The Darkest Light

Me

For those of you who have been reading this blog for a while, you may also know I've been working with Simon Mendes on a documentary about Shlomo Carlebach. For those of you unfamiliar with him, Carlebach was a prolific and popular songwriter in the 60s and 70s. His music is intertwined in our liturgy across Jewish denominations. His tunes are fun and catchy. Carlebach had a cult-like following and was considered by many to be saintly and holy.  

Or not.  You see, Shlomo was a known pedophile and abuser of women. He flattered, he groomed, he molested. And I was 14 when he molested me. 

He told me I was a schoene maidel...a beautiful girl...which I was not. I was gawky and goofy, and, well, not pretty. This was not news. I knew this and it wasn't something I thought much about. But then this famous man came from behind, wrapped his arms around me, and told me I was beautiful, I could barely breathe. He hugged me and continued to press against me while he whispered how beautiful I was... until someone else came into the place where we were standing. Then he let go. 

At this point, I have to admit my mother becomes the real hero of this story. And in very soft and non-scary tones, (hardly like my mom at all!) she explained that what I felt was his erection, which she had to further explain because I was 14, naive, and completely unaware about that sort of thing. After that very cautious, non-threatening conversation, Mom quietly took action, beginning with our outraged and very supportive rabbi.

I was warned about being alone with him after that, and in two other encounters, I made sure he didn't touch me or anyone else. His behavior, it turned out, was not unknown to his handlers or anyone else that had worked with him. It just seemed no one gave a damn. After that, I put it all away until....

Lilith published an article about Carlebach. Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach's Shadow Side in 1998. I read it and shared it with Mom. She and I talked about what happened. I was relieved to know I was not alone, nor had I imagined it. Mom urged me to tell Ziggy and I did. 

When Hadassah Magazine featured him on its cover, Ziggy brought the offending item into the house pinched between two fingers and suggested I let him pitch it into the trash...or at least let him read it before I did. The story, by-lined for January 2008, appeared as the cover story of the October 2008 issue. That issue sat face down on my desk for a while before I read it...and wrote an angry letter to Hadassah, a women's organization who had, at that time, a man editor-in-chief of their glossy magazine. Shlomo Carlebach The Music Man did not get the reaction they must've expected, but there were lots of angry letters. 

Finally, in December of 2008, Hadassah pretended to address the anger:

Editor’s Note: Our October cover story, “The Music Man,” focused on the musical legacy of Shlomo Carlebach. We mentioned the controversy surrounding his behavior toward women, but many of our readers found this insufficient. The following is just one of the numerous letters we received.

They published a single, wimpy letter not written by one of us. It was not enough of a response and I damn near quit Hadassah over it. 

Enter Simon Mendes. On January 26, 2022, he reached out to me, a total stranger:

I'm writing to you today because for the last several months I've been developing and in production on a film about the legacy of Shlomo Carlebach and his music, and the question of what to do with the music...I read your story in one of the comment threads on one of the articles that has circulated over the last several years. I was struck not only by the story, but also how you shared the cover up and the fact that he was confronted repeatedly about his behavior. 

And I have been working on this film ever since. What Mendes has gone in THE DARKEST LIGHT is to give voice to so many who were largely ignored or dismissed because the allegations seemed so ridiculous. But they were not. The San Francisco Jewish Film Festival describes the film this way:

In this searing portrait, filmmaker Simon Mendes examines the towering and deeply complicated shadow cast by Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach, the “Singing Rabbi,” whose music transformed Jewish worship across denominations and became woven into the fabric of the Jewish people. Through the perspective of his daughter, singer Neshama Carlebach—who spent years carrying forward her father’s teachings and music—the film traces a painful reckoning that emerged after numerous women publicly accused Carlebach of sexual abuse following his death in 1994. Haunted by revelations about the man she idolized, Neshama and an entire community are forced to confront the difficult question: what do you do when someone revered as a holy teacher has also caused profound harm? With compassion and complexity, Mendes crafts a thoughtful exploration of faith and accountability, capturing a community and a family still grappling with how to reconcile the comfort and ubiquity of Carlebach’s music with the disturbing allegations surrounding his legacy.

If you are in the Bay Area on Sunday, July 19th, come see THE DARKEST LIGHT...and me at noon at Kanbar Hall, 3200 California Street, San Francisco. Please stay for the panel discussion after the film. 

The Wifely Person's Tip o'the Week

Projects like this one is not fun.

It's serious stuff, but I am so glad I did it. 

Be a voice, not a silent observer. 

You can make a difference.