Our Story

Rabbi David Polish was the founding Rabbi of Beth Emet and its spiritual leader from 1950 until his retirement in 1980. Rabbi David Polish came to Chicago as the rabbi of Temple Mizpah as the Associate Rabbi.

At that time anti-Zionism was very intense within Reform Judaism, and Rabbi Polish found himself caught in the crossfires of Zionist and anti-Zionist beliefs, Beth Emet became a breakaway congregation.

Beth Emet, under Rabbi Polish’s leadership became known as a new kind of Reform Congregation, which talked a good deal about the return to tradition, of commitment to Jewish national ideas, to Zionism, and particularly to the concept of freedom of the pulpit so that a rabbi in our congregation did not feel inhibited — did not have to feel inhibited about maintaining a position on Jewish values or on Universal values for that matter.

Rabbi Polish was also the founding president of the Chicago Board of Rabbis and a founder of the Association of Reform Zionists of America, an organization whose statement of principles he drafted.

Rabbi Polish brought Beth Emet through the period of defining what it means to be a Reform Jew. As a congregation, and a broader movement, we figured out what was important to us and why we existed as a reform Congregation.

Rabbi Polish was a contemporary pillar of the Reform Rabbinical movement, he set a foundation for the Beth Emet community as a rabbi which then Rabbi Peter Knobel continued to expand.

In 1958, Beth Emet had the privilege of hosting a lecture series.

During the lecture, we hosted Dr. Martin Luther King, Theodore Bikel, and Dr. Abba Lerner. We knew how important it was to house MLK that when he was prohibited from getting a hotel room anywhere in Evanston, one of our very own congregants housed him in their home.

(Fun Fact: each lecture cost 50 cents!) 

Rabbi Knobel served Beth Emet, first as senior and then Rabbi Emeritus, from 1980 to his passing on August 20, 2019. He was a man of many accomplishments from scholarship on the ancient Aramaic translation of the Torah to prayer book editor and leader of the Central Conference of American Rabbis.

For the long-time members of Beth Emet, he was best known as a learned and kind person who thought of others first and did his best to improve the world around him.

“For a man of such vast accomplishments and prodigious gifts…one might expect a certain amount of conceitedness or vanity. Yet Peter Knobel was a mensch who was supportive of, and placed the greatest emphasis on, the accomplishments of others, not his own,” said Rabbi Andrea London.

“I can think of countless examples of his publicly praising others; it seemed he never missed an opportunity to elevate those around him.”

He co-chaired the CCAR Project, Lay Involvement in the Development of Liturgy, sponsored by the Lilly Endowment and the Nathan Cummings Foundation and he chaired the Central Conference of American Rabbis’ Ad Hoc Siddur Editorial Committee which produced Mishkan T’filah, the Reform Movement’s new prayer book.

Beth Emet played the role of guinea pig while Rabbi Knobel was the head of this Mishkan T’filah project. Beth Emet had the privilege of trying out and giving feedback on some of the many adaptations that were eventually added into the new prayer book.

Under Rabbi Knobel’s leadership, we as a congregation focused on strengthening our relationship to each other and to the community at large. We established a Chevra Kadisha, (a practice that previously had only been practiced in Orthodox communities), and practiced Tahara (religiously preparing the body for burial). To this day, the Progressive Chevra Kadisha performs this service anonymously as g’mitlut chesed (an ultimate act of lovingkindness) to honor the dead and to comfort the living who remember them.

During this time, our Men’s group and Synagogue Sisterhood were very strong forces of community and connection for Beth Emet members. Not only did we strengthen our relationships with each other, we also strengthened our relationship to social action and the broader community in Evanston.

He published papers and articles on such subjects as Assisted Suicide, Cloning, Reform Zionism, Reform Judaism, Dietary Laws, Spirituality, Rites of Passages, Judaism, and Homosexuality and Same-Sex Marriage. He also served as a member of the National Interreligious Leadership Initiative on Peace in the Middle East and was the Past Chair of the Institute for Reform Zionism. He was also the editor of Mishkan Moeid: A Guide to the Jewish Seasons and Navigating the Journey: The Essential Guide to the Jewish Lifecycle recently published by the CCAR Press.

Read more about Rabbi Knobel z”l

Rabbi Andrea London is a nationally recognized Jewish leader who has served at Beth Emet since 2000 and was named the congregation’s Senior Rabbi in July 2010.

Rabbi London is deeply engaged in all aspects of congregational life, including worship, lifecycle events, counseling and support, adult education, youth education and programming, social action, and interfaith relations. She strives to teach and encourage individuals and communities through contemplative, social, and spiritually based actions.

Social justice activism is an integral part of Rabbi London’s rabbinate. She has led several social action trips, including two congregational trips to hurricane-devastated areas on the Gulf Coast, where Beth Emet teens and families repaired homes and community centers and forged relationships with Reform Jews and members of a local church.

In April 2013, teens from Beth Emet and Second Baptist Church in Evanston, led by Rabbi London and colleagues from Second Baptist Church, spent their spring break on a six-day “Sankofa” bus journey to civil rights sites throughout the southern United States. (Sankofa is a West African word meaning “go back and get it.”) During the trip, the group explored the history of slavery and the Civil Rights Movement, using various racial and religious lenses through which we experience the world to understand the roles that race and racism play in our world and how we might be change agents in the quest to create a more equitable and compassionate society. Rabbi London is committed to continuing the work of racial justice.

Rabbi London has long promoted learning, dialogue and action on Israel and Zionism. She has been a strong proponent of congregational participation in the Reform Movement’s EIE high school program in Israel and regularly invites speakers from diverse backgrounds to offer challenging perspectives on Jewish/Muslim and Israeli/Palestinian issues. She is the chair of J Street’s rabbinic cabinet.

Rabbi London has also worked to build bridges between Chicago-area Jews, Christians, and Muslims. She has chaired the Jewish Council on Urban Affairs’ Jewish-Muslim Community-Building Initiative that works with the Chicago-area Muslim community to build relationships and understanding through educational, artistic, and religious activities and to stand up for each other when our communities face discrimination, threats, intimidation and acts of physical violence.

Jewish spirituality plays an important role in Rabbi London’s rabbinate. She is a graduate of the Institute for Jewish Spirituality’s rabbinic cohort and its Jewish Mindfulness Meditation Teacher Training program. She has initiated a variety of programs on spirituality at Beth Emet, including an ongoing Shabbat afternoon spirituality group and a yoga minyan.

Read more about Rabbi London

“Beth Emet was a playground for talented youth professionals, and I would not be the rabbi I am today without each of them (Elliot Leffler, Sara and Aaron Gunning, Yoni Sidon, Nathan Render, Beth Rodin). They made Jewish life fun, accessible, and effortlessly inclusive, and even during moments when I felt on the outside of my secular school, I always felt like I belonged at Beth Emet. Rabbi Andrea London invited me into her world and then made me a central part of it. She mentored me, treated me like a colleague, and in many ways acted as an additional parent at times! She opened my eyes to the world of justice through a Jewish lens, taking me on trips around Chicago, NYC, and DC to discuss inequities and Jewish values.”

“Beth Emet is incredibly dear to me. It is where I got my start as a Jewish leader, first experienced the joy of ruach-filled services, and was lovingly folded into an intergenerational community. As a regular at Kahal, my ritual skills, presence, and thoughts were gratefully welcomed with open arms by older Kahalniks, some of whom became my greatest supporters. My desire to become a rabbi was in large part inspired by watching them and the other Klei Kodesh lead the community with so much heart, spiritual depth, intellectual rigor, joy, and passion. They beautifully modeled for me what a future in spiritual leadership could look like, and as an adult, gave me the opportunities to share my Torah with the community that helped shape it — a profoundly meaningful gift.”

“Beth Emet was my safety, is my family, and will be an integral part of my life in perpetuity. I will never have enough words to explain the impact that growing up and then rejoining Beth Emet and Rabbi London has had on me. Beth Emet has been my home for as long as I can  remember. Throughout a very unpredictable childhood and adolescence, Beth Emet was the only constant. It instilled in me a love for Jewish learning and more importantly, the relationships I gained within those walls guided me to become the rabbi I am today. I grew up going to Kahal with my mom and sister, and the acceptance that we experienced was unique in our lives. In my senior year of high school, I worked for Cantor Arik Luck, whom I credit for my ability to lead services well before starting rabbinical school.”

“I grew up learning at a Jewish day school, but Beth Emet was really where I came into my own as a Jewish person. As a long time Beth Emet community member, Beth Emet has invested in me, giving me many opportunities to lead and teach and share my passion for Jewish music over the years. I particularly remember getting to teach a trope class to 7th graders and it reminded me of how much I love doing this work. Rabbi London always inspired me with her political leadership and collaboration skills. When I was a freshman in college, I attended a J Street conference and was in awe as Rabbi London gave the opening remarks to kick off the entire conference. I have always been proud to be a member of the Beth Emet community.”

“I tell people all the time that I had an incredible Jewish upbringing. Beth Emet was an extension of my family and a place where I experienced firsthand a model of what exemplary Jewish education and Jewish community could be.

I never played the guitar, but singing Jewish music was woven throughout my Beth Emet experience. The music of Cantor Jeff Klepper, and the idea that Judaism was participatory, were central. During the religious school year, there was an annual countdown of the top 10 songs of the year. We waited with bated breath to see which song would be number one. I can still sing a surprising number of lyrics from “We Didn’t Start No Trouble,” a parody about Purim with many verses. As a child, those songs created a foundation of Jewish learning, but as an adult I understand that they also unlock a sense of belonging and open doors to connection with others. Beth Emet has had many cantors over the years. They all taught me so much and gave me room to try new things. Rabbi London has been there with me through every step of my clergy journey, and it is a blessing to now call her my colleague. She inspires me to be a strong mentor to others and to take time to invest in the next generation.”

“There is a teaching ascribed to the Kotzker Rebbe — Menachem Mendel of Kotzk — explaining this text from the book of Psalms: 

“KeChitzim BaYad Gibor Ken Bnei haNeurim” (Tehillim 127:4)  

Like arrows in the hand of a mighty archer, so are the children in youth.  

“What is the connection between arrows and children?” he asked? “Just as when an archer holds their bow closer to their heart, the farther and straighter the arrow flies. So too with raising children, the closer we hold them to our heart the farther and straighter they go.”  

This is how Beth Emet affected my path to becoming a rabbi. From my very earliest memories, the synagogue, its clergy, people, congregants, and leadership held me and many of those around me close to its heart. It sent many of us on a path of creativity, spiritual curiosity, Jewish practice that was deeply considered, and social justice oriented living that we otherwise might not have travelled. There is no way my path would have ended in the rabbinate without seeing a Judaism that was this rich and varied. Beth Emet the Free Synagogue could not have played a more influential role and I continue to look to it as a model for the rabbinate about which I teach others.”

“When my family moved to Evanston in 1964, we continued our membership at a synagogue in Chicago for several years. And today—nearly 50 years since I finished the high school program at Beth Emet—I am pleased and proud that they made that choice. 

I still remember the first time it occurred to me that perhaps I could become a rabbi. As a young college student who didn’t know Rabbi David Polish very well, I nervously mentioned this to him following a Shabbat evening service. His face lit up, and he suggested that we have a conversation. Although my long and winding road to rabbinical school would take more than 15 years, and steer me away from HUC-JIR, that conversation remained in my mind the entire time. It inspired my academic work on activist rabbis, and as I was growing into my own role as an activist rabbi, he was a source of inspiration. 

Although in many ways the synagogue I currently serve could not be more different than Beth Emet (it is a very small congregation located in Stockholm, Sweden), it is not infrequently that I bring up something that I learned from having grown up at Beth Emet.”

“It was truly b’sheret that I ended up working at Beth Emet going into my senior year of college. At the time, I thought it was a great part-time job for a full-time student. Little did I know that it would be the job that helped shaped my identity and future. I had toyed with the possibility of one day becoming a cantor while a teenager, but my time at Beth Emet is what gave me the final push to pursue the cantorate. I absolutely loved the work I got to do at Beth Emet, leading both the Kahal service and leading t’fillah and a junior choir at Beit Sefer. Working at Beth Emet ended up being not just a job to pay my bills; Beth Emet became my community. My parents didn’t live in the Chicago area, but I knew that I would always have a place to go for all the holidays. I feel so fortunate that Rabbi London and Cantor Luck saw the potential in 20-year-old me and hired me.

Beth Emet is a special place that dives deep into our tradition. I learned so much about customs and rituals that I hadn’t known, just by being a community member of Beth Emet. Not only did the klei kodesh’s love of Judaism inspire me, but the community’s commitment to our tradition and one another showed me that the cantorate was what I wanted to pursue so I could help facilitate Jewish community out in the world. I am forever grateful that Beth Emet was the place where I started my journey as a Jewish professional, and that it helped me get to where I am today. ”

“In 2005, I met Cantor Erin Frankel for an informational interview before moving to Chicago. She offered me the opportunity to apply for a position leading the Kahal minyan. Without knowing whether or not I would get the job, I booked a one-way ticket to Chicago one month later, to start my new life. As my duties expanded, I was the beneficiary of much work experience that to this day informs my work as a cantor. The expanded roles also gave me opportunities to deepen my relationships with families in the community. I still consider several families from Beth Emet some of my most precious friends. 

A big part of me longed to be Beth Emet’s next cantor, but I knew that my cantorial style would not meet the community’s needs. That clarity gave me the ability to do my job, knowing that I was exactly where I needed to be, doing what I needed to be doing, and learning hugely valuable things every day. When an opportunity arose to work full time at another congregation, I was truly torn, and sad to leave this very special place. I will always hold Beth Emet in my heart and history as the most formative experience of my career to this day.”