Jewish American Heritage Month

Posted By admin on November 4, 2021

One of the happiest nights I ever spent in synagogue was May 16, 2011, when my fellow congregants and I gathered to watch that nights episode of Jeopardy!

One of the members of our shul, Congregation Beth Sholom in Teaneck, was a contestant, but of course Rabbi Joyce Newmark, hadnt been able to tell us the results of a game, which had been taped months before. She sat stone-faced as her televised self ripped through category after category and nailed the Final Jeopardy! question: What is liberal arts?

When it sunk in that she had won the game and $29,200 the social hall erupted. Koufax pitches no-hitter! Mark Spitz swims to seven gold medals! Rabbi Newmark wins on Jeopardy!

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The victory was especially sweet if you knew Joyce.

She could come off as forbidding, especially if you couldnt keep up with her knowledge of Torah, science fiction, and current events. She lived alone and suffered from various ailments. But those who got to know her appreciated her sharp mind and keen wit, which she showed off when she chatted with Alex Trebek.

Mr. Trebek noted that she was appearing on the show 20 years to the day after her ordination at the Jewish Theological Seminary, and asked her a question about being a female rabbi. Joyce replied, In an interview I was asked by the search committee, Whats it like to be a female rabbi? I said, I dont know. Ive never been any other kind. Mr. Trebek deemed that a good answer.

Joyce died on Monday, at age 73, at Jewish Home Assisted Living in River Vale. I had seen her in services over the High Holidays and she told me she wasnt well. Actually, she told me she was dying. Joyce was blunt and would hate a euphemism like she wasnt well.

Joyce moved into the assisted living facility in her 60s, a few decades younger than the average resident. It was a compromise to her health and finances: She had last held a pulpit job in 2005, at Congregation Sons of Israel in Leonia, and was on a fixed income. She kept busy editing papers and books for scholarly friends, taking part in a regular rabbis study class, and reading the novels (mysteries and thrillers, it always surprised me to learn) that she brought home by the armload from the public library. She came to services every week when she was well, driven by a former synagogue president to whom she was devoted.

My mother-in-law was living at the same facility, and whenever Id visit Id see Joyce, usually with a book in her lap. She turned her apartment into a sort of rabbinic cockpit: a desk and computer dominated the living room, surrounded by her sifrei kodesh, her holy books. She wrote sharp and often funny commentaries on the weekly Torah portion, many of which I published when I edited the New Jersey Jewish News. The guest sermons she delivered from our synagogue pulpit always were the highlight of a Shabbat morning service.

I considered Joyce a kiddush friend, the kind you run into once a week after services and chat up over kugel and tuna fish. I always enjoyed our conversations, so long as we steered clear of politics. (We didnt agree on much.) Shed reminisce about her career before she became a rabbi; shed spent more than 15 years in management consulting and banking. Shed share a little Torah, often quoting herself which I, a habitual self-quoter, found endearing. And, in the last few years, shed report on how my mother-in-law was doing, especially when she suspected Mom was having a bad week.

Joyce reveled in her attention as a Jeopardy! winner and the flurry of media attention that followed. She would spin tales of the process, from auditions to taping to the community of former players who met and chatted online. She was part of an elite club, and knew it, and nobody could begrudge her.

When Alex Trebek died last year, I spoke to Joyce about what he meant to her. He was the kind of person who competes on Jeopardy! she told me. He loved odd facts and read books and appreciated knowledge lishma for its own sake. He just loved learning.

I am pretty sure she was also describing herself.

Jewish Telegraphic Agency

Andrew Silow-Carroll of Teaneck is the editor in chief of the New York Jewish Week and senior editor of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. He is the former editor in chief and CEO of the New Jersey Jewish News.

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She just loved learning - The Jewish Standard

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