HBT Archives: Remembering Rabbi Jacob J. Eisen

Remembering Rabbi Jacob J. Eisen

By Michael Cole and Sheila Smolkin, Holy Blossom Archives Committee

In 1953, Holy Blossom’s membership had reached 1200 families, at which time, a second rabbi became necessary. Ordinarily, a congregation in this situation would engage a recent graduate of Hebrew Union College. We hired a veteran of several years in the rabbinate and a veteran of World War II. It was an inspired choice. Our new assistant rabbi was a mild-mannered, self-effacing gentleman and a perfect foil for the dynamic and often controversial senior rabbi, Abraham L. Feinberg.

Jacob (Jack) Eisen was a graduate of the Jewish Institute of Religion before its merger with HUC, and he was the founding rabbi of Beth Shalom, a Conservative congregation in Edmonton, Alberta, where he served from 1932 until 1942, before enlisting in the RCAF as its first Jewish chaplain. (Apparently, it took much lobbying for him to be accepted into the Air Force due to his hearing impairment and American citizenship. Born in Massachusetts, his family moved to Georgetown, Ontario when he was a child.)

Upon his enrolment in the RCAF, Squadron Leader Eisen was posted to air bases across Canada until he was shipped off to England, where young Canadian men were training for the invasion of Europe. There, he was responsible for the spiritual needs of the Jewish airmen, which involved providing for the Jewish holidays (including holding Passover seders in a London hotel) and, occasionally, officiating at the weddings of ‘his boys’ to local Jewish women.

After the war, Rabbi Eisen remained in Europe, working for the Canadian Jewish Congress and the Joint Distribution Committee in helping ‘displaced’ Jews from all over the continent find new homes in North America. He returned to Canada in 1951, serving as a temporary rabbi in some small Ontario congregations before being called to Holy Blossom, where he remained until both he and Rabbi Feinberg retired in 1961. After that, Rabbi Eisen, a lifelong bachelor, travelled widely and assisted congregations over the High Holy Days in such far-flung locations as Ireland and New Zealand.

Rabbi Eisen was a great friend of the Danson family here at Holy Blossom. Bert Danson served with him in the RCAF, and his sister, Marilyn (Farber), knew him from her days at summer camp in Maine when Jack Eisen was a rabbinical student and counsellor to Bert. At Selichot services in 1975, shortly after his passing, Marilyn remembered him thus:

The Jewish boys in the Air Force cherished his friendship. He had a remarkable ‘person-to-person’ relationship with hundreds of men in the services. He wrote to their families to let them know he had seen their boys and how they were getting along. He was a source of comfort to bereaved families through letters and, whenever possible, called on them personally when he returned to Canada. After the war and until recent years, he received invitations from ex-airmen from coast to coast asking him to officiate at their simchas. Whenever possible, he went.

And of his years at Holy Blossom and beyond, Marilyn described Rabbi Eisen as “a one-man mitzvah committee, remembering those who had been forgotten by others. He was, indeed, his brothers’ keeper.”

Not many current Temple members remember Rabbi Eisen, and few, if any, of his Air Force boys are still among us. However, as we approach Remembrance Day this year, it is just and fitting that the story of people like him, who served their nation and their people with courage and dignity, be told to the generations who succeed him.

The Archives Committee receives inquiries regularly. We invite you to contact us about this or other areas of interest at: [email protected].   We are always interested in learning and sharing more about our remarkable history. We also encourage you to examine the archival displays in the Schwartz-Reisman Atrium.