Visiting Rabbi Liora Alban and Rabbi Daniel Freedman in their Mid City home, it\u2019s possible to believe they\u2019re newlyweds, even though they\u2019ve been married for four years and it\u2019s been 11 and a half years since they met.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat\u2019s special about being married to a rabbi,\u201d Rabbi Freedman said, \u201cis that we aren\u2019t able to just provide support for each other \u2013 in terms of the general way a partner would support a spouse. We are able to go deeper because we really understand what each other is doing and what the other person is facing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rabbi Alban was asked how being married to a fellow rabbi is distinct from other relationships. She grew up in the Valley, he\u2019s from St. Louis and they met as incoming freshmen before classes began at Hebrew Union College, Jerusalem. \u201cI was not specifically looking,\u201d she said. \u201cA lot of couples are formed that first year (at HUC). Out of 35 students, we are the only couple still together.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Geography is one example of their relationship\u2019s intentional design. They reside about equidistant from her assistant rabbi position at Temple Emanuel of Beverly Hills and his position at Temple Akiba in Culver City.<\/p>\n
Rabbi Alban explained why a marriage between rabbis is unique. \u201cOur conversations at dinner,\u201d she said, \u201care about our jobs. I know other couples do, but we really understand what the other person is doing. A lot of times we will be teaching the same classes, we will utilize the same notes, be studying the same things and have tips for the other person. The beautiful part is we really understand each other. We can support each other. We get each other\u2019s schedules. The hard part is it makes it even harder to separate from the job, and our jobs in general are very hard. Not only does it take up your whole life but it takes up your whole couple life. We end up talking about our jobs and Judaism most of the time.\u201d<\/p>\n
He noted that both oversee Religious Schools and both teach adult education. \u201cWe both have a spectrum of students from four years old all the way up to mature adults,\u201d he said. \u201cHis school is much larger than mine,\u201d she said, \u201cand I probably work with more adults.\u201d<\/p>\n
In retrospect, it seemed like a needless question: Does having similar\/identical careers enrich your marriage? \u201cWe really understand and support each other,\u201d Rabbi Alban said. \u201cI think it definitely is a way in which we bring the work home,\u201d said Rabbi Freedman. \u201cIt is not just bringing it home, but there is a partner to bounce ideas off of. It\u2019s not just like \u2018Oh, what are you working on?\u2019 It\u2019s sharing an idea. It means the space here also is a space for support, reflection, creativity.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201dWe will talk about what we are working on,\u201d\u00a0 Rabbi Alban explained, \u201dand one will say, \u2018Oh, I did that before. Let me tell you how I did it.\u2019\u00a0 We\u2019ll bounce ideas off each other.\u201d When they were students, she said, \u201cwe did a lot of studying together. Now, because we are both deeply involved in our jobs, it\u2019s not as if we sit down and study together but we might. If I\u2019m having trouble writing a lesson, I might ask him for ideas. But we don\u2019t usually sit down and study texts together.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is something we used to do when we were in school,\u201d he said. \u201cIt would be nice if we could carve out time for that.\u201d Eventually? \u201cOne day,\u201d she says with a laugh. \u201cStudying texts together was something we did when we got together,\u201d he said. \u201cI remember having a Shabbat lunch picnic where we would study the Parsha HaShavuah (the weekly Torah portion). That was really nice.\u201d
Jewish Journal: Your favorite Shabbat moment?<\/p>\n
Rabbi Alban: We both lead Shabbat services. Then we\u2019ll come home and have a later Shabbat dinner together around 9 p.m. I cook, he cleans.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Rabbi Freedman: I look forward to that same moment each week. It\u2019s something we count on each week.<\/p>\n
J.J.: Your favorite vacation destination?<\/p>\n
RF: We got married in Southern California and took a trip up the Coast. We had a really nice time exploring the Coast together. We both liked it so much we did it for our fourth anniversary. We enjoy being in a place where it\u2019s not so difficult to get around so we can focus on enjoying our time together. Liora inspired in me a sense of travel I don\u2019t think I had.<\/p>\n
RA: The Coast is a special place to us.<\/p>\n
J.J.\u00a0 What are your career goals?<\/p>\n
RA: It\u2019s not just about what would be my dream job but how would that fit into our life. Before rabbinical school, I had an idea of what a successful rabbinic career would look like.\u00a0 Now I realize there are many ways to be a rabbi. There is a lot that measures success, and it\u2019s not just the title.<\/p>\n
RF:\u00a0 I think the way we do that together is that we are constantly helping each other to reflect on our experiences. That helps me to learn what feels good about a job or not as fitting. It helps to think more about where do you want to go since you have a partner who has helped you reflect on what is working, what could be better.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Visiting Rabbi Liora Alban and Rabbi Daniel Freedman in their Mid City home, it\u2019s possible to believe they\u2019re…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":444058,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5123],"tags":[1582,276,2961,224,5337],"class_list":{"0":"post-444057","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-california","10":"tag-la","11":"tag-los-angeles","12":"tag-losangeles"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115711212539581177","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/444057","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=444057"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/444057\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/444058"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=444057"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=444057"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=444057"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}