Why Shouldn't an Avreich Who Goes Out to Work Feel 'Disconnected' from the World of Shlichus? | Mendy Toledano #020

00:00 Speaker 1 Belonging—the feeling that may be missing for someone who enters the workforce and feels he’s no longer part of the world of shlichus. This time I sat down with Mendy Toledano, a high-tech professional who runs the Didos community and the Light Up initiative. We talked about encountering the world outside, breaking down stereotypes through Jewish pride, and how shlichus doesn’t end—it simply moves to a different place. A powerful episode that offers a completely new perspective on identity, work, education, and shlichus. I’m Meir Wishnefski, and you’re listening to On Chabad Education. Mendy Toledano, welcome.

00:35 Speaker 2 Glad to be here.

00:36 Speaker 1 It’s so good to have you.

00:37 Speaker 2 Thanks for inviting me.

00:38 Speaker 1 I’ll start with a story. About six months ago, I sat with a few friends—young married men I’d learned with in yeshiva, in kvutza. Each of us went his own way and built a home. Some went into education, including me and a few other friends; some opened Chabad Houses; and some entered the workforce. They studied for a few years, finished, got married, and started working. We got together for a farbrengen, and one of the friends shared something that has stayed with me to this day. He said, “Meir, I don’t feel like I belong. Our friends went and opened Chabad Houses. They belong—they belong to the Rebbe. They feel that sense of belonging. But I work for a living now, I’m involved in...” He has a business, and his wife works too. They’re both very much in—in—

01:30 Speaker 2 The world.

01:30 Speaker 1 Yes, the world. He said, “I don’t feel like I belong. It doesn’t feel connected to me.” And ever since he said that, the story has really stayed with me. We learned together, and yet he has such a different feeling. We talk a lot here about education.

01:47 Speaker 2 Yes.

01:48 Speaker 1 And I think sometimes education isn’t only for children; it’s also for us, inwardly. I think the story you bring is a different one, one that casts a completely different light on this kind of life. We’ll talk more about work and the workforce—about being in this world and, at the same time, feeling a little different. So let’s start with you. Tell everyone who you are. I know a little of your story, but share it with us.

02:13 Speaker 2 Okay. First of all, thanks for inviting me. I’m happy to be here. I’ve listened to a few of the podcasts—you’re doing wonderful work.

02:21 Speaker 1 Thank you, thank you.

02:22 Speaker 2 They have a lot of value. So thanks for the invitation. I have to say right away that I don’t share your friend’s feelings. A little about me: I’m Mendy Toledano, and I went through the full Chabad educational track. I grew up and went to school in Kiryat Shmuel: cheder, then yeshiva ketana in the Krayot, then my third year in Netanya and three years in yeshiva gedola in Tzfas. After that I was on shlichus in Florida, at Rabbi Nati’s Beis Moshiach, may his memory be a blessing. After completing semicha in Tzfas, I taught semicha classes to bochurim for about half a year, and then I returned to Israel. After I got married, I enlisted in the IDF on a computer track, taking the army’s programming course at its School of Computer Professions. I completed the programming course and served in the Air Force’s communications and IT unit.

03:25 Speaker 1 Mm-hmm.

03:26 Speaker 2 After that I entered the high-tech world. That’s more or less what I’ve been doing for the last ten years.

03:34 Speaker 1 So today you have children, you live in central Israel, and you work in high tech to support your family. Now, there’s that encounter: after finishing kvutza, yeshiva, and so on, you arrive at work. There’s a lot to it. You’re entering an environment that isn’t Chabad, and isn’t—

03:54 Speaker 2 Not at all.

03:55 Speaker 1 Right. So tell us a little about that. What was it like?

03:57 Speaker 2 I can share my personal experience from my very first week in high tech.

04:02 Speaker 1 Mm-hmm.

04:03 Speaker 2 As Chabadniks, the outside world isn’t foreign to us, whether through shlichus or mivtzoim. We more or less know how to navigate it—or at least we think we do. Even in the army, the track is as geared toward chareidim as possible: there are set times for learning and davening. But my first week in high tech felt a bit like crossing into a world I hadn’t known existed. That’s how stark it was. In my first few days, I joined a team of experienced people with five or ten years under their belts. Suddenly this strange creature walks into the room: a chareidi guy who’d served in the army, studied programming, and come to work alongside them in exactly the same role. You could already see the question marks in their eyes. But pretty quickly, from our conversations and day-to-day interactions, I felt there was something stuck in their throats—this tension. I didn’t want to live with that feeling. So I closed the door with the five other members of my team.

05:16 Speaker 3 And none of them were Torah-observant.

05:17 Speaker 2 Not one. That’s putting it mildly. They didn’t know what Shema Yisroel was, let alone Birchas Hamazon. Maybe one person on the team at the time had a father who was somewhat more traditional. But the disconnect was on a level we don’t even understand. As people who grew up in yeshivos and do mivtzoim, we don’t really know this part of the population or have much exposure to it—certainly not every day. I said to them, “Okay, guys, what’s going on? Talk to me for a moment. I’m picking up on something. Tell me.” For half an hour, one after another, they hurled so many accusations about chareidim at me. I had no idea where it was coming from—I didn’t even know people thought that way. It sounded almost like stories of antisemitism. The things they’d been taught, the images they brought up: chareidim pollute and use too many disposable products; chareidim—and, you know, the classics—don’t work and don’t pay taxes. Then I show up in the middle of this story they’ve built for themselves, and something doesn’t add up. At what point am I going to take off the mask? I remember the only thing I said to them. First of all, I was shocked, but I also understood that the tension I’d sensed was real. I said, “The one thing I take from this is that the chareidi community has bad PR—really bad PR. What you see on the news, on TV, and in the media is what they want you to see. But here I am. This is reality.” I really felt how great the distance was, and I thought, “Okay, within the limits of what I can do, let’s see how we can try to fix this.” First of all, you realize the spotlight is on you in several ways—

07:22 Speaker 3 You feel they’re examining you on all kinds of things.

07:24 Speaker 2 Yes. How you conduct yourself personally, how you relate to others, the way you speak. There’s a lot of awkwardness. They don’t even know what questions to ask. I’m telling you, they don’t know what Shema Yisroel is—that’s the level. So imagine how far apart you are when it comes to having a conversation. But pretty quickly we became very good friends. We sat and ate lunch together, and we’re still in touch today. I even saw some of them a week ago. In the end, just being there breaks down a lot of those stereotypes.

07:57 Speaker 3 In other words, they see you, a Chabadnik, going about your work there. At what point in your story did it turn around? I mean, when did it become more than just you—

08:07 Speaker 2 When I turned the tables, so to speak.

08:08 Speaker 3 Yes. That next stage.

08:11 Speaker 2 I think—

08:12 Speaker 3 So you arrive there as a complete stranger.

08:14 Speaker 2 Yes.

08:14 Speaker 3 Right away, you break the ice with everyone.

08:17 Speaker 2 Yes.

08:17 Speaker 3 And then you carry on working there, with the same team in the same office.

08:21 Speaker 2 Yes, I broke the ice. I arrived in September, around Elul, so in Elul I brought a shofar. I blew the shofar for them at—

08:28 Speaker 3 Right at the start.

08:29 Speaker 2 Yes. I mean, it’s Elul—you have to hear the shofar. “Guys, have you heard the shofar? Come on over.”

08:33 Speaker 3 And how did they react? I mean, these are people—

08:36 Speaker 2 I try to make it accessible, too. “Look, this is a shofar I made myself. Isn’t it beautiful? Come see how it works and what it does.” So yes, there’s that initial reaction of, “What’s this guy doing here?” But there’s also a lot of thirst and curiosity. Again, precisely because they don’t know, it raises a lot of questions. Look, these aren’t just any people. You shouldn’t assume that because they don’t keep Torah and mitzvos, or whatever it may be, they’re somehow lesser as people. These are very accomplished people.

09:10 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

09:13 Speaker 2 And eventually they realize, wait, there’s something here they missed. They ask a lot of questions, and they’re embarrassed that they don’t know. So I try to bridge that gap gently, as a friend. But you don’t show up on your first day there and set up a tefillin stand.

09:34 Speaker 3 Right.

09:35 Speaker 2 It doesn’t work like that.

09:36 Speaker 3 It’s like a shliach arriving in a foreign country. He gradually starts building relationships with people.

09:40 Speaker 2 Identifying the people with influence.

09:42 Speaker 3 And was it clear to you that that was where you were headed? Because the experience—

09:45 Speaker 2 Right away, and where?

09:46 Speaker 3 Your experience—that’s why I sat down with, let’s call him Reuven, the friend.

09:51 Speaker 2 Reuven, right.

09:51 Speaker 3 I sat down with Reuven, and he tells me, “You know, listen, I don’t belong. I’m in the workforce, I’m earning a living for my family. I’m not part of—I’m not part of shlichus. The Rebbe wanted people to go on shlichus; the Rebbe wanted people to work in education. That’s not where I am.” So he says, “I’m not connected; I don’t belong.” But you’re saying, “Oh, it’s obvious to me.” A month later, Elul arrives, and you’re blowing the shofar for them. Was that automatic for you? Just obvious?

10:13 Speaker 2 Now that you ask, I’m trying to think what I was thinking at the time.

10:18 Speaker 3 Probably.

10:18 Speaker 2 I think it’s something in the education we received. We both grew up, after all, in those institutions of—

10:25 Speaker 3 The Rebbe’s institutions.

10:26 Speaker 2 The Rebbe’s institutions, ultimately, where every Jew is a shliach. I mean, it’s nice to say that in a lecture, or to a Jew who doesn’t observe Torah and mitzvos, to inspire him to do something. But where does it meet us in the end? Look, I’ll be honest: I never had any plan, at any point in my life, to be some major shliach in some country, or even a shliach running a Chabad House for travelers or anything like that. It wasn’t something I personally saw myself doing. You know? I grew up in a home with a father who worked and a mother who was a secretary at a Chabad cheder for forty years. So, from that perspective, the home I grew up in didn’t put me on a track toward shlichus. It was pretty clear to me that I would earn a living. I never thought otherwise. And really, my entire education was built around being ready for the day after, the day when yeshiva would end. What would remain then? The way of life, the values the Rebbe teaches, the...

11:26 Speaker 3 Wow.

11:26 Speaker 2 In those situations, “Because it is busy expelling, it does not absorb.” When you enter the workforce and you’re trying to figure things out and adapt, I can relate to what your friend feels. If you’re trying to adapt, you can end up absorbing things—or feeling disconnected.

11:47 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

11:48 Speaker 2 But once you understand that if you don’t influence others, you’ll be influenced, and you probably don’t want to be influenced by those environments—because otherwise, why did you go through that whole path? Go take a path that prepares you for that day. Go get your matriculation certificate, right? After all, we built the whole—Maybe my personal story is a little different, too, in that my extended family isn’t religious. So—

12:16 Speaker 3 Your parents—your parents became observant.

12:17 Speaker 2 My father became observant at twenty-eight; my mother has been a Chabad chossid since she was fourteen. Yes, but their brothers and sisters don’t observe Torah and mitzvos. I’ve always encountered those questions. What about matriculation exams? What about studying a—

12:33 Speaker 3 From the family.

12:33 Speaker 2 Profession? From the family. So the answer I had, and was raised with, was: during the critical years of life when you shape your character, shape it in the spiritual way you want to live. You can acquire a profession afterward.

12:47 Speaker 3 Do you feel you paid a price?

12:51 Speaker 2 In what sense?

12:53 Speaker 3 I’ll tell you. It’s interesting: during that conversation, when we were sitting together, one of the friends said—he was sharing at the farbrengen that it was very important to him for his children to come out with some kind of, you know, preparation for life, as he called it, in terms of a profession or something like that.

13:15 Speaker 2 So ask ten-year-old Meni Toledano, whose aunt asks him, “How will you earn a living? What will you do? How will you live? Will you be like all those people who receive benefits?” Again, the answer is very, very clear-cut, and I think I’m a pretty good example of it. Spend the years when you build your character building it the way you want, personally and spiritually. That means taking in the Chassidic education we grew up with. Earning a living? I think I earn a decent living. I don’t think I missed out on anything in the process.

13:53 Speaker 3 Excellent.

13:53 Speaker 2 I mean, ultimately, livelihood comes from Hakadosh Boruch Hu, of course. But even on a practical level, there are plenty of ways to make up for—what, matriculation exams? I don’t feel that by having my son study in yeshiva for six years, I’m depriving him of preparation for the world. There’s something very basic to me about keeping those things separate. There’s no connection. No connection.

14:19 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm. You were also featured in—Globes has a list of forty young people, right? You’re under forty.

14:26 Speaker 2 Forty under forty.

14:27 Speaker 3 Right, forty influential people under forty. And you were selected, one of those forty. I think the only charedi, or—

14:35 Speaker 2 Yes.

14:36 Speaker 3 And certainly the only Chabad chossid. But what struck me there, beyond the text and the content and the story, was your photo. They show you wearing a hat and a sirtuk, standing with your head held high, and it says, “Meni Toledano,” and so on.

14:56 Speaker 2 Yes.

14:56 Speaker 3 And I think the story you’re telling—your story—is the opposite. You’re saying, “I can also work for a living, work in high-tech.” You really studied and became a professional, and we’ll talk more about that. You’re saying that, for you, there’s no contradiction. It doesn’t make you feel second-class, or as though you’re somehow disconnected or don’t belong. And you’re saying that this was clear to you from the outset. It’s not something you feel...

15:23 Speaker 2 I think that’s my motto: one hundred percent charedi and one hundred percent professional. One doesn’t come at the expense of the other. On the contrary, each feeds the other.

15:31 Speaker 3 Wow.

15:31 Speaker 2 A few words about Globes. Among other things I do, I’m involved with a community of charedim in high-tech.

15:41 Speaker 3 What does that mean?

15:43 Speaker 2 A community called DDoS. It’s a neat play on words. DDoS is the name of a type of cyberattack, so we took “DDoS” and combined it with “dos,” a colloquial word for a religious Jew. It fits together well. The community was founded by Meni Matof [unclear], also a graduate of the yeshivos in Tzfas, about eight years ago. I joined five years ago. I lead the community, and that received recognition, as you said, from Globes, in its forty influential young people of 2026.

16:13 Speaker 3 What does the community do? What’s its—just in a word?

16:16 Speaker 2 Basically, it’s a community of charedim who work in high-tech. How did it start? Even when we were in the army, there was something in high-tech called a meetup. You go to a gathering once every month or two, a professional gathering where you also meet people in the field and make connections, and learn about the latest technology. When we went to those gatherings, we realized we were the only charedim there. We asked why. I mean, nothing about them was adapted for us—not the kashrus, not the atmosphere, not the style. And even then, there were already charedi graduates of technological programs in the IDF.

16:59 Speaker 3 Charedim.

17:00 Speaker 2 But there was no place for them. And almost immediately, as soon as we said, “Here, let’s get charedim in high-tech together,” it grew. Today we have close to six thousand community members. It’s a professional community that provides professional support. We hold meetups, professional gatherings like that.

17:23 Speaker 3 It helps people make connections within the whole...

17:25 Speaker 2 Connections, yes. We’re currently running a course on AI. Ultimately, our goal is—there are many organizations that bring charedim into high-tech. We make sure charedim stay in high-tech.

17:33 Speaker 3 Mm.

17:35 Speaker 2 And advance professionally and into management. So that work received recognition from Globes. First of all, the heading is “Integrating charedim into high-tech,” so it makes sense for me to show up looking like a charedi.

17:50 Speaker 3 Right.

17:51 Speaker 2 With a hat and jacket. Uh, that wasn’t strange. On the contrary, it really reflects the— I want to tell you something about Haredim in high-tech. I say Haredim because I work with other Haredim too, not only Chabad people and not only shluchim. But it’s relevant. The secular world, and the high-tech world as an extreme example of what we might call the enlightened secular world, really value sincerity and values. They can recognize sincerity; it melts them. And when—

18:27 Speaker 3 What do you mean by sincerity?

18:28 Speaker 2 Sincerity in your path, your way of life, the values you bring. You can have religious values and be a professional. How can that be? On the contrary, they reinforce each other. We started talking about this earlier: one hundred percent Haredi and one hundred percent professional. When you’re one hundred percent professional, then suddenly—for example, Shuki Gur and I won first place in a competition at work. By the way, Shuki Gur comes into the office every day wearing a hat and a sirtuk. I personally don’t, but his presence is very noticeable.

19:04 Speaker 3 And people notice it.

19:05 Speaker 2 They notice it and appreciate it. It isn’t treated as something ridiculous; it earns respect. So when we won first place, suddenly you hear the vice president telling us she grew up attending a religious preschool. People start trying to find what they have in common, where they connect. It’s precisely because you come from a position of professionalism and say, “I’m thoroughly professional. I don’t compromise. I do things as well as you do, or better. Look, I won first place.” Then they say, “Wait, but he’s religious too. Could the two be connected? Maybe his values actually reinforce his work.” That’s what I’m saying. People recognize it.

19:40 Speaker 3 They don’t contradict each other.

19:41 Speaker 2 They don’t contradict each other; they strengthen each other.

19:45 Speaker 3 Recently, um—wait, I want to go back a little to the shlichus. You arrive at Tokyo at the end of the first month and say, quite naturally, “I—” Where does it go from there? In the office, on the team—your shlichus there.

20:02 Speaker 2 First of all, the moment you’re religious or a Chabad person, especially when you’re the only one around, you naturally become a Chabad House. If someone needs—someone moves, buys a house, and people buy houses a lot—they need mezuzahs. They come to you. They’re looking for a mohel, they come to you. They’re looking for—

20:20 Speaker 3 You become the person to ask.

20:21 Speaker 2 You become the person to ask. More than that, there’s also a department called HR, human resources, in high-tech companies. They’re responsible for employee well-being. So naturally, when there’s—

20:32 Speaker 3 Every office has its own HR?

20:35 Speaker 2 Yes, every company has—just as there are programmers and product people, there are people responsible for the perks that pampered tech workers get. So they know that if they have an event and need to address kashrus, they can ask me. Just two months ago, our HR person called me: “Mendy, I know you have a few dates in Tammuz and Menachem Av that are a problem, and I have several events. Open your calendar and tell me exactly which dates they are so I can plan around them.”

21:06 Speaker 3 Wow.

21:07 Speaker 2 So in the end you become the person people come to. The personal connection with people, the relationships, and being someone they can approach are absolutely critical at that point. Look, you join a high-tech company, look to your right and left, and you’re the only religious person—or certainly the only Chabad person. Yes, there may be a few other religious people elsewhere in the company, and you need to look after them too. But for us, as shluchim, as people who grew up with this, you suddenly realize you don’t have the option not to do it. On the most basic level, if you don’t have the employee badge that gets you onto the floor, into the building, into the office, no other shliach can do it. Hakadosh Boruch Hu arranged things so that you are the person in that place at that time, the only one who can bring spirituality to the people around you. There’s no one else, no one else... You realize you have no choice.

22:09 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

22:09 Speaker 2 You understand? Nobody asked you. You’re in that place, and the contrast makes it even more powerful, because you realize how far removed they are. So you say, “Guys, come listen for a second...” Just one more point. In high-tech there’s something called happy hour. Once on Thurs—Thursday afternoon—

22:27 Speaker 3 The good life.

22:28 Speaker 2 Yes. On Thursday afternoon they bring out a bottle for l’chaim, say l’chaim, and finish the week. At my first job, everyone took turns sharing some bit of wisdom, some thought. Pretty soon people ran out of things to say, and what was left was Mendy sharing his thought. His thought was a sicha of the Rebbe on the weekly parsha.

22:55 Speaker 3 Wow.

22:55 Speaker 2 At some point it became exclusively the weekly parsha. The next step was that we moved out into the kitchen, and then all the teams joined us. Eventually it became a routine: every Thursday, someone in turn brings a bottle of mashke, we say l’chaim, and we listen to a sicha of the Rebbe. It’s—

23:12 Speaker 3 You could be standing in front of forty people, telling them—

23:14 Speaker 2 Yes, yes. Forty, a hundred.

23:16 Speaker 3 Wow.

23:16 Speaker 2 A thousand. Each person in their own setting, yes. So somehow you get drawn into it. Ultimately, if you have that state of mind, that awareness of shlichus, you understand there’s no other option.

23:34 Speaker 3 Has it happened on a more personal level too? I mean, a personal relationship with someone beyond standing in front of a crowd, whether on Chanukah or other holidays and so on. You come with your family. It’s really shlichus in every respect, like any other Chabad House we know.

23:50 Speaker 2 Absolutely, absolutely. A short story, specifically about personal connection.

23:55 Speaker 3 Yes.

23:56 Speaker 2 At my previous workplace I handed out menorahs, as I’d also done in the army, among other things. So I kept up the habit. I ordered a box of nice wooden menorahs—they had beautiful branches—and handed them out. They told me, “Mendy, skip that office. There’s a guy there who I don’t think would like you offering him one.” He was the first person I went to.

24:21 Speaker 3 Like a good Chabad chossid.

24:24 Speaker 2 “Hi, how are you? Here’s a menorah. We light a candle tonight”—I think it was the first night. I offered it to him, and he immediately stood up and said, “Absolutely not.” Not unpleasantly. Thanks, but no thanks. I asked, “What? Why?” He told me, “My wife immigrated from the Soviet Union, and in the army they put her through some kind of conversion process. She really had to prove she was Jewish, and it hurt her deeply. The whole thing left her with an aversion to the rabbinate and religious people.” I said, “Okay, I’m sorry that was her experience, but still, it’s a menorah. What could happen? A nice family candle-lighting in the evening—what could happen?” He said, “You know what? Fine. But if there are any problems, I’m sending them your way.” That evening he sent me a picture of himself lighting the menorah with his wife and told me, “Mendy, listen. I grew up in Israel; she didn’t. But she knows all the Chanukah tunes. She got emotional and sang them.” I was stunned. I said, “A moment ago you didn’t want any part of this. Where did that come from?” Well, over time, we stayed colleagues and had a good relationship. A few months later, he told me that they’d been struggling to get pregnant, going through treatments and everything, without success. And he said, “Mendy, just a few days after Chanukah, we found out she was pregnant. I feel it had something to do with that light of Chanukah, that warmth. Something happened there.” Seven or eight years have passed since then, and every Chanukah this guy sends me—he’s had three children since then—

26:09 Speaker 3 Wow.

26:10 Speaker 2 A picture with the menorah and the children. Somehow he connects it to that first candle-lighting. So ultimately, the personal connection and relationship are the foundation. The key is not to feel awkward about making a personal connection through Yiddishkeit. And also, since around the time I entered high-tech, I’ve had a regular Chassidus study partner in the morning, from 8:30 to 9:00, for seven years now, since I finished my army service. It started during COVID, when a few of us were talking about Tanya in the kitchen. What’s Tanya? How much Tanya? They asked questions. So we started a small class.

26:50 Speaker 3 Guys who weren’t observant?

26:52 Speaker 2 No.

26:52 Speaker 3 What kind of guys?

26:53 Speaker 2 No. One of them is connected to the Chabad House in Tel Aviv, and the rest aren’t. It was about five or six guys. Then, somehow, COVID came along, so the meetings moved to Zoom. And those five guys became... Since then, I’ve had one chavrusa, Yuval—a friend and chavrusa, a wonderful person. Every morning, for seven years now, we haven’t missed our half hour from 8:30 to 9:00. You wouldn’t believe how much you can accomplish in a focused half hour. So yes, in the end, it’s a personal connection—

27:31 Speaker 3 Seven years of learning with someone who... with a friend, a colleague from work there.

27:35 Speaker 2 A colleague, yes.

27:36 Speaker 3 Wow. When it comes to raising your children—do you have children?

27:40 Speaker 2 Baruch Hashem, four.

27:41 Speaker 3 Yes, four, may there be many more. And your children, I imagine they sometimes come and see your work. Where you... I mean, do they?

27:51 Speaker 2 Yes, yes. Let’s say I’ve taken my son. What’s the question? Finish it.

27:57 Speaker 3 So the question is, you’re involved—you do so much shlichus in high-tech, and to me, what’s amazing is how you’ve turned the whole thing on its head. If I’m there, you’re saying, I’m the only one who can be in that particular place, so I have to be there. But when it comes to your child and his upbringing, he could say, “Dad works.” How do you—I don’t know whether you invest time or energy in this—but how do you instill in him this sense of shlichus, so that when he builds his own home and, with Hashem’s help, works or opens a Chabad House—I don’t know which direction he’ll take—how do you instill that in him? That yes, I have a job, but that doesn’t contradict my being a shliach. When I’m there, I transform and illuminate my surroundings.

28:46 Speaker 4 If you asked my oldest, Yosef Yitzchak, I’m not sure what he’d tell you. I think that if you asked what Dad does, he’d say, “Dad is a shliach in high-tech.”

28:53 Speaker 3 Oh, that’s his answer?

28:54 Speaker 4 I mean, I think so.

28:56 Speaker 3 Wow.

28:56 Speaker 4 I think so, because I make a real effort to make that part of our life visible. He knows Yuval, my chavrusa; he’s friends with Yuval’s children. He knows we met through work, yes, but ultimately our connection is through Torah and learning.

29:10 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

29:11 Speaker 4 When I take my son along, I try to do it on Chanukah: lighting a menorah beside his father in the cafeteria, in front of two hundred employees, while his father lights the menorah. So is it more shliach or more high-tech? I’m not sure what he’d answer if you asked him, but I do try to make the shlichus visible through what I do.

29:35 Speaker 3 That’s incredible. And recently you developed a connection and started some kind of initiative, a program with Tzach. Could you tell us a little more about it? How did it come about? Where is it headed? What’s the vision?

29:48 Speaker 4 It started a few years ago. I try to publicize the activities I do, whether on my status, on WhatsApp, or by sending them to my community’s group.

29:59 Speaker 3 The community of chareidim, uh—

30:01 Speaker 4 No, the Chabad community in Ganei Alon.

30:03 Speaker 3 Mm.

30:03 Speaker 4 So if I’m already placing an order with Tzach, I try to bring more people in and connect them to it. A few years ago, I met with Rabbi Solerik Ashkenazi [unclear], and he suggested that I formalize the idea of shlichus in the workplace. It was close to Chanukah. We started taking orders for menorahs, which I circulated in the chareidim-in-high-tech community—as I mentioned, about six thousand people.

30:33 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm. So they could do it at their companies—

30:36 Speaker 4 So they could order menorahs for the companies where they work. If someone can get HR on board, great; if not, they can pay for it from their maaser money. But this created a more official connection with Tzach for Chabad in the workplace, or “Chabad in high-tech,” as I call it. It’s broader than high-tech. Gradually, people from the Electric Corporation and other organizations, like Israel Aerospace Industries, joined us too—we have people there. Ultimately, we’re reaching into all these places that no one else can really get into. The initiative is called Light Up. We’ve created a kind of community around it. Law firms, uh—

31:20 Speaker 3 So these are places without shluchim, where there’s a Chabadnik working there—though he isn’t necessarily a Chabadnik.

31:23 Speaker 4 Exactly, not necessarily a Chabadnik. The community isn’t made up only of Chabadniks.

31:26 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

31:27 Speaker 4 About thirty percent are Chabadniks, but not all of them.

31:29 Speaker 3 Oh, and—

31:29 Speaker 4 In other words, it’s Judaism in the workplace. I don’t call it Chabad. I deliberately don’t call it Chabad.

31:34 Speaker 3 Mm, deliberately.

31:35 Speaker 4 We’re now developing a line for the holidays, and for Chanukah a container has already shipped from China with no mention of Chabad on the products. In other words, it’s Judaism—Judaism in high-tech.

31:46 Speaker 3 Incredible.

31:46 Speaker 4 Yes, deliberately. And credit is due to Tzach, by the way—to Levi Vilankin and the whole team working with him. Even when it comes to graphic design, they’re completely on the same page as us and understand what we’re doing. Look, Israeli high-tech today supports—I don’t know what we’d do without it—

32:03 Speaker 3 Yes.

32:03 Speaker 4 Something on the order of four hundred thousand people.

32:06 Speaker 3 Wow.

32:06 Speaker 4 And for those four hundred thousand people in high-tech, there isn’t really a shliach presence apart from the people who work there themselves.

32:17 Speaker 3 Meaning, in a town there might be a shliach based there and so on, but in high-tech, all four hundred thousand people you’re describing—

32:24 Speaker 4 They aren’t brought together under any one organization, and that’s what we’re doing right now.

32:28 Speaker 3 Powerful.

32:29 Speaker 4 Yes.

32:30 Speaker 3 And where is it headed? Where do you want to take it? What’s the vision for this project?

32:37 Speaker 4 Basically, to formalize it so that when a religious or chareidi Jew starts working somewhere, he knows he has support from Light Up—that’s the name of the initiative. There he gets, first of all, the practical tools: the ability to order a physical menorah or matzah at some kind of subsidized price. We can also help him connect with HR. Through experience, we’ve come to understand more or less how these systems work: what they like to hear, what they don’t like to hear, and how to present it properly. And ultimately, it’s also about keeping the flame alive within the community, specifically Didos [unclear], the community of friends in high-tech. For the third year in a row, we’ve tried to hold a Yud Shvat farbrengen for people in high-tech. We sit in a high-tech company, and Rabbi Shneur Ashkenazi makes a point of coming and farbrenging with these people who are really on the technological front line of Judaism. They’re in those places, and—

33:45 Speaker 3 Lighting them up. Light Up.

33:46 Speaker 4 Lighting them up. Exactly. They come and bring light.

33:47 Speaker 3 Incredible. Listen, it’s amazing. I’m sitting here with you, and you’re bringing something completely different. I mean, our Reuven’s story is completely different from what you’re bringing, and it’s amazing.

33:59 Speaker 4 Reuven surprises me. What? Where did he study?

34:02 Speaker 3 Yes. I think he represents all of us, and it’s such a powerful message. I’m glad you came to share it. I wanted to ask one more question. Has it ever happened at work that something was organized that didn’t fit your values? Didn’t fit what we were raised with, and it was challenging? I mean, suddenly there’s music, or one of those—what did you call them?—all those Happy—

34:28 Speaker 4 Happy Hours.

34:29 Speaker 3 Yes, those times when you’ve faced something and thought, “I’m a Chabadnik; this isn’t right for me,” and you said, “That’s it,” and left. Have you had experiences like that? Because it’s a challenge I don’t encounter. I work in education, in schools and so on. Have you encountered it there?

34:48 Speaker 4 Look, no one in high-tech forces you to attend events. Some people don’t participate in them for reasons that have nothing to do with religion. They do try, if they’re holding an event, to make it professional up to a certain point, and then more social from that point on. So during the professional part, it’s important to me that there be kosher food and that there be a place for me there. Again, [unclear]. If something like that is happening, I’ll try, within my limits, to make sure that anyone there who needs an accommodation can get one. But once it turns into something less suitable for us, not really our style—at the end of the day, people do look at you. It would be a chillul Hashem to be somewhere you shouldn’t be. And I don’t think that has much to do with the workplace. I mean, you aren’t expected to take part in social events, and no one will look askance at you if you don’t. It’s completely accepted. They actually respect it a lot—respect you more—

35:42 Speaker 3 Yes, you said at the beginning that they respect the sincerity and the—

35:44 Speaker 4 Exactly. More than appreciate it—they’re even disappointed that they can’t make things suitable for us, even in this context. They held some kind of Purim party, and apparently it wasn’t suitable. So HR asked me, “Mendy, what do you think about us doing something the next day just for the chareidim, something more suitable?” I told her, “It’s all right, don’t go to the trouble. We celebrate Purim just fine. You’re welcome to join us.” But there is sensitivity. Again, not everywhere. Baruch Hashem, I work somewhere that’s receptive to this. At eToro, we also have a relatively significant number of chareidi women and men working at the company, mainly women. But this is where we can offer that, yes.

36:33 Speaker 5 Okay, wait—what’s your message to Reuven? What would you say to Reuven?

36:38 Speaker 4 Come work at eToro.

36:40 Speaker 5 No, but seriously. I mean, say he works at a high-tech company that’s very accommodating—he’s out in the world, raising his children, a young avreich with two or three kids, and he says, “I’m not connected to this.”

36:50 Speaker 4 Why isn’t he connected? I’m genuinely trying to understand. I—

36:54 Speaker 5 Okay, let’s get into it.

36:55 Speaker 4 Why isn’t he connected? What’s the issue? Where’s the gap?

36:59 Speaker 5 From what I’ve heard, I think the gap is between someone who chose a life of shlichus, or a life in education, or a life surrounded—

37:08 Speaker 4 Yes, he’s a shliach to four hundred thousand people. I’m not—hold on, what?

37:11 Speaker 5 But he’s not—I don’t know—he’s not there.

37:13 Speaker 4 It’s a matter of perspective.

37:14 Speaker 5 Absolutely.

37:14 Speaker 4 So not four hundred thousand. You have an office of thirty people. There are shluchim in remote places with a minyan, at best. So if you can have an impact on ten Jews, on fifteen Jews around you, who gave you the right not to take on that responsibility, that privilege?

37:32 Speaker 5 Yes.

37:33 Speaker 4 I think it’s a matter of perspective, and I want to believe I’m not the only one who sees it this way. I want to believe that, especially in our generation—a generation that can be more challenging, where you want to adapt yourself to a certain situation. To me, there’s no gap in how I see it: every Jew is a shliach.

37:56 Speaker 5 Completely. You really demonstrate that throughout your story—bringing light and keeping it going, and this project you’re doing now, this Light Up initiative. To close, I ask all my guests for a tip in serving Hashem or in education, something you can share from your challenges and experience.

38:21 Speaker 4 Look, of course there are challenges. At the end of the day, you’re busy earning a living, you’re in meetings from morning till night, you get drawn into the world. You have to keep your head above water in a very definite way—whether through fixed times for Torah study or through being sensitive to your surroundings, spiritually sensitive to the people around you. People really are looking for it; they’re really thirsty for it. So if we just open our eyes to our colleagues, to the people around us, understand that thirst and know how to respond to it appropriately—in a sensible, warm way—that’s what will keep us above water first and foremost. I don’t know what would have happened to me today if I thought like Reuven. Maybe I’d be Reuven too.

39:24 Speaker 5 Yes. So you’re saying the things to do are setting fixed times for Torah study—

39:28 Speaker 4 Fixed times for Torah study.

39:30 Speaker 5 And being spiritually sensitive to the people around you.

39:31 Speaker 4 Yes, active sensitivity. Active sensitivity. Don’t be embarrassed. “Do not be ashamed before those who mock.” I wouldn’t use that phrase, because there really isn’t anyone mocking here. Ultimately, they’re asking for it.

39:43 Speaker 5 Wow.

39:44 Speaker 4 Yes.

39:44 Speaker 5 Amazing. Well, yasher koach. Thank you for your time. Thank you for coming all this way.

39:48 Speaker 4 Thank you very much.

39:49 Speaker 5 And with Hashem’s help, may this be an episode that brings light—lights things up, Light Up, and—

39:53 Speaker 4 Light Up.

39:54 Speaker 5 Yes. That awakens the Reuvens in each and every one of us. Just kidding. Thank you very much, Mendy Toledano. Yasher koach.

40:00 Speaker 4 Thank you, Meir.