Houston rabbi competing for nat’l chess championship
 |
|
JHV: DANIEL BISSONNET
Rabbi Danny Horwitz won the United States Chess Federation Absolute Correspondence Chess Championship in 2016 and is competing again in 2021. |
A lot has changed in the chess world since Houston Rabbi Danny Horwitz went to his Norman, Okla., post office in 1965 to pick up a supply of 100 postcards he used in “correspondence chess” tournaments.
“Nowadays, to play over-the-board chess on a really competitive level requires lots of training, memorization of opening moves and, since the early 2000s, lots of computer-based games,” Rabbi Horwitz told the JHV. “And of course, the internet has changed everything.
“My father taught me chess when I was 4, and when I was about 8, I began to regularly play chess at the YMCA after school. Chess tournaments were hard to find. So, when I was about 14, I started playing in United States Chess Federation correspondence chess tournaments.”
Rabbi Horwitz’s lifelong interest in the game eventually would lead him to win the 2016 United States Chess Federation Absolute Correspondence Chess Championship.
He currently is competing in the same championship for 2021.
“Correspondence chess before the internet worked like this: A player indicated a move on a postcard using a standardized notation system,” Rabbi Horwitz said. “I am sure postal carriers wondered why I received all these cryptic-looking cards.
“The receiver would have three days to ponder his move, which he mailed back. A typical game took at least six months and, if you were playing someone in the USSR or Cuba, countries with notoriously bad postal systems, it could take a couple of years to play a game. Now, it is all on servers and goes a lot faster.”
Rabbi Horwitz, formerly the rabbi of the J.B. Greenfield Chapel of Congregation Beth Yeshurun, continued playing through his college years at Rice University. But, when he moved to New York to work for United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, things slowed down a bit.
“It certainly was not hard to find a game in New York any day of the year, but I was on the road a lot,” Rabbi Horwitz said. “For two years, I drove the United Synagogue Bookmobile, primarily going to small- and medium-size Jewish communities and universities all over the country. This made correspondence chess impossible, and over-the-board games were scarce,” he said.
After United Synagogue, he spent a year in Israel studying. He returned to become a rabbi through the Academy for Jewish Religion, now based in Yonkers, N.Y.
“I got my first job as a congregational rabbi in 1980 at Beth Jacob in Galveston and restarted correspondence chess games,” he said. “I had gone to the Chapel Minyan at Beth Yeshurun while at Rice and began to socialize in Houston while working in Galveston. I began dating Tobi Cooper there, and we married in 1982.
“We lived in Kansas City between 1986 and 2004 when I was the rabbi at Congregation Ohev Sholom in Prairie Village. We already had two children and had two more while in Kansas. I was super busy with work and family, but managed to keep up my correspondence chess games to some degree.
“During all this time, I grew increasingly interested in Jewish mysticism. I was deeply moved by Abraham Joshua Heschel’s books in high school and afterwards. I began a doctoral program at the Spertus Institute of Leadership and Learning in 1993. I taught Melton classes beginning in 1998, and my project for a doctorate in Jewish Studies was a curriculum on Jewish mysticism.
“In 2004, we moved to Houston, where Tobi began taking over the family Houston Pecan Company business, learning the ropes from her father to become its current president. I was the interim rabbi at Brith Shalom for a year, and when that was done, I decided to focus on finishing my doctorate. The curriculum project was completed and became the genesis of my book, ‘A Kabbalah and Jewish Mysticism Reader,’ which was published in 2016.”
Like Rabbi Horwitz’s lifelong interest in chess, the history of the Jewish people has long been intertwined with the game.
Most scholars agree that chess originated in India around 600 C.E.
It spread to Persia, then the Arab world, becoming popular with Spanish Jews by the 11th century, and spread to the Jewish community in Eastern Europe by the 12th century. Some evidence exists that chess was commonly played by Jewish women then.
The first two officially recognized world champions, Wilhelm Steinitz (1886 to 1894) and Emanuel Lasker (1894 to 1921) were Jewish. The proportion of Jewish world-class chess players since 1850 has been estimated at around 50%. The International Chess Federation (FIDE) currently ranks Israel 15th among countries, based on the average rating of its top 10 players in over-the-board chess, an impressive ranking considering Israel’s population size.
Jews seem to have an affinity for chess. Rabbi Horwitz thinks there are several reasons.
“Judaism has always tried to teach people how to think for themselves, how to evaluate all the things that are possible to foresee,” said Rabbi Horwitz. “Shimon Ben Zoma said in Pirkei Avot, ‘Who is wise? The one who sees the outcome.’ That talent also applies to playing chess.
“While learning to play chess is relatively easy, to play well takes really hard work, practicing patience and learning how to overcome adversity. Jewish history is full of examples where we have learned survival strategies using the same strategies.”
Rabbi Horwitz noted that chess and Jewish culture are connected.
“There is a valuable example of persistence in the life of Grandmaster Mikhail Botvinnik,” said the rabbi. “He won the World Champion title, lost it twice and won it back both times. He may not have been the greatest champion, but the fact that he was able to retake the title is extraordinary. It is also a Jewish story over thousands of years.”
“Nowadays, to play over-the-board chess on a really competitive level requires lots of training, memorization of opening moves and, since the early 2000s, lots of computer-based games,” Rabbi Horwitz told the JHV. “And of course, the internet has changed everything.
“My father taught me chess when I was 4, and when I was about 8, I began to regularly play chess at the YMCA after school. Chess tournaments were hard to find. So, when I was about 14, I started playing in United States Chess Federation correspondence chess tournaments.”
Rabbi Horwitz’s lifelong interest in the game eventually would lead him to win the 2016 United States Chess Federation Absolute Correspondence Chess Championship.
He currently is competing in the same championship for 2021.
“Correspondence chess before the internet worked like this: A player indicated a move on a postcard using a standardized notation system,” Rabbi Horwitz said. “I am sure postal carriers wondered why I received all these cryptic-looking cards.
“The receiver would have three days to ponder his move, which he mailed back. A typical game took at least six months and, if you were playing someone in the USSR or Cuba, countries with notoriously bad postal systems, it could take a couple of years to play a game. Now, it is all on servers and goes a lot faster.”
Rabbi Horwitz, formerly the rabbi of the J.B. Greenfield Chapel of Congregation Beth Yeshurun, continued playing through his college years at Rice University. But, when he moved to New York to work for United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, things slowed down a bit.
“It certainly was not hard to find a game in New York any day of the year, but I was on the road a lot,” Rabbi Horwitz said. “For two years, I drove the United Synagogue Bookmobile, primarily going to small- and medium-size Jewish communities and universities all over the country. This made correspondence chess impossible, and over-the-board games were scarce,” he said.
After United Synagogue, he spent a year in Israel studying. He returned to become a rabbi through the Academy for Jewish Religion, now based in Yonkers, N.Y.
“I got my first job as a congregational rabbi in 1980 at Beth Jacob in Galveston and restarted correspondence chess games,” he said. “I had gone to the Chapel Minyan at Beth Yeshurun while at Rice and began to socialize in Houston while working in Galveston. I began dating Tobi Cooper there, and we married in 1982.
“We lived in Kansas City between 1986 and 2004 when I was the rabbi at Congregation Ohev Sholom in Prairie Village. We already had two children and had two more while in Kansas. I was super busy with work and family, but managed to keep up my correspondence chess games to some degree.
“During all this time, I grew increasingly interested in Jewish mysticism. I was deeply moved by Abraham Joshua Heschel’s books in high school and afterwards. I began a doctoral program at the Spertus Institute of Leadership and Learning in 1993. I taught Melton classes beginning in 1998, and my project for a doctorate in Jewish Studies was a curriculum on Jewish mysticism.
“In 2004, we moved to Houston, where Tobi began taking over the family Houston Pecan Company business, learning the ropes from her father to become its current president. I was the interim rabbi at Brith Shalom for a year, and when that was done, I decided to focus on finishing my doctorate. The curriculum project was completed and became the genesis of my book, ‘A Kabbalah and Jewish Mysticism Reader,’ which was published in 2016.”
Like Rabbi Horwitz’s lifelong interest in chess, the history of the Jewish people has long been intertwined with the game.
Most scholars agree that chess originated in India around 600 C.E.
It spread to Persia, then the Arab world, becoming popular with Spanish Jews by the 11th century, and spread to the Jewish community in Eastern Europe by the 12th century. Some evidence exists that chess was commonly played by Jewish women then.
The first two officially recognized world champions, Wilhelm Steinitz (1886 to 1894) and Emanuel Lasker (1894 to 1921) were Jewish. The proportion of Jewish world-class chess players since 1850 has been estimated at around 50%. The International Chess Federation (FIDE) currently ranks Israel 15th among countries, based on the average rating of its top 10 players in over-the-board chess, an impressive ranking considering Israel’s population size.
Jews seem to have an affinity for chess. Rabbi Horwitz thinks there are several reasons.
“Judaism has always tried to teach people how to think for themselves, how to evaluate all the things that are possible to foresee,” said Rabbi Horwitz. “Shimon Ben Zoma said in Pirkei Avot, ‘Who is wise? The one who sees the outcome.’ That talent also applies to playing chess.
“While learning to play chess is relatively easy, to play well takes really hard work, practicing patience and learning how to overcome adversity. Jewish history is full of examples where we have learned survival strategies using the same strategies.”
Rabbi Horwitz noted that chess and Jewish culture are connected.
“There is a valuable example of persistence in the life of Grandmaster Mikhail Botvinnik,” said the rabbi. “He won the World Champion title, lost it twice and won it back both times. He may not have been the greatest champion, but the fact that he was able to retake the title is extraordinary. It is also a Jewish story over thousands of years.”