James Goodman, Staff writer
8:32 a.m. EST December 20, 2014
Democrat & Chronicle
The Deaf Hanukkah Celebration that will be held Monday evening in Rochester features a deaf rabbi committed to making Jewish culture accessible to members of the deaf community.
Rabbi Yehoshua Soudakoff, who lives in Brooklyn, has become not only an advocate for deaf Jews but also for removing any barriers that prevent equal treatment of deaf people.
He will light the menorah at the Deaf Hanukkah Celebration at the Chabad House on Genesee Street.
“The holiday of Hanukkah imparts us with a timeless message: to add more and more! On each night of Hanukkah, we increase in the number of flames, adding more light to the world,” Soudakoff wrote in an email describing the message he brings.
The event, he added, is a way to strengthen “our sense of Jewish Deaf identity.”
At the age of 23, Soudakoff has established a website and a nonprofit to help deaf Jews. His stop in Rochester is part of a Hanukkah tour for the deaf and hard of hearing that includes appearances in Manhattan at the Museum of Jewish Heritage and at Gallaudet University in Washington, D.C.
Hanukkah celebrates the rededication of the holy Temple in Jerusalem more than 2,000 years ago, after it had been freed from Syrian control and cleansed of idols. The oil in a small container was believed to be enough to provide light for a day, but it miraculously lasted for eight days.
Rabbi Asher Yaras, who is director of the Chabad House, said that Soudakoff has been making visits to Rochester a few times a year, usually around a Jewish holiday.
Advocating for the deaf
In his Hanukkah appearances, Soudakoff travels with a special menorah. There is a hand sign for the number 8 at the base of the menorah, another sign for light and the open hands on the menorah represent the spreading of light.
“He is an advocate for the deaf within the Jewish community. He makes the Jewish holidays and celebrations accessible to deaf Jews in American Sign Language,” said Jennifer Gravitz, who is chair of the National Technical Institute for the Deaf’s Department of Liberal Studies at Rochester Institute of Technology.
Estimates of deaf Jews in the Rochester area fall in the 100 to 200 range.
Diana Pryntz, 57, of Brighton is among those from the local Jewish community who will be at Monday evening’s event.
“People are drawn to him. They sense his good heart, nature and deep-felt interest in the well-being of everyone,” Pryntz said in an email. She is the main coordinator for the Society of Rochester Jewish Deaf events and will be honored at Monday’s event.
Pryntz added: “I consider him as a son of mine. I knew his father from my college years and later met his mother, so I feel the need to look out for him, not that he needs anyone taking care of him.”
Soudakoff said that he is one of four deaf rabbis in North America. Born to deaf parents, he grew up in Los Angeles.
Soudakoff’s roots
His mother ran the Jewish Deaf Community Center, a nonprofit educational, religious and charitable organization, and hosted Jewish events in their home for the deaf community.
Soudakoff graduated from Yeshivas Tomchei Tmimim-Chovevi Torah- Lubavitch in Brooklyn.
His efforts to reach the deaf community led to his establishment of Jewish Deaf Multimedia in 2010, and then the Jewish Deaf Foundation, which runs such programs as summer camps for Jewish deaf children and Hanukkah celebrations.
The multimedia website, which Soudakoff directs, says that it “aims to bring the beautiful wisdom of our precious heritage to the Jewish Deaf community.”
Everything from online courses for deaf people to Soudakoff’s blog postings are offered on the website.
Soudakoff said that the “Deaf Community has been left out of the Jewish world for far too long.”
In a blog posting (“The World Still Does Not Understand Us”) that appeared a year ago in The Huffington Post, Soudakoff weighed in on the controversy sparked by the imposter interpreter at Nelson Mandela’s memorial service in South Africa.
“It is not just that Deaf people were left to decipher a mumble-jumble of random signs, it also serves as a message to the Deaf community that the world still does not understand us,” he wrote.
Soudakoff then described the beauty of sign language, writing that “it is through the silent voices of our hands that we are heard loud and clear.”
