By Eliyah B.
Seventh Grade, Krieger Schechter Day School of Chizuk Amuno Congregation
Hawaii, a tropical paradise, is the place everyone wants to visit. In this Utopia, there resides a small, homegrown gathering of Jews. From the outside, it seems like heaven, but in reality the Hawaiian Jewish community is struggling.
The Jewish people on Oahu, the island home to Honolulu, are small in number and have one of the highest intermarriage rates in the world, according to Barbara Fischlowitz-Leong, current president of Oahu Jewish Ohana (OJO), a synagogue on the island of Oahu.
Hawaii’s first Jews immigrated to the Polynesian islands area from Brazil after the Spanish Inquisition. As time went on, more Jews arrived from the continental United States, which the islanders call the mainland, Fischlowitz-Leong explains.
The Jews of Hawaii worship at five different congregations spread across the state. Temple Emanuel is the Reform synagogue which rents space for services. Sof Ma’arav, a Conservative temple, meets in a church building, and a Chabad shul gathers in a local hotel. The only house of worship with a designated building is the Aloha Military Chapel, which was founded specifically for army troops and their relatives.
The Oahu Jewish Ohana, meaning family in Hawaiian, is a splinter congregation from Temple Emanuel. Founded upon the rabbi’s firing without cause, OJO has operated for six years. For the first three years, they had a part-time rabbi, and today congregants lead services. Currently, holiday services and Saturday morning Torah study sessions are held at the Moiliili Hongwanji Buddhist Temple.
According to Fischlowitz-Leong, the Jewish community of Oahu is extremely special. “We live in the most isolated area in the world with a civilization; we’re very far from other Jews,” she remarked.
With the nearest land mass being a five-hour plane ride away, they truly are isolated. But even so, modern culture thrives, through tourism and the internet, alongside their native culture.
Although the cultural vibe is strong, and many people visit every year, very few live on the archipelago, primarily because there are two social classes on Oahu: the upper-class that can afford nice homes and the lower-class that lives in poverty. Because of this, very few Jews relocate to Hawaii, so the community changes very slowly.
This has made it very hard for OJO to accomplish their goals, according to Fischlowitz-Leong.
“The plan of the congregation is to hire a [full-time] rabbi, because we have survived six years without one,” she explains. Finding a rabbi proves difficult, especially since the job requires uprooting a life and family and committing to a million-plus dollar home.
Once a new rabbi joins the congregation, the community would likely become a Jewish Ohana, a kehilah, a family.
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