Rabbi Joshua Gruenberg may not be from Baltimore, but he loves the Jewish community here as much as anyone who grew up in the area.

The senior rabbi at Chizuk Amuno Congregation joined the shul eight years ago and quickly found out just how special it is to be a Jew in Baltimore.

“I’m new to Baltimore, even though I’ve been here for eight years — as you know, eight years is new in Baltimore. There’s just so many things to appreciate about the Jewish Baltimore community that are just unbelievable that you don’t see in a lot of other Jewish communities, and so the combination of this incredible institution together with Jewish Baltimore, we feel very lucky to have come here.”

For Gruenberg, something that really stands out when considering what makes Baltimore Jewry so special is how unified the Jewish community is.

“There’s a lot of Jewish communities that don’t have that,” he said.

When Gruenberg came to Chizuk Amuno, he knew he was joining a legendary shul with a national reputation. He is the eighth senior rabbi of the 155-year-old congregation, and he knew that the community would expect a lot of him.

“There’s a lot of pressure, but I would say it’s the good kind of pressure. There’s two kinds of pressure in the world — there’s pressure you feel from the outside, and then there’s the sort of pressure you feel internally that you put on yourself. For me, that’s the good kind of pressure where you’re essentially betting on yourself. I’m betting on myself that I can rise to the occasion.”

It has not been an easy time for any Jew, let alone the head of a large congregation. Soon after Gruenberg joined Chizuk Amuno, the Tree of Life synagogue shooting in Pittsburgh happened. After that, the COVID-19 pandemic struck. From there, Oct. 7 occurred, a rise in anti-Israel sentiment and then the wave of increased antisemitism.

That has altered how Gruenberg, and other rabbis, have had to do their jobs.

“We’ve had to kind of reimagine ourselves, reinterpret ourselves, figure out everything that we’ve done, and how we can do it differently,” Gruenberg said. “I guess what I’m most proud of is, we all look collectively pretty good on the other side, we’re still a vibrant synagogue, we’re still a vibrant Jewish community, we still have vibrant schools … if there’s one thing right, our communal resiliency and adaptivity and ability to reinterpret and reimagine is inspiring.”

He added the job of a rabbi is an ever-evolving one.

“I think on a very big level, that’s always true. Our role evolves, our role changes because the community changes. That being said, I also think we are living in a time of deep uncertainty for Jewish people, and deep discomfort,” Gruenberg said.

But, like any good rabbi, Gruenberg considers the situation as more complex than that.
“On the one hand, you could make the case that, as a global Jewish community, we’ve never been as powerful as we are today. We have people in Fortune 500 companies, sitting in governments, I mean, there are Jews at the highest echelons of the world,” he said. “On the other hand, many of us have felt more vulnerable today living as a Jew in America, or in the world, than we have throughout our existence, so it’s a challenging time — not just for Jews, but I think especially for Jewish people, and so I think good rabbis understand that the world changes, and you have to meet the given moment.”

Even with the troubles in the world, Gruenberg is confident that the future is bright for Chizuk Amuno. Over the last two years, two new rabbis have been hired. They have helped evolve the synagogue’s music program, add new Torah scholars to the community and breathed more youth into the shul.

Gruenberg loves Baltimore and loves Chizuk Amuno, largely because of how much intermixing there is. However, he still hopes for a time when there is even more collaboration.

“I always wish that all of us, all the synagogues at Baltimore, would figure out ways to elevate, enhance, engage with one another,” Gruenberg said.

For now, he’ll keep leading one of the biggest names in Baltimore and American Jewry with his patented smile and warm disposition. After all, there’s a lot to look forward to.

aguckes@midatlanticmedia.com