DC Orthodox Jews visit Selma reform synagogue to honor MLK

Group spends Shabbat in city where Martin Luther King Jr. and Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel walked together for civil rights

By JTA 16 January 2017, 10:22 pm
Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel (second from right), marches at Selma with Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., Ralph Bunche, Rep. John Lewis, Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth and Rev. C.T. Vivian. (Courtesy of Susannah Heschel)

More than 100 members of the Orthodox National Synagogue in Washington, DC traveled to Selma, Alabama, to visit the historic Reform Temple Mishkan Israel.

The Reform temple in Selma only has seven remaining members, according to the Montgomery Advertiser.

Rabbi Shmuel Herzfeld of the Orthodox National Synagogue said the purpose of the group’s visit was to “educate ourselves about the civil rights movement” in Selma, where Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel walked together across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in 1965 as a sign of religious solidarity.

The trip was timed to coincide with the weekend of Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

Selma politicians joined the Jewish visitors for Shabbat, who ate their Shabbat meals together, danced together, and then walked through the Selma neighborhood and heard about its history.


Selma’s small Jewish community has dwindled to almost nothing in recent years. Temple Mishkan has not had a full-time rabbi in many decades, and the historic building has fallen into disrepair, according to the newspaper.

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