Rebbetzin Miriam Gordon, matriarch of Rivkin family

REBETZIN MIRIAM GORDON, widow of the late Rabbi Sholom Ber Gordon of Maplewood, NJ, died the evening of December 3 after a lengthy illness  in New Orleans, surrounded by her children and grandchildren. She was 87.

Gordon was known as an upright woman of valor, whose dedication to Judaism and her respect for its hallowed traditions was never questioned. Born in Harlem, she graduated from Beit Jacov High School.  After her marriage, she and her husband moved to New Jersey as the first shluchim (emissaries) there. Later they were instructed to move to Springfield, MA, and were responsible for opening a yeshiva day school there. They lived in Springfield for three years, but returned to to Newark, NJ in 1948 when the rabbi was appointed to the pulpit at Congregation Ahavath Zion.

In 1967 the Gordon family moved to Maplewood, NJ, where they lived until the rabbi’s passing on Pesach in 2001. Gordon moved to New Orleans a year and a half ago at the urging of her daughter, Rebetzzin Bluma Rivkin, who cared for her at the University section home she shared with her husband and son-in-law Rabbi Zelig Rivkin and their children and grandchildren.

She is also survived by her other children, Mrs. Yocheved Baitelman, Crown Heights, NY; Mrs. Chanie Friedman, St. Paul, MN.; Rabbi Yehoshua Gordon, Encino, CA; Rabbi Yossi Gordon, Melbourne, Australia, Rabbi Mendy Gordon, London, U.K.; and Mrs. Frumie Posner, Birmingham, AL; and hundreds of grandchildren and great-grandchildren, many of whom serve as shluchim around the world.

Gordon is also survived by her siblings: Rabbi S.M. Simpson, Rabbi Leibel Simpson, Mrs. Esther Goldman and Mrs. Krainy Rosenfeld.

The funeral took place on December 5, in New York City. A procession will  left Shomrei Hadas in Boro Park at 12:45 p.m., passing by the Chabad-Lubavitch World Headquarters at 770 Eastern Parkway in Crown Heights at 1:15 p.m. Members of the family will be sitting shiva through next week.

Condolences can be sent by email here. Memorial contributions can be made to Chabad of Louisiana.