Who We Are
Beth El’s Story
From the beginning…
Our synagogue was born on August 27, 1993, in the living room of an apartment on 70th Street between York and First Avenue in Manhattan’s Upper East Side, with a group of seven interested local people and our Rabbi & Rebbetzin, Bruce & Debi Cohen, who came to Manhattan to build a “Two-Testament” Jewish Synagogue.
At the time Beth El began, our rabbi and rebbetzin had a combined thirty-five years of ministry and leadership experience in teaching, conference speaking, youth-ministry and education, as well as front-line recognition in musical worship, and Israeli-style dance-as-worship. Additionally, both been honored national and international representatives or officers of their national religious alliance organization, and even editors and authors in Movement-wide periodicals and journals.s
Like most “overnight success stories,” Beth El of Manhattan was actually long in preparation.
Through many affirmations from many corners of the Messianic Jewish world’s leadership, Rabbi Bruce and Rebbetzin Debi Cohen received what was considered a clear call to establish a “Messianic Jewish” congregation in the capital of the Jewish world outside Israel – the island of Manhattan, where no “Two Testament” synagogue had ever been able to thrive, even with large evangelical associations pouring millions of dollars at their disposal into their own organization’s efforts. It never resulted in an enduring, healthy congregation. It should be noted, Manhattan is often thought of as “the western-most suburb of Jerusalem.” (In light of the deliberate way God led the Cohens. in 1992 into their Israeli citizenship in Jerusalem just before the planting of this Manhattan synagogue, this is a fascinating glimpse of God moving the chess pieces on the board in long-term strategy.)
In the two weeks following the August 1993 Beth El preparatory meeting on 70th Street, a retired New York Messiah-believing Jewish couple who had been praying for years for such a synagogue to rise in Manhattan’s Upper East Side – where 100,000s of Jewish people live in one 40 x 5 block neighborhood – learned of Beth El being started. This Manhattan-resident couple had already explored the Upper East Side for the best meeting location possible, and had by faith arranged a deal in what they considered an ideal meeting place: The Barbizon Hotel on 63rd Street & Lexington Avenue. Without having met the Cohens, this couple felt led through prayer that Beth El was the answer to their long-term prayers, and in early September 1993 donated their deal with the Barbizon to Beth El of Manhattan. And so, the Beth El story began to unfold in real history.
Till now…
Beth El exists through the faith, commitments, co-laboring, and giving of its constituency: our growth in impact – from Los Angeles to Jerusalem, New York to Moscow to Cape Town, South Africa – all results across time from what is done or shared by those with a shared vision for the nature of our work.
Shortly after the 1993 first Rosh HaShanah service, Rabbi Bruce received a phone call out of the blue from a ministry in another part of the country that asked Beth El if the newly-planted Manhattan synagogue wanted a full-sized Torah. We, of course, said yes!
Beth El’s Rabbi Bruce was in 1993 one of very few American Messianic rabbis who could actually read from and teach directly from the unpointed Hebrew text of the Torah; and the Biblical model of teaching directly from the scroll to the people (Nehemiah 8:7-8) was near the heart of the vision Rabbi Bruce had for the service of a Manhattan congregation serving the most Judaism-erudite, Jewish-perpetuity-conscious population outside Israel in the entire world.
The young Beth El of Manhattan suddenly, found itself with a full-sized Torah scroll with a beautiful history: it was composed of three Torah scroll fragments having survived the Holocaust in Europe and having been sewn together to form one complete, kosher Torah scroll.
A short time later, a Manhattan Jewish businessman walked up to Rabbi Bruce at a party for mutual friend, and casually said, “Well, Rabbi - your Manhattan office is ready.” This God-following businessman - William Reese, owner and President of Litigation Graphics, Inc.” continued, “We have just moved into a new suite of offices, and as the architect and I were laying out the design, the Lord showed me I should include an office space for you. It’s done now, and you can move in any time you want.”
God was clearly at work.
The people in Beth El at the time can tell you, before the Torah or Office were donated, I had told them, “If I understand correctly as I am asking God to lead us in this effort, our Torah and Office are going to be donated to us. We will not have wait to have them; God is leading people to give them to us so we can ‘hit the ground running.’” Baruch HaShem. So it went.
In the time since Beth El started at in the Barbizon Hotel, the congregation has thrived in various rented facilities (see link here for recommendation letter from one), and totally “virtually” (online) during the two-year 2020-2022 Covid-19 quarantine. In June 2022, the synagogue re-started Shabbat Morning & Jewish Holiday Services in-person in The Park Avenue Methodist Building on the SE corner of 86th Street & Park Avenue.
Our midweek תורה ותפילה “Torah & T’filah (Teaching & Prayer) Meetings are entirely virtual via Zoom, as are our אחוה Achvah (Brotherhood) and אחיות Achayot (Sisterhood) weekly prayer & fellowship meetings.
Our longstanding and dynamic relationship with Jerusalem and all of Israel is still firmly in place – and the last few years have seen several trips to our Homeland for ministry and life-cycle events. Our Jerusalem and Israel-wide rhythm of service is definitely on the uptick from 2021 to the present (late 2023).
So – let us ask … might you be “us?” :-)
Might anything from intermittent attendance or prayer and/or financial support, all the way to full Membership (local or “virtual”) be for you?
If you are within local travel; distance of Manhattan, in-person Membership would enable you to savor and partake of all that the Hebrews 10:25 “synagoguing of ourselves together” provides. Yet – if you are not within reasonable travel distance of Manhattan – you can be a full Member of Beth El as a Virtual Member. We have Members who live thousands of miles from New York, and are central to the congregational life.
Please do explore our website, and call or write to us with any questions. If you are a returner (Hosea 3:4-5) in this historic season of HaYishuv –“The Return” (Ezekiel 36:24-33), then this might be the spiritual “home” for which you have been praying and searching.
Kadima! (Forward!) as we say around here.
The story continues – and you might just be a part of it! Shalom.
Let the story continue…
The following video done a few years ago gives you a taste of who we are & what we do.
Y’hi ratzon (May it be God’s will) there is much more to come.
And who knows … maybe your story will become interwoven with this one across time?
If you have never visited the synagogue … maybe now is the time.
“Visit because you are intrigued. Stay because you’re home.” Shalom and Kadima!