Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Fast Forward

Rabbi With ALS Makes Cross-Country Trip For Son’s Bar Mitzvah

(JTA) — A West Hollywood, California father of seven suffering from ALS made a cross-country trip to be at his son’s bar mitzvah with family and friends in his hometown of Brooklyn.

Rabbi Yitzi Hurwitz, 47, was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, in 2013. He can no longer move, and he cannot breathe without the assistance of a ventilator. He communicates using a computer with laser-based software that tracks his eye movements to move the cursor.

Hurwitz writes a weekly commentary on the Torah and a blog offering marriage advice.

On Monday, his youngest child, Shalom, 13, read from the Torah in the Brooklyn study of the late Lubavitcher Rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson. The family visited the rebbe’s grave on Sunday, the New York Post reported. The rabbi cried at the grave as he prayed for his wife, his children and for a cure.

The rabbi’s wife Dina told the Post that her husband’s illness has helped the couple reach people that they could not reach before.

“There are thousands and thousands of people going through their own hardships, their own sicknesses, their own tragedies, that look to my husband for guidance, for love, for support, for somebody who understands them,” she said. “He knows what’s going on, and he chooses to be happy.’’

A fund has been set up to help the family with medical expenses, including daily care and exploratory treatments, as well as living expenses.

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse..

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.