‘More than I could have ever hoped for’: A conversation with Rabbi Leslie Y. Gutterman

In July, having completed 45 years of service to Temple Beth-El as well as the larger Jewish and gentile communities, Rabbi Gutterman will retire as senior rabbi of Temple Beth-El. Three years ago, he surpassed the record of his mentor, Rabbi William Braude, as Rhode Island’s longest-serving rabbi. The following questions and answers are highlights from a conversation recently conducted in his study, looking at his life and career here.

Q. In 1970, before you became Beth-El’s assistant rabbi, had you ever been to New England?

A. No. I had only been once to New York City, when I was best man at my best friend’s wedding.

Q. Did you think that, after your ordination at Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati, you were headed to the Midwest?

A. Yes, I hoped so. It probably would have been Chicago, a great city. It wasn’t far from where I grew up, in Flint, Michigan. One of my HUC classmates, David Mersky, did go to a congregation in Chicago, which wanted a person who had more experience with youth programming. He did not stay there, however. Ironically, David’s daughter, Rachel, became a member of our congregation and now chairs our youth committee.

Q. How long did you think that you would remain here as assistant rabbi?

A. Probably three to five years, although Beth-El was different from most congregations because both of Rabbi Braude’s last two assistants had stayed six years each. I didn’t have any great career plans. I thought that after Beth-El I would have my own, probably a smaller, congregation. Size, however, was never a requirement for me. I had been a student rabbi in Rome, Georgia, and Alpena, Michigan, which were really wonderful experiences.

Q. Before coming to Beth-El, do you have a pretty good understanding of your strengths and weaknesses?

A. I knew what my strengths were not. Scholarship was not my talent or gift. I never had the discipline that distinguished my mentors at HUC, who meant so much to me. My strength was the pastorate.

Q  Did you ever have any premonition that Rabbi Braude would soon retire?

A  No, I never sensed that I would be able to succeed him.

Q. Were you ready to become senior rabbi in 1974?

A. No, probably not. I was a good pastor, a good friend to people and I was kind. I knew that I was a mensch because that is how I was raised. I married Julie, a woman who reinforced those values. How I grew in character and in stature unfolded over the years. Yet, it wasn’t by chance that all my professors at HUC, my mentor Rabbi Samuel Karff and Rabbi Braude were great Jewish scholars. I had no doubt about their authenticity as found in Jewish tradition. I respected them. The menschlichkeit, which may have won people’s hearts, was not seen as a great value within the rabbinate, however. It was a great value within human beings. Anybody should be kind, caring and sincere.

Q. You were the right person in a sense because you were not Rabbi Braude?

A. That is correct. I filled in gaps that did not always interest him. But he respected, nurtured and reinforced my abilities.

Q. Do you think of yourself as a Rhode Islander?

A. Rabbi Eli Bohnen of Temple Emanu-El once said that you think of yourself as being home when you’re ready to buy cemetery plots.

After my parents moved to Providence, we decided that there wasn’t anybody left in Michigan to visit graves. So my parents decided to sell their plots there and buy plots in Beth-El’s cemetery. We may have bought four plots at the time, in the mid-1980s. So, to answer your question: my daughters were born here, my parents and first wife were buried here, so I do think of this place as home.

Q. But are you a Rhode Islander?

A. The joke is, “One of these days you will be.”

Q. Many years after you became senior rabbi and felt secure in your position, did you ever consider moving to a larger congregation?

A. I once had an opportunity to interview with a much larger congregation in a much larger city, but I didn’t accept the invitation. It was very clear to me that this was home. Julie was happy, our kids were growing up here and this was a wonderful congregation. It was more than I could have ever hoped for or ever dreamed of. I once asked a friend what it meant when he received a life contract. He said, “My dreams are over.” I never felt that way.

Q. Have you ever thought that God chose you to come here?

A. No. It was stupid luck. Rabbi Braude was looking for an assistant.

Q. That’s it?

A. That’s it. I don’t believe in that kind of destiny. Somebody else could have perfectly filled the bill. I could have been happy in another community. But this did turn out to be providential. It’s been a rabbinate that has been truly blessed. There is essentially a lack of conflict, and there’s been an opportunity for me to be who I am. I am very grateful to God, but I do not think that this was particularly God’s plan. He had bigger fish to fry.

Q. Had you felt called to the rabbinate?

A. It had been suggested by Rabbi William Sajowitz, who officiated at my bar mitzvah, but that age is much too young to have any reasonable idea of what being a rabbi is all about. I clung to the idea sometimes very naively. It meant that I didn’t have to take the law school boards. In those days I knew very few people who earned a Ph.D. in psychology, and even fewer men who became social workers. But these would probably have been professions that suited me fine. When I was a junior or a senior in college, I knew that I would try for the rabbinate. I had been on the national board of the National Federation of Temple Youth, which spawned a number of rabbinic candidates.

Many of us decided to become rabbis before we decided to become Jews, however. Jewish commitment, Jewish teaching and rootedness in Jewish tradition all came later. But there was an emotional “X” factor that drew us to the rabbinate.

Q. Why do you allow and encourage everybody to call you “Les”?

A. I was able to be just me, which worked out great. As a young assistant rabbi, there was less of a tendency to take on a black robe of religiosity. But it was a different age, when rabbis embraced such formality. I know of rabbis whose wives referred to them in public as “rabbi.”

Q. Do you ever deny yourself a sense of honor that you’ve earned?

A. No. I like it when people call me by my first name. It lowered the bar and became more accepted, at least in my peer group. I realized, however, that in a time of crisis or need, some folks who would normally call me by my first name suddenly called me “rabbi.” I learned that it was something that they needed to do, and it was fine. I would not correct them. Reverence can be a barrier, and it is not something I aspire to. Being approachable has its own merit. It is something that I have always valued. It has brought out some of the best in me.

Q. I think that you’re also a very private person.

A. Yes, I think I am much shyer than people assume. I’m not private in the sense that I’m reluctant to share of myself or of my own life or experiences that could be helpful to somebody else, but I’m not always eager to enter into a social situation. It’s a comfort level sometimes. I do not ever mind when I spend an evening only with Janet or by myself. I do envy some people who have their own social group because I’ve never had that. But on the other hand, I have had many friends who are much, much older rather than much, much younger than I.

Q. So what is the best part of being rabbi of Beth-El?

A. Oh, the opportunity for me to have been part of generations of families and to have been privileged to help bring meaning and purpose to their lives at significant moments.

Q. So what is the worst part of the job?

A. I think the relentlessness. There are a lot of tasks, administrative and otherwise, that you can’t say no to. You just can’t pick the things that you’re very good at. I often feel that I was on a public stage, and there’s a certain stress. Often, as you suggested, people’s reactions are overly generous and overly forgiving. There are also experiences when you have disappointed people, particularly when you’ve known them a long time. You don’t give them what you wanted or you made a mistake. I think that it’s hard for a rabbi when people don’t know how to resolve conflict. They may find it easier to cut off a relationship.

Q. Are you alluding to the tediousness of having to write a zillion thank-you and congratulatory letters?

A. No, I don’t find it tedious. When I say that there’s a relentlessness, you can always visit someone more. You do what you can do.

Q. Do you feel guilty that you weren’t perfect?

A. Look, I’m realistic. I need to learn from and correct my mistakes, but you can’t do it all. You have to find your own voice and be content with what your strengths are and be appreciative of people with different strengths.

Q. When you retire from your formal duties, what are you going to miss most?

A. Oh, it’s very clear. It’s the web of relationships that have nurtured me as I’ve nurtured others. If it doesn’t change somewhat, however, it will not be fair to my successor.

Q. What will you miss least?

A. The pressure of feeling that what I prepared is not good enough. I won’t miss spending an entire summer working on three sermons.

Q. Are you ready to retire?

A. Yes, I chose it. My original contract was until I was 70, but I asked to extend it by two years.

Q. What if the Temple’s leadership came to you now and asked for three more years?

A. No, I think that this is the right time. It’s better to go gracefully than burn out.

One area that has not weakened for me is listening to people’s stories and crafting eulogies that reflect a life. Those kinds of experiences are still meaningful to me. But if I never gave another sermon, I would not be unhappy.

Q. Do you see God in a different way than you did 20 or 40 years ago?

A. The question, honestly, does not speak to me. I have more of an appreciation of the lack of control that all of us have. I also have a better appreciation that most people are more resilient than they thought they were. Having grown older, I have seen terrible things but also people who rise to the occasion. They learn to walk with a limp or manage their lives quite nobly. Having seen life differently, I probably see God’s role differently. I’ve never been big on theology. I wonder, however, what I said to the congregation about Julie, before she died, or what my own kids went through before they moved out of the house and had their own struggles. What kind of rabbi am I now compared to then?

Q. Ultimately, does it matter whether God hears or listens to our prayers?

A. Whether God answers our prayers is a conversation about our part in them. Are our prayers worthy of God’s listening? What does it mean when we pray for something that we can help affect? On the other hand, some prayers are instinctive. The first payer in the Bible is Moses asking God to heal his sister, Miriam. Prayers heal. His prayer wasn’t theological or well thought out. There is always a sense of reaching out in hope for the support that we can only imagine.

Q. Is God more than a beautiful allusion?

A. When I pray to God, I don’t think about a kind of theological construct. I also know that it is not a kind of soliloquy. I pray to God.

GEORGE GOODWIN, a member of Temple Beth-El, has edited the “Rhode Island Jewish Historical Notes” for more than 10 years.