THOSE WE’VE LOST, https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/06/science/abraham-j-twerski-dead-coronavirus.html
Abraham Twerski, Who Merged 12 Steps and the Torah, Dies at 90
A noted psychiatrist, he looked outside his Orthodox tradition to meld an eclectic menu of addiction treatments, including the A.A. idea of a “higher power.”
Abraham J. Twerski in 2015. He was both an Orthodox rabbi and a psychiatrist highly regarded as an authority on addiction.Credit...Menachem Butler
By Joseph Berger
Published Feb. 6, 2021Updated Feb. 12, 2021
Abraham J. Twerski was an Orthodox rabbi, the descendant of several Hasidic dynasties. Yet he was also a psychiatrist and a respected authority on addiction who was drawn to the 12-step approach central to Alcoholics Anonymous, a program whose origins are Christian.
“He discovered in A.A. meetings the kind of sincere and even selfless fellow-feeling that was often absent in synagogues,” Andrew Heinze wrote in a 1999 profile of Rabbi Twerski for Judaism, the quarterly magazine of the American Jewish Congress. “He was moved by the example of men and women who would willingly be awakened in the middle of the night to go out and help a fellow alcoholic.”
He saw no contradiction between the 12 steps and his belief in the laws of Torah, according to his granddaughter Chaya Ruchie Waldman. “The 12 steps may have been created by Christian believers,” she said, “but it was about spirituality, surrendering to a higher power, and that is synonymous with Judaism.”
Rabbi Twerski melded an eclectic menu of treatments in his work as director of psychiatry at St. Francis Hospital in Pittsburgh. The Gateway Rehabilitation Center, which he founded, was named one of the top 12 rehabilitation clinics in the United States by Forbes magazine in 1987. He also wrote 80 books, many on Jewish topics but many others on addictive thinking and the addictive personality, all of which enhanced his international reputation as an authority on addiction.
He died on Jan. 31 at a hospital in Jerusalem, the city where he had lived full time for the past five years. He was 90. A grandson, Chaim Twerski, said the cause was complications of Covid-19.
A devotee of the comic strip “Peanuts,” Rabbi Twerski sought out its creator, Charles M. Schulz, in an attempt to broaden people’s thinking about issues like alcoholism and psychology. Their collaboration resulted in a series of self-help books illustrated with pictures of Snoopy, Charlie Brown and other Peanuts characters, with titles such as “Waking Up Just in Time: A Therapist Shows How to Use the Twelve-Steps Approach to Life’s Ups and Downs” (1990).
What distinguished Rabbi Twerski from many other Orthodox therapists was his willingness to look outside his community. In one of his works, “The Shame Borne in Silence: Spouse Abuse in the Jewish Community” (1996), he called attention to a problem that many Hasidic leaders argued should be handled discreetly within the insular community, without informing the police or outside authorities.
Abraham Joshua Heschel Twerski was born on Oct. 6, 1930, in Milwaukee, where his parents had immigrated in 1927 after leaving Russia. His father, Jacob, the sixth-generation descendant of the grand rabbi of Chernobyl, was the rabbi of Beth Jehudah Synagogue in Milwaukee. His mother, Devorah Leah (Halberstam) Twerski, was the daughter of a grand rabbi of Bobov, one of the largest Hasidic sects.
Abraham was the third of five brothers, each of whom became a rabbi but was given an advanced secular education as well, earning college and graduate degrees, something very few Hasidim strive for. He attended public schools in Milwaukee, and in second grade acted in a Christmas play. When his mother visited the school, the principal thought she was there to complain; instead, she told the principal that if her son’s Jewish upbringing was not strong enough to weather a second-grade play, it was his family that had failed him.
He received his rabbinical ordination in 1951 through the Hebrew Theological College in Chicago (now in Skokie, Ill.). While working with his father’s synagogue as an assistant rabbi, he relished counseling others but realized that the members of the congregation would always turn to his father for advice about their most intimate personal problems. He decided, he explained in a 1988 interview with the National Council of Jewish Women, that by studying psychiatry he might enhance his own talent.
“So I went to medical school to become a psychiatrist to do what I wanted to do as a rabbi,” he said.
He received his medical degree at Marquette University in Milwaukee, a Jesuit institution. When the actor Danny Thomas, a practicing Catholic who had been raised in the Midwest, learned during a lunch with Marquette officials that a student who was an Orthodox rabbi needed up to $4,000 to complete his medical studies, he told the officials, “He’s got it,” and made good on his pledge.
Rabbi Twerski trained as a psychiatrist at the University of Pittsburgh. He was supposed to take up a teaching position at the university, but after Sister Adele at St. Francis Hospital let him know of the hospital’s needs for a stronger mental health program, he became its director of psychiatry. He stayed there for 20 years.
At the time, St. Francis might house about 30 patients for alcoholism treatment, all of them drying out for a few days before being sent home. Rabbi Twerski felt the hospital needed a longer-term clinic and, according to an interview he gave to Pittsburgh Quarterly in 2008, told the nuns, “We must build a place they can go for a few weeks after they’ve dried out to give them a head start on sobriety.”
He was drawn to the idea of helping addicts promptly stop drinking or abusing drugs, in contrast to the more classic psychoanalytic approach of having them explore the roots of their need for those substances. He found that this tougher approach accorded with the Orthodox approach to combating the “evil inclination,” as well as A.A. tenets. But he applied other approaches as well, relying on what he felt each individual could tolerate.
He is survived by his wife, Gail (Bessler) Twerski, a psychologist; four children, Yitzchak Meyer Twerski, Benzion Yehuda Leib Twerski, Shlomo Chaim Twerski and Sara Reizel Miriam Twerski; two brothers, Aaron, a professor of law at Brooklyn Law School, and Michel, the grand rabbi of the Hornosteipler Hasidim of Milwaukee; 28 grandchildren; and dozens of great-grandchildren. His first wife, Goldie (Flusberg) Twerski, died of cancer in 1995.
Rabbi Twerski’s work with Charles M. Schulz was a particular highlight of his writing career, though he noted in 1999 that Mr. Schulz denied there was anything particularly psychological about “Peanuts.” “I’ve often talked with Schulz,” he said, “and I’ve pointed out to him the insights in his strip. And he said to me, ‘If I saw in my strips everything that you see, I would be paralyzed and unable to draw.’”
Abraham Twerski, Who Merged 12 Steps and the Torah, Dies at 90
A noted psychiatrist, he looked outside his Orthodox tradition to meld an eclectic menu of addiction treatments, including the A.A. idea of a “higher power.”
Abraham J. Twerski in 2015. He was both an Orthodox rabbi and a psychiatrist highly regarded as an authority on addiction.Credit...Menachem Butler
By Joseph Berger
Published Feb. 6, 2021Updated Feb. 12, 2021
Abraham J. Twerski was an Orthodox rabbi, the descendant of several Hasidic dynasties. Yet he was also a psychiatrist and a respected authority on addiction who was drawn to the 12-step approach central to Alcoholics Anonymous, a program whose origins are Christian.
“He discovered in A.A. meetings the kind of sincere and even selfless fellow-feeling that was often absent in synagogues,” Andrew Heinze wrote in a 1999 profile of Rabbi Twerski for Judaism, the quarterly magazine of the American Jewish Congress. “He was moved by the example of men and women who would willingly be awakened in the middle of the night to go out and help a fellow alcoholic.”
He saw no contradiction between the 12 steps and his belief in the laws of Torah, according to his granddaughter Chaya Ruchie Waldman. “The 12 steps may have been created by Christian believers,” she said, “but it was about spirituality, surrendering to a higher power, and that is synonymous with Judaism.”
Rabbi Twerski melded an eclectic menu of treatments in his work as director of psychiatry at St. Francis Hospital in Pittsburgh. The Gateway Rehabilitation Center, which he founded, was named one of the top 12 rehabilitation clinics in the United States by Forbes magazine in 1987. He also wrote 80 books, many on Jewish topics but many others on addictive thinking and the addictive personality, all of which enhanced his international reputation as an authority on addiction.
He died on Jan. 31 at a hospital in Jerusalem, the city where he had lived full time for the past five years. He was 90. A grandson, Chaim Twerski, said the cause was complications of Covid-19.
A devotee of the comic strip “Peanuts,” Rabbi Twerski sought out its creator, Charles M. Schulz, in an attempt to broaden people’s thinking about issues like alcoholism and psychology. Their collaboration resulted in a series of self-help books illustrated with pictures of Snoopy, Charlie Brown and other Peanuts characters, with titles such as “Waking Up Just in Time: A Therapist Shows How to Use the Twelve-Steps Approach to Life’s Ups and Downs” (1990).
What distinguished Rabbi Twerski from many other Orthodox therapists was his willingness to look outside his community. In one of his works, “The Shame Borne in Silence: Spouse Abuse in the Jewish Community” (1996), he called attention to a problem that many Hasidic leaders argued should be handled discreetly within the insular community, without informing the police or outside authorities.
Abraham Joshua Heschel Twerski was born on Oct. 6, 1930, in Milwaukee, where his parents had immigrated in 1927 after leaving Russia. His father, Jacob, the sixth-generation descendant of the grand rabbi of Chernobyl, was the rabbi of Beth Jehudah Synagogue in Milwaukee. His mother, Devorah Leah (Halberstam) Twerski, was the daughter of a grand rabbi of Bobov, one of the largest Hasidic sects.
Abraham was the third of five brothers, each of whom became a rabbi but was given an advanced secular education as well, earning college and graduate degrees, something very few Hasidim strive for. He attended public schools in Milwaukee, and in second grade acted in a Christmas play. When his mother visited the school, the principal thought she was there to complain; instead, she told the principal that if her son’s Jewish upbringing was not strong enough to weather a second-grade play, it was his family that had failed him.
He received his rabbinical ordination in 1951 through the Hebrew Theological College in Chicago (now in Skokie, Ill.). While working with his father’s synagogue as an assistant rabbi, he relished counseling others but realized that the members of the congregation would always turn to his father for advice about their most intimate personal problems. He decided, he explained in a 1988 interview with the National Council of Jewish Women, that by studying psychiatry he might enhance his own talent.
“So I went to medical school to become a psychiatrist to do what I wanted to do as a rabbi,” he said.
He received his medical degree at Marquette University in Milwaukee, a Jesuit institution. When the actor Danny Thomas, a practicing Catholic who had been raised in the Midwest, learned during a lunch with Marquette officials that a student who was an Orthodox rabbi needed up to $4,000 to complete his medical studies, he told the officials, “He’s got it,” and made good on his pledge.
Rabbi Twerski trained as a psychiatrist at the University of Pittsburgh. He was supposed to take up a teaching position at the university, but after Sister Adele at St. Francis Hospital let him know of the hospital’s needs for a stronger mental health program, he became its director of psychiatry. He stayed there for 20 years.
At the time, St. Francis might house about 30 patients for alcoholism treatment, all of them drying out for a few days before being sent home. Rabbi Twerski felt the hospital needed a longer-term clinic and, according to an interview he gave to Pittsburgh Quarterly in 2008, told the nuns, “We must build a place they can go for a few weeks after they’ve dried out to give them a head start on sobriety.”
He was drawn to the idea of helping addicts promptly stop drinking or abusing drugs, in contrast to the more classic psychoanalytic approach of having them explore the roots of their need for those substances. He found that this tougher approach accorded with the Orthodox approach to combating the “evil inclination,” as well as A.A. tenets. But he applied other approaches as well, relying on what he felt each individual could tolerate.
He is survived by his wife, Gail (Bessler) Twerski, a psychologist; four children, Yitzchak Meyer Twerski, Benzion Yehuda Leib Twerski, Shlomo Chaim Twerski and Sara Reizel Miriam Twerski; two brothers, Aaron, a professor of law at Brooklyn Law School, and Michel, the grand rabbi of the Hornosteipler Hasidim of Milwaukee; 28 grandchildren; and dozens of great-grandchildren. His first wife, Goldie (Flusberg) Twerski, died of cancer in 1995.
Rabbi Twerski’s work with Charles M. Schulz was a particular highlight of his writing career, though he noted in 1999 that Mr. Schulz denied there was anything particularly psychological about “Peanuts.” “I’ve often talked with Schulz,” he said, “and I’ve pointed out to him the insights in his strip. And he said to me, ‘If I saw in my strips everything that you see, I would be paralyzed and unable to draw.’”
- Integrating The Twelve Steps and Judaism
From the Wikipedia entry on Rabbi Dr. Twerski (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_J._Twerski):
Andrew Heinze explains Rabbi Twerski's attraction to the Twelve Steps this way:[13]
The significance of the religious dynamic in Alcoholics Anonymous was captured in Abraham Twerski's comment that he discovered in AA meetings the kind of sincere and even selfless fellow-feeling that was often absent from synagogues. He was moved by the example of men and women who would willingly be awakened in the middle of the night to go out and help a fellow alcoholic. Recovering alcoholics, Twerski observed, "will often exhibit a sense of responsibility far superior to that of the non-alcoholic in relationship to their families, friends, and God."[14]
He was attracted as well by the pragmatism of the Twelve Steps.... [T]he AA system offered a practical non-analytic therapy that resonated with traditional Judaism much more than conventional psychoanalysis did. In treating addicts, Twerski discovered limitations of the psychoanalytic emphasis on understanding the origins of one's behavior. Patients would continue to drink while they inquired with their therapists into the possible reasons for their drinking. The Twelve Step program took the opposite approach, demanding that the person start his or her transformation by stopping the bad behavior. "There is an important similarity between the Torah approach to behavior and the Twelve Step program approach," Twerski realized. "One does not enter into a discussion or argument with the yetzer hara. Whatever reasons you can propose for one position, the yetzer hara will give several logical reasons to the contrary....[15]"
Heinze gives the following example of how Rabbi Twerski introduced Twelve Steps, a movement with Christian origins, to the Jewish audience, which, according to Heinze, perceived alcohol addiction as a non-Jewish problem:[16]
"....Twerski cleverly presents the theme of alcoholism, not as a modern American phenomenon, but rather as part-and-parcel of rabbinic discourse. He refers to Rabbi Chaim Shmulevitz, who cites Midrash Tanhuma on the drunken man whose family escorts him to witness an obviously drunk and degraded man. To his family's dismay, he bends over the fallen man and whispers in his ear, "My good man, where did you get such fine wine?"[17] To those who would claim that the problem of addictive behavior is secondary or even peripheral to the observant Jew, Twerski answers, "one cannot consider oneself to be truly observant if one neglects mussar." And for Twerski mussar entails dealing with "the psychological mechanism of denial [which] can blind a person to even the most obvious self-destructive behavior."[18]
Rabbi Twerski's reinterpretation of mussar "depends fundamentally on psychological categories in spite of his rejection of psychoanalysis as a therapeutic tool."[19] Heinze writes:
Much as it is impossible for a psychologist to ignore or overlook obvious psychological problems, so Twerski's training in the biochemistry of the brain inevitably led him to abandon the strict and often austere moral economy of traditional mussar. He cannot simply exhort, in the ancestral way, about human laziness. If a person seems incapacitated by depression, Twerski must investigate the possibility of a biochemical problem before resorting to the conventional prescription of mussar---the performance of mitzvot.
And further:[19]
"In my earlier days of doing psychotherapy, treating persons with a negative self-image was most distressing," [Twerski] recalled, "I would become angry because it seemed to me that the patient preferred to wallow in the mire of his fantasied worthlessness." "The trick in therapy," he concluded, using the English equivalent of the word mussar employed (tachbulah) to describe both the evil urge and methods to defeat it, "is to remove the distortion" of view that hindered psychological and moral growth.[20] Starting out with an old-fashioned moralism that emphasized the stubborn will as chief stumbling block to self-improvement, Twerski ended up with the premise that psychological blocks were essentially involuntary and therefore tantamount to physical disabilities, albeit ones subject to remedy.
Andrew Heinze explains Rabbi Twerski's attraction to the Twelve Steps this way:[13]
The significance of the religious dynamic in Alcoholics Anonymous was captured in Abraham Twerski's comment that he discovered in AA meetings the kind of sincere and even selfless fellow-feeling that was often absent from synagogues. He was moved by the example of men and women who would willingly be awakened in the middle of the night to go out and help a fellow alcoholic. Recovering alcoholics, Twerski observed, "will often exhibit a sense of responsibility far superior to that of the non-alcoholic in relationship to their families, friends, and God."[14]
He was attracted as well by the pragmatism of the Twelve Steps.... [T]he AA system offered a practical non-analytic therapy that resonated with traditional Judaism much more than conventional psychoanalysis did. In treating addicts, Twerski discovered limitations of the psychoanalytic emphasis on understanding the origins of one's behavior. Patients would continue to drink while they inquired with their therapists into the possible reasons for their drinking. The Twelve Step program took the opposite approach, demanding that the person start his or her transformation by stopping the bad behavior. "There is an important similarity between the Torah approach to behavior and the Twelve Step program approach," Twerski realized. "One does not enter into a discussion or argument with the yetzer hara. Whatever reasons you can propose for one position, the yetzer hara will give several logical reasons to the contrary....[15]"
Heinze gives the following example of how Rabbi Twerski introduced Twelve Steps, a movement with Christian origins, to the Jewish audience, which, according to Heinze, perceived alcohol addiction as a non-Jewish problem:[16]
"....Twerski cleverly presents the theme of alcoholism, not as a modern American phenomenon, but rather as part-and-parcel of rabbinic discourse. He refers to Rabbi Chaim Shmulevitz, who cites Midrash Tanhuma on the drunken man whose family escorts him to witness an obviously drunk and degraded man. To his family's dismay, he bends over the fallen man and whispers in his ear, "My good man, where did you get such fine wine?"[17] To those who would claim that the problem of addictive behavior is secondary or even peripheral to the observant Jew, Twerski answers, "one cannot consider oneself to be truly observant if one neglects mussar." And for Twerski mussar entails dealing with "the psychological mechanism of denial [which] can blind a person to even the most obvious self-destructive behavior."[18]
Rabbi Twerski's reinterpretation of mussar "depends fundamentally on psychological categories in spite of his rejection of psychoanalysis as a therapeutic tool."[19] Heinze writes:
Much as it is impossible for a psychologist to ignore or overlook obvious psychological problems, so Twerski's training in the biochemistry of the brain inevitably led him to abandon the strict and often austere moral economy of traditional mussar. He cannot simply exhort, in the ancestral way, about human laziness. If a person seems incapacitated by depression, Twerski must investigate the possibility of a biochemical problem before resorting to the conventional prescription of mussar---the performance of mitzvot.
And further:[19]
"In my earlier days of doing psychotherapy, treating persons with a negative self-image was most distressing," [Twerski] recalled, "I would become angry because it seemed to me that the patient preferred to wallow in the mire of his fantasied worthlessness." "The trick in therapy," he concluded, using the English equivalent of the word mussar employed (tachbulah) to describe both the evil urge and methods to defeat it, "is to remove the distortion" of view that hindered psychological and moral growth.[20] Starting out with an old-fashioned moralism that emphasized the stubborn will as chief stumbling block to self-improvement, Twerski ended up with the premise that psychological blocks were essentially involuntary and therefore tantamount to physical disabilities, albeit ones subject to remedy.
"The Gateway Rehab Brand Origin Can Be Traced Back To 1965 When Doctor Abraham Twerksi Had A Vision Of “A Nursing Home For Alcoholics.”
https://www.gatewayrehab.org/blog/honoring-the-life-of-rabbi-dr-abraham-twerski
In 1970, ground was broken for a 100-bed residential treatment facility. Gateway Rehabilitation Center’s first patient was admitted on Jan. 2, 1972.
At that time, most commercial healthcare insurance did not cover drug addiction treatment, so the center was off to a rocky financial start. Despite repeated threats of foreclosure, Twerski credits CEO Ken Ramsey, MD, and a “dedicated board of directors” with keeping the doors open.
Today, Gateway Rehab has grown into a rehabilitation treatment system that spans 22 locations in Pennsylvania and Ohio, serving some 1,700 patients daily.
In 2001, Doctor Twerski, became Gateway’s emeritus medical director. Under his guidance, Gateway Rehab has grown to provide an expanding range of services to young people and their families.
In 2012, Gateway Rehab rededicated its 75,000 sq ft, 152-bed detox and inpatient addiction treatment facility, located northwest of Pittsburgh. The facility, known as “Abe’s Place,” honors the organization’s founder, Abraham J. Twerski, a man with a vision.
https://www.gatewayrehab.org/blog/honoring-the-life-of-rabbi-dr-abraham-twerski
In 1970, ground was broken for a 100-bed residential treatment facility. Gateway Rehabilitation Center’s first patient was admitted on Jan. 2, 1972.
At that time, most commercial healthcare insurance did not cover drug addiction treatment, so the center was off to a rocky financial start. Despite repeated threats of foreclosure, Twerski credits CEO Ken Ramsey, MD, and a “dedicated board of directors” with keeping the doors open.
Today, Gateway Rehab has grown into a rehabilitation treatment system that spans 22 locations in Pennsylvania and Ohio, serving some 1,700 patients daily.
In 2001, Doctor Twerski, became Gateway’s emeritus medical director. Under his guidance, Gateway Rehab has grown to provide an expanding range of services to young people and their families.
In 2012, Gateway Rehab rededicated its 75,000 sq ft, 152-bed detox and inpatient addiction treatment facility, located northwest of Pittsburgh. The facility, known as “Abe’s Place,” honors the organization’s founder, Abraham J. Twerski, a man with a vision.
- Rabbi Twerski on Being Jewish
- Rabbi Twerski on Happiness
- Rabbi Twerski on Stress and Growth
- Rabbi Dr. Twerski on Self Esteem
- Rabbi Twerski on Anger
- You Are Never Alone- God is with you.
It's Not as Tough as You Think: How to Smooth Out Life's Bumps
books.google.com › books
Abraham J. Twerski · 1999, pp 60
"As unpleasant as solitude may be, it is surpassed by the aloneness that one feels when depressed. In this case, one tends to feel not only alone, but what is much worse, abandoned. People who may have experienced some type of abandonment in their childhood are particularly vulnerable to such feelings if they become depressed, even many decades later.
Rabbi Nachman of Breslov writes extensively about his depression, and states that there were times when he felt he was in the deepest recesses of hell. Yet, he never felt abandoned, because he recalled the verse (Psalms 139:8), " If I ascend to the heavens, You are there, and if I descend into hell, You are there too." Since there is no place bereft of God, He is everywhere, and His presence accompanies even those who are in the depths of hell. The knowledge that God was always with him banished the frightening feeling of aloneness and abandonment and gave him a modicum of comfort in his anguish."
books.google.com › books
Abraham J. Twerski · 1999, pp 60
"As unpleasant as solitude may be, it is surpassed by the aloneness that one feels when depressed. In this case, one tends to feel not only alone, but what is much worse, abandoned. People who may have experienced some type of abandonment in their childhood are particularly vulnerable to such feelings if they become depressed, even many decades later.
Rabbi Nachman of Breslov writes extensively about his depression, and states that there were times when he felt he was in the deepest recesses of hell. Yet, he never felt abandoned, because he recalled the verse (Psalms 139:8), " If I ascend to the heavens, You are there, and if I descend into hell, You are there too." Since there is no place bereft of God, He is everywhere, and His presence accompanies even those who are in the depths of hell. The knowledge that God was always with him banished the frightening feeling of aloneness and abandonment and gave him a modicum of comfort in his anguish."
- Rabbi Twerski on Decision Making
- Rabbi Twerski requested no eulogies at his funeral, rather that they sing Hoshia Es Amecha to accompany him to burial.