughout the year, he will offer classes on Judaism which will “be a reconnection for some, and an exploration for others.” He hopes to teach by example, modeling to his congregation that one can be fully immersed in modernity, while being fully committed to Jewish observance and practice.
He is personally committed, but he is open minded.
“As a rabbi, it is not my job to be God’s policeman, but rather to be God’s ambassador.”
Bramly adds, “It is my job to meet people where they are and symbolically stretch out my hand and walk together with them.”
Howard Blas is a freelance writer in New Haven. Comments? Email
editorial@jewishledger.com