Black, Jewish and Proud: How Rabbi Yossi Kulek Promotes Inclusion

00:00 Speaker 1 I was working with a chaplain of another denomination. He was actually my supervisor.

00:05 Speaker 2 That's Rabbi Yossi Kulik. He's a Chabad on Campus rabbi, and a chaplain for the Connecticut Department of Corrections.

00:13 Speaker 1 And it's a few days before Juneteenth, and he scheduled the meeting on Juneteenth, which is a legal holiday in Connecticut.

00:20 Speaker 2 And in all other US states, it's a federal holiday. Kulik mentioned this to his supervisor.

00:27 Speaker 1 So he was a little frustrated. He makes some comments, he's like, "Well, who made up this holiday?" Like, "Who care- like, what's this? Is it a new made-up holiday?" Once upon a time, I might have internalized that and taken it personally, but I thought about it. I'm like, you know what? That's the time to share the message. I'm gonna write on Juneteenth, on June 19th, 2024, I'm going to share why I think it's an important day that matters.

00:49 Speaker 2 That message was an account of the pain that had been bottled up for decades inside Yossi Kulik, who's Black. It came pouring out through a Times of Israel article. Kulik's first public expression of pain created waves that are still rippling across the Jewish world. I'm Gary Wolk, and this is Lamplighters, stories from Chabad emissaries on the Jewish frontier. Life as a Chabad emissary is often joyous, but it can be unpredictable, and even dangerous. Chabad has become a ubiquitous presence in every corner of the world, but behind every Chabad house are emissaries, regular people striving to transcend their circumstances, and a community that supports and relies on them. These are their stories. Here's a great opportunity for you. You rely on the Lamplighters podcast to bring you inspiring stories of Chabad emissaries all over the world. Now, you can help keep our series going strong. To dedicate an episode, please email us at podcast@lubavitch.com to explore dedication opportunities. That's podcast@lubavitch.com. To subscribe digitally to Lubavitch International Magazine, or to receive it at your doorstep, please visit lubavitch.com/subscribe.

02:31 Speaker 3 I'm Dalia Kulik.

02:32 Speaker 1 I'm Rabbi Yossi Kulik.

02:34 Speaker 2 The Kuliks are Chabad emissaries to the University of Hartford. On the surface, their story begins much the same way as the stories of many other Chabad emissaries. Yossi was raised in a Frum family in Crown Heights in Chicago, attended Chabad cheder, mesivta, and yeshiva, and he received his rabbinic ordination in Jerusalem. Dalia was raised in what she calls a traditional family.

03:01 Speaker 3 We were very involved with the Chabad in our community, and we went to Hebrew school, and a few of my siblings went to preschool, and we were always part of the camp.

03:08 Speaker 2 Dalia attended private Jewish high school in California, and then Beis Rivkah in Crown Heights. She and Yossi believe in the vision of the Lubavitcher Rebbe, but the story of the Kuliks, as is true of so many great stories, is not just about what's on the surface. Especially when it came to Yossi, whose story began in Cleveland.

03:34 Speaker 1 My mother met my biological, uh, father when she was a teenager. She was studious, she worked hard. She wanted an education, but she met this, uh, young, handsome, charming Black man by the name of Robert, and they hit it off. She thought she fell in love. Even though she was very young, she had this tremendous desire to bring life into this world, and she wanted to have a child.

03:59 Speaker 2 And so Kulik, born Robert Jr., came into the world in 1976 to a teenage Jewish mother who had grown up in a secular working class family.

04:10 Speaker 1 Unfortunately, Robert didn't appreciate my mother. You know, he started to be abusive to her. He started to beat her, verbally put her down. He began cheating on her and was seeing other girls. Any time she tried to say anything about it, that just led to more violence. And he just really, really made her life a living hell. But my mother just prayed to God. That was the first time in her life she said she prayed. She asked God, "Please, please help my Robert love me, and that we can live happily ever after."

04:42 Speaker 2 Kulik's mother was still living at home with her parents, and Robert Sr. would come and go as he pleased.

04:49 Speaker 1 And one of those times, he walks in and he sees my grandmother, my bubbe, holding me in her arms, and he went crazy. He went off on her, started yelling and screaming, "I don't want you touching my son ever. Put him down now." Just lashed into her. My grandmother didn't say anything, but my mother saw the hurt in her eyes. She saw the pain in her eyes and said, "I can't do this anymore. It's not fair to my family."

05:15 Speaker 2 She decided to leave Robert, but he wouldn't leave her or her parents alone. They were afraid of him. Kulik's grandmother tried to find a place for Yossi and his mother in one of Cleveland's many domestic abuse shelters, but not one would take them in.

05:32 Speaker 1 And they were really kind of feeling desperate and hopeless.

05:39 Speaker 2 But Kulik says, quoting the famous passage from the Talmud, "God provides the cure before the disease." That began about a year before Kulik's birth, when his mother's brother had a life-changing experience.

05:53 Speaker 1 Moyshe was quite eccentric Was flamboyant. He wore red everything. He wore a red shirt, red socks, red shoes, red shirt. Everything about him was red.

06:02 Speaker 2 One day, Uncle Moishe was walking in downtown Cleveland.

06:05 Speaker 1 And he gets stopped by these yeshiva students to put on tefillin. My uncle loved these guys right away. He's like, "Wow, these are my type of people. They have their full beards, and they have their yarmulke, and they have their black hats in the middle of the summer, and a black jacket in the middle of the summer." He said, "Boy, these are great guys." And he started hanging out with them and started going to Chabad of Cleveland.

06:25 Speaker 2 In fact, Kulich says Chabad of Cleveland, under the direction of Rabbi Leibel and Rebbetzin Devorah Alevsky, became like a second home for Moishe. Kulich's grandmother noticed.

06:37 Speaker 1 Out of desperation, she remembered that her son was going to this Jewish place. I don't think she even really knew much about Chabad. So she called up the Alevskys and she told them the story. She said, "Look, I'm desperate. Are you able to take in my daughter and her baby?"

06:51 Speaker 2 The Alevskys immediately took them into their home. Kulich says it was a homecoming in more than one way.

07:00 Speaker 1 When I was six months old, I guess it was a few weeks after my mother had settled in at the Alevsky home, she'd already told herself, "This is what I want for my son." She said, "I want to raise my son as a Jew."

07:11 Speaker 2 The Alevskys' home was a fine place to do that, but after a while, Devorah Alevsky had an idea.

07:19 Speaker 1 It was going into the summer, and there were these summer learning programs in New York. And Mrs. Alevsky suggested to my mother, "Would you like an opportunity to go to Machon Chana in Crown Heights and learn more about what it means to be a Jew?"

07:33 Speaker 2 She accepted the offer, and Mrs. Alevsky bought her a bus ticket to New York. What they experienced in Crown Heights would amaze both of them, starting with Devorah Alevsky's siblings, Henya Lane and Rivke Kotlarsky.

07:48 Speaker 1 And they immediately took us in for Shabbat meals, helped my mother out.

07:53 Speaker 2 The Eckhouse, Zarchy, Baumgarten, and Wurtzberg families also extended their unconditional love as mother and child integrated into the Crown Heights community.

08:04 Speaker 1 So yeah, there were some very good people.

08:07 Speaker 2 But there were people who weren't as good. As Yossi got older, he began to notice that some couldn't see beyond the color of his skin. One day during Sukkot, he was out on the street, a young kid helping people fulfill the mitzvah of lulav and etrog.

08:25 Speaker 1 And, uh, I was standing in front of this Jewish kosher-style restaurant. It wasn't kosher, but it was very popular with the secular Jewish community. It was called The Bagel. And I was standing outside of it asking people, "Are you Jewish? Would you like to make a blessing on the lulav and etrog?" And I remember this middle-aged guy looks at me. I'm eight, nine years old. I'm nine years old, I think, and he laughs and he says, "I look a lot more Jewish than you." When I would go to the JCC swimming pool, there were kids who made fun of me because of the color I was.

08:54 Speaker 2 And Kulich endured comments that were even worse, but which aren't appropriate to share in this podcast. Kulich says he had no idea how to handle these racist comments.

09:07 Speaker 1 So I usually kept quiet. I usually didn't say anything at all, but I absorbed it. I felt it.

09:12 Speaker 2 And he began to realize that they were not just directed at him.

09:16 Speaker 1 I heard all the discussions among people. They would make casual comments about Blacks and the crime rate or associate Blacks with violence. I don't need to repeat them, but all the stereotypes that are put out there about the African American community. And that really affected me because that led to me feeling negatively about who I was and where I came from.

09:39 Speaker 2 Kulich has used the term silent embarrassment to describe how he was feeling. He says he kept it inside, and it was painful, but those feelings can only stay bottled up for so long. Once, he was on a bus with his mother and his emotions came pouring out.

09:58 Speaker 1 I told my mother, I said, "I'm ashamed. I'm ashamed to be Black. I look in the mirror and I ask God, 'Why me? Why do I have to look this way? Why do I have to be Black?'" And I could see that the kids over next to me, like, saw me literally sobbing. And I broke down. It was embarrassing. And you gotta remember, I wasn't just a dark-skinned Jew. I had a non-Jewish Black father. That was something I had to process.

10:21 Speaker 2 That would take many years, but even when he was low, Yossi remembered an encounter with the Lubavitcher Rebbe before Kulich even knew the meaning of the word racism. When Yossi was just four years old, his mother met a man in Crown Heights. She was still studying at Machon Chana. He studied at Hadar Hatorah. They dated.

10:46 Speaker 1 My mother and father, the only father that I grew up to know, were engaged, and they wanted the Rebbe's blessing, so they went to yechidus. They went to have a private audience with the Rebbe. And they made the unique decision that even though I was a little four-year-old, that hey, if they're gonna go see the Rebbe one on one, they should bring me along. This is a once in a lifetime experience, and they brought me.

11:05 Speaker 2 The Rebbe gave his blessing to the couple, and then-

11:09 Speaker 1 I remember the Rebbe leaning forward over the big wooden desk to talk to me, asked me if I wear tzitzit, and I said, "Yes." He then asked me, "How many strings does your tzitzit have? Does it have one?" And I said, "Yes." "Does it have two?" And I said, "Yes." And he went all the way up to eight, and I just kept saying yes. I, I, I don't recall actually saying any other words to the Rebbe. I just remember the Rebbe smiling at me with that famous smile, his eyes glowing. What the Rebbe showed me and demonstrated to me from a young age was his unconditional love. As I'm going through my journey, and even as I'm still ashamed, and even as I'm in pain, I held the Rebbe very close. The, the Rebbe held me very close. I felt his hug. I felt his embrace. That experience gave me strength in every low point in my life And, um, my mother think that the Rebbe then saw me being a shliach one day, saw the potential in me.

12:06 Speaker 2 The Rebbe, of course, was correct. Yossi went on to yeshiva and rabbinic ordination. He taught for a summer in Tzfat, and in 1997 taught middle school in Chicago. But he was considering becoming a shliach. For that, he'd need to find a life partner, but-

12:24 Speaker 1 I was reluctant to start dating. I was nervous about it. I, I didn't think anybody would want to marry me because of my biracial identity.

12:33 Speaker 2 Then Kulik's mother took charge. She contacted a shadchan, who arranged a date with a young woman from California named Dalia, who was working and studying in Crown Heights.

12:45 Speaker 1 I think it was a 12-hour first date, so that was pretty intense. Then we did a second date and then a third date. But I, I didn't know my long-term plan at that moment, so I went back to Chicago and had to do, like, a reset to try to figure out how my feelings were. After a couple days, I, I realized I missed her very, very much and I wanted to continue. Got engaged in about three weeks, and we got married two months after that.

13:10 Speaker 3 And he was working in Chicago in the cheder. We moved there, and he was working there, and I was working in the Chabad of Buffalo Grove.

13:17 Speaker 2 But the young couple decided to explore the possibility of going out on shlichus on their own. They reached out to the Shluchim Office in Crown Heights.

13:27 Speaker 3 We interviewed like you would interview for a shidduch. We looked for places that would match us and what wouldn't match us.

13:33 Speaker 2 So I'm assuming you requested a Chabad on Campus gig at the outset, right?

13:38 Speaker 3 Campus was not my ideal. I did not want to do campus.

13:41 Speaker 2 The Kuliks discussed a few possibilities, including Chicago and Atlanta. Those ideas didn't click, but then they interviewed with Rabbi Yosef Gopin in Hartford, Connecticut. Yossi told him that he enjoyed working with students. In 2000, Yossi and Dalia Kulik were hired to work full-time in the greater Hartford community to teach, run Jewish workshops and camps, and to do community outreach. They'd also provide religious, social, and educational support to students at the University of Hartford. In 2003, they established a university-recognized student group they called Chabad Chevre. They worked that way for years. They say they loved it, but it was like having two full-time jobs. So in 2007, Dalia made a suggestion.

14:37 Speaker 1 "Let's build our own Chabad House. The students love you. That's what we should do." And Dalia and I sat down with Rabbi Gopin and Mrs. Gopin and said we can't do both anymore. So we put all our focus into University of Hartford.

14:49 Speaker 2 The Kuliks received a grant from the George and Pamela Rohr Foundation to establish their own Chabad House.

14:56 Speaker 3 It started with the kosher dinner hour.

14:58 Speaker 2 Those were on Thursdays.

15:00 Speaker 3 And Friday night dinners. They both had exploded, and throughout the holidays, you know, all the things that we offered, and being a family, being a home for them, they would just stop by to come say hello, come play with my kids, to babysit my kids. That's really how it all started, just being their home.

15:15 Speaker 2 The Kuliks soon realized how important it was for students to have a warm, open, non-judgmental Jewish home.

15:23 Speaker 1 There was a young lady who was estranged from her mother, had unfortunately a very tough upbringing. I remember Renee telling me when she first met me, "Just look, you know, on the night of Pesach, Passover, we have a tradition with my father to go to a deli, and we eat a deli on rye sandwich. That's how secular we are."

15:44 Speaker 2 After her time with the Kuliks-

15:46 Speaker 1 That Renee married a Jew- nice Jewish boy. Dalia and I both danced at the wedding. They have children. So that kinda tells you about the relationships we were building and impact that we must have been having on these kids

15:58 Speaker 2 Kids like Yehudit Abramson. She grew up in Orlando, Florida, and had some Jewish background: synagogue affiliation, day school, and summer camp. She arrived at the University of Hartford in the fall of 2009 to begin a Judaic studies program. She met the Kuliks right away. A Shabbat invitation was quickly extended.

16:21 Speaker 4 I think it was the first Shabbos, and I didn't know anyone on campus really. And I just remember going, and Dalia, she was just so warm, and it just felt like home right away. I was there every Shabbos. I was there for events. I loved the kids, and they were just the cutest. So we, we grew very, very close.

16:44 Speaker 2 During her sophomore year, the Kuliks brought Yehudit and other University of Hartford students to Crown Heights. That Shabbaton weekend made a huge impression on her, especially the trip to the Rebbe's Ohel, his resting place. But she says she still didn't fully understand the Rebbe or what Chabad was, at least beyond campus. Yehudit made Aliyah to Israel in 2011. She completed her Judaic studies degree there, worked in an operational IAF squadron, and then in high tech. But in 2022, Yehudit was diagnosed with Behcet's disease, an autoimmune disorder that causes vasculitis. She was in great pain as it attacked her brain, eyes, and limbs.

17:34 Speaker 4 I, I was going blind, and I mamash saw darkness. I could barely speak. I could barely walk.

17:44 Speaker 2 The Kuliks stayed in touch, sending her messages of encouragement.

17:48 Speaker 1 Thinking of you. Everything will be okay. Davening for you. Saying Tehillim for you.

17:54 Speaker 3 She almost died. She had, you know, terrible, terrible things going on.

17:57 Speaker 2 And the greater Chabad community cared for her as well, including the shliach at the hospital in Tel Aviv, Rabbi Tal Gomberg, who came almost every day. He gave Yehudit cookies, a book about the Rebbe, and her first book of Tehillim

18:12 Speaker 4 And I remember I could barely finish a kapitel. It hurt my eyes so much, and my brain hurt so much. And I was so scared that I wasn't gonna be able to see ever, I was gonna get worse. I was also very depressed. I was really sick. I was in double darkness, both physically and spiritually.

18:33 Speaker 2 Yehudit went into the hospital as an inpatient three times in 2022 and 2023. She was on chemo and a host of other treatments, but nothing seemed to be working.

18:46 Speaker 4 The next course is really hard chemo.

18:52 Speaker 2 Yehudit wrote letters to the Rebbe and requested that her doctor should have the wisdom to provide the correct treatments, and that she should have the strength to keep fighting. Then, after months of trying to convince doctors to approve an alternative treatment, she went on a biological therapy. She says that changed everything, along with lots of physical therapy and her constant study of Hasidus.

19:21 Speaker 4 When I was starting to be able to walk again, when I was able to see, I was just seeing miracles, like, every day. The Rebbe just gave me strength, taught me to look at life through an optimistic lens. This has to be from when I went to the Ohel. There's no other way. This is when I started my teshuva.

19:40 Speaker 2 Yehudit says the process that brought her closer to Yiddishkeit and the healing began with the Kulics.

19:46 Speaker 4 If they hadn't taken me to that yechidus, I wouldn't be alive.

19:50 Speaker 2 Yehudit O, nee Abramson, was married a few weeks ago in Israel. She's in tzfias with her groom for their Shana Rashona, their first year of marriage. The Kulics refer to Yehudit and Rene and the thousands of college students they've gotten to know as their kids. And as any parent knows, it can be very difficult to watch them go out into the world.

20:17 Speaker 1 We do a very big, uh, graduation commencement day party every year, and yeah, that gets very emotional.

20:23 Speaker 3 Friday night dinner, you know, senior Shabbat, you know, they'll get up, some will cry, so- like, we'll cry 'cause we know it's the last Shabbos with them. It's very, very, very difficult, not just for us, but for our children as well.

20:35 Speaker 5 The attention my parents gave to us as children, they invested in the students as well.

20:40 Speaker 2 That's the Kulics' daughter, Devorah Leah, or Lakey.

20:44 Speaker 5 When they said, "This is our family and you're our family," to students, they meant it 100%, and they showed it.

20:52 Speaker 2 Lakey is the oldest of the Kulics' six girls. They also have one son. The family is made up of a unique multicultural blend. Dalia is of Israeli, Mexican, and Kurdish descent.

21:05 Speaker 1 Each of my children looks different. Really, uh, some have lighter skin, some have darker skin, some have very thick curls. Another daughter might have more of the African American features in her, and daughter Lakey looks more Asian.

21:17 Speaker 3 She never got Hispanic. She looked Asian. I instilled in my children that if there's anyone that's ever had an issue with them, it's because they have a problem. You're not the problem.

21:31 Speaker 1 That's a Hasidic concept, that the more holiness there is, the more light there is, darkness is also drawn to it. And unfortunately, there are some people who need to look in the mirror, need to do some self-reckoning.

21:48 Speaker 2 From a young age, Lakey knew that the only path for her was to be an emissary of the Rebbe. Well, almost the only path.

21:56 Speaker 5 And for maybe two years, I also wanted to be a ballerina on top of all of that. But I always said, "You know, I wanna be just like my mommy. I wanna be a teacher. I wanna be a shlucha."

22:08 Speaker 2 And so last year, Lakey and her husband, Mendy Rappaport, settled in for their first year as shluchim to Syracuse University, taking over operations there for their parents, Rabbi Yaakov and Chanie Rappaport, who established the Chabad House there in 1981.

22:26 Speaker 5 Thank God, it was an interesting year, especially with everything happening on college campuses, and also with the birth of our daughter.

22:35 Speaker 2 In addition to his new role of zeide, Rabbi Kulik now serves as a chaplain for the Connecticut Department of Corrections and the Hartford Police Department. He and Dalia are busy helping incoming Jewish students settle in for the new academic year.

22:51 Speaker 3 Baruch Hashem, we've come to a place where we're overflowing. They are here every Friday night tenfold. There's no room.

22:59 Speaker 2 The Kulics would like to create more space for them. For that, they need to do some fundraising, never an easy thing to begin with. But in a candid moment, Yossi Kulik says that after decades of internalizing racism, he sometimes still struggles when it's time to ask for help.

23:18 Speaker 1 I didn't have the confidence to see my own value, so I struggled a lot with approaching, uh, people and asking them for money. I struggled a lot with being judged.

23:28 Speaker 2 Kulik saw a therapist for years to deal with that issue

23:31 Speaker 1 Because he was struggling with convincing me that I should be proud of who I was, that being Black is something I should be proud of. And I, I'm able to see now that the baruch of my skin color, the baruch of having to experience what it's like to be different than others really made me the person I am today. It really helped me develop tremendous empathy, helped me see the good in other people, 'cause that's what I wanted to see in myself, and I wanted others to see that in me. It was so important.

24:01 Speaker 2 And that brings us back to the idea of seeing beyond the surface and into the soul, and why it was so important to Rabbi Yossi Kulik to share his story after so many years of keeping it hidden.

24:14 Speaker 1 I had to do my own soul-searching, and I had to figure this out for myself. And I hope that by my admitting this, other people can look in the mirror, and they might do it as well.

24:24 Speaker 2 And also why it's so important for him to remember the Lubavitcher Rebbe's example of unconditional love.

24:31 Speaker 1 I've internalized what the Rebbe says, that he likes counting diamonds. I sincerely believe that I am here today because of the Rebbe's master vision.

24:42 Speaker 2 Did the Rebbe ever mention race or skin color to you?

24:46 Speaker 1 It, it would have absolutely shocked me if the Rebbe would have mentioned color to me. The Rebbe didn't operate by differentiating people based on their color. He looked at the soul of each person and saw something special, and he saw something unique in each and every person that he encountered.

25:02 Speaker 2 That's how the Kulics operate in their work on campus. It's also the way Lakey and Mendy Rappaport do things as they begin their second year at Syracuse.

25:13 Speaker 5 There is so, so beauty in each person, in each person's soul, and that's what Chabad on Campus is doing, Chabad around the world is doing, is we're finding those souls and bringing out that beauty.

25:28 Speaker 1 If Chabad on Campus doesn't succeed in lighting souls, inspiring and helping others, if we're not gonna be proper Lamplighters, there will be no Jewish students on these campuses in 20 years. So our job's not done.

25:42 Speaker 5 It's planting these seeds that we don't know are sprouting. Just being here, just being present, is planting seeds somewhere.

25:58 Speaker 2 I'm Gary Wolik. Thanks for listening to Lamplighters: Stories from Chabad Emissaries on the Jewish Frontier. We welcome your questions and comments about what you've just heard on Lamplighters. Please email us at podcast@lubavitch.com, and if you know of a great story involving Chabad emissaries or the people they inspire, please let us know about them. That's podcast@lubavitch.com. To subscribe digitally to Lubavitch International Magazine or to receive it at your doorstep, please visit lubavitch.com/subscribe. This is a Lubavitch International podcast