What if you couldn’t get to synagogue on a Saturday morning — either because of an illness, a disability or bad weather? Would you watch Shabbat services live on the Web?
A Santa Cruz rabbi is making that possible.
Rabbi Yitzhak Miller is the founding director of CyberJudaism.org, a Web portal for synagogues to stream services live and to host “webinars” and online group classes. The portal also gives rabbis a way to offer virtual counseling or advice to Jews anywhere.
What makes CyberJudaism.org different from other online Jewish ventures is that it’s not creating original content or selling its own Judaica.
Rather, it will collect and distribute webcasts, course materials and Judaica from synagogues around the world. It’s believed to be the only Web-based clearinghouse for such information.
“This is a 21st century community,” Miller said.
The technology to broadcast live feeds and host interactive online learning is not cheap to use or simple to develop, Miller said. Though many synagogues already upload podcasts or webcasts to their own Web sites, thousands of small synagogues will never have the resources to do that on their own.
That’s where Miller’s CyberJudaism.org can help.
“We’re giving synagogues the opportunity to reach out in ways they couldn’t before,” he said.
Synagogues would have to simply purchase a digital video camera to record services or classes, and Miller would do all the work to put the content on the Web.
Synagogues would pay CyberJudaism.org to provide such a service. Much of the content would be free to individual users, although other elements, such as group classes, might require a registration fee that would in part generate revenue for the synagogue.
“Shulcasting” is making its debut just in time for Rosh Hashanah. So far, five synagogues in three movements (Humanist, Reform and Conservative) have signed on to shulcast their services for the New Year.
“I think we may stay home and watch the service on the Web,” said Charlotte Evans, who lives in West New York, N.J., with her husband and two young children, who are 3 years old and 18 months.
“The synagogue I like best and am comfortable in is way downtown [in Manhattan] and I don’t know that I want to travel with kids on Yom Kippur,” Evans said. Watching it on the Web would “make it more of a family thing.”
Evans studies with Miller in the hopes of conversion. She found the “cyber rabbi” via his own Web site, in which he provides education, guidance for wedding preparation and b’nai mitzvah training via video conferencing, telephone calls and e-mails.
A Santa Cruz native, Miller has a technology management degree from Stanford University and worked in business for seven years before becoming ordained at Hebrew Union College in Los Angeles in 2003.
He has previously served as a pulpit rabbi at Congregation Emeth in Gilroy and at Temple Beth El in Riverside.
Through his Web site, he teaches and counsels to a range of people: a sergeant on tour in Iraq who wants to convert, a sales manager in Chicago whose work schedule prohibits him from attending classes at a nearby synagogue, and a park ranger who wants to prepare for his Jewish wedding but lives five hours from the nearest rabbi.
Since January, Crystal Hines has studied with Miller via regular e-mails and telephone calls, and plenty of reading new bookcase,” Hines said of the huge amount of books and articles Miller has assigned her. “He lets us work at our own pace.”
Hines, 26, lives in Corvallis, Ore., because her husband, a Marine, was assigned to a post there. They hope to move to Hawaii in the next couple of years.
In the meantime, Hines has access to the only synagogue in Corvallis, which is Reconstructionist. But she prefers the Reform movement — and the nearest Reform rabbi is 70 miles away in Portland.
“I would have had to put my learning on hiatus [until after I moved] if not for Rabbi Yitzi,” she said.
Reaching people in ways a pulpit cannot is a big reason Miller likes the Internet.
“I’ve always been passionate about serving unconnected and disenfranchised Jews and those curious about exploring Judaism,” Miller said.
He started CyberJudaism.org to bring Jewish life and learning to many more people than he could on his own.
The structure of the Web site mimics that of an actual synagogue. Click on the “spiritual center” — watch a live daily minyan or Shabbat service. Click on “learning center” — participate in interactive classes or listen to lectures.
Miller has heard from concerned rabbis and lay leaders who say CyberJudaism.org will chip away at the already delicate institution of a synagogue.
But Miller and some colleagues say CyberJudaism.org will only be a boon — not a threat — to their organizations.
“There will be options for people to learn virtually, but those will be bridges to the actual community,” said Rabbi Lori Klein, a Renewal rabbi in Santa Cruz who serves on the advisory board for CyberJudaism.org.
“I have talked to unaffiliated people who say, ‘I’m interested in coming to services but I’m afraid I won’t know what to do or that I’ll embarrass myself,’ ” Klein said. “Something like CyberJudaism.org can be a low-barrier gateway to get basic Jewish education so that when you’re ready to set foot into a community, you’re more ready.”