JEC Elmora Avenue Shul
The Elmora Jewish Community is a warm and heimish kehilla consisting of four shuls, including a minyan S’farad, an eruv, two mikvaot and a kaylim mikvah, a superlative Judaic/secular school system from nursery through post-high school, educating almost one thousand students, kosher eateries, a Shomer Shabbos YM/YWHA and a kehilla of more than two hundred families, all within a half hour of Manhattan and Brooklyn. These statistics, however, are only a small part of the story.
The Jewish community of Elizabeth was founded in 1881, but became what it is today during the six decades of the Torah leadership of Rabbi Pinchas M. Teitz, zichrono livracha, who set out in 1935 to establish a modern Torah community when he accepted the rabbinate. His vision was to build the community around the Jewish Educational Center, schools and shuls. That vision has been realized and expanded, within two geographical areas. Just off the town's main strip, Elmora Avenue, is the elementary school and the Rav Teitz Mesivta Academy for middle- and high school boys, that shares space with the JEC Elmora Avenue Shul.
Approximately one mile away, is yet another large religious area, better known as the Westminster section of Elizabeth/Hillside, which is home to the popular Bruriah School for middle- and high school girls and Yeshivas Be’er Yitzchak, post high school Bais Medrash and Kollel. Although the community has two living areas, they are close enough to one another to allow Shabbos visits, and one eruv encompasses both. Elizabeth is a remarkable place to live, with the amenities of a city, but the suburban housing and feeling of community.