Soon, the twins found out just how many weddings take place in Bnei Brak. Their days were for learning, while the nights found them walking from hall to hall, doing their shows. Usually, they’d ask the parents of the couple if they were interested in paying for a performance, but sometimes they just got on their bikes, did their act, and then asked for tips.

“In those days there was no one recording on their phone and posting clips,” Yaakov points out. “But slowly, the word got around. We did two or three shows a night.”

At age 20, most of the Chabad bochurim in Bnei Brak packed up and headed off to Crown Heights to spend a year learning in 770 Eastern Parkway. Yaakov and Yisrael felt torn.

“We wanted to follow the minhag and learn in New York, but we had a good parnassah from our shows,” explains Yaakov. “Eventually, we made our decision and traveled, leaving behind a message on our voice mail that we’d be away in America for a year and then return to Eretz Yisrael.”

Building up again from scratch didn’t faze the Gourions, who have a great work ethic and plenty of persistence.

“During the day we learned, and at night we went around to wedding halls, doing shows for free again, then asking for tips and giving out business cards,” says Yaakov. “Once, we rode our bikes further to find more wedding halls — in Boro Park.”

Then came the big break. Yisrael says the brothers had no prior warning before they became famous.

“In February 2010, someone asked us to come to a sheva brachos in Williamsburg,” he relates. “We arrived at the address he gave us, and there were 5,000 chassidim celebrating the marriage of the Satmar Rebbe’s grandchild! It was very, very stressful, but if you have to go onstage, you just do it. We did our tricks, on the table. Someone there publicized a clip — and in a second, the world knew about us.”

Including the authorities at the 770 yeshivah. The twins were called in: “Are you working? Bochurim are not allowed to work.”

Actually, the Gourions were keeping all the sedorim, and going out to weddings when night seder was over. Still, at the end of the first year, the menahel told them he would not renew their visas unless they gave up their show business act. The brothers had to find another way to stay in New York.

Yisrael, the younger twin by four minutes, married in New York in 2012 and continued to perform solo. Yaakov returned to Eretz Yisrael, where he married only four years later. The names of their wives? Rachel and Rachel! Like the original Yaakov/Yisrael Avinu.

During the time they lived apart, the twins only performed a handful of special shows together. But after Yaakov and his Rachel returned to the States in 2016, the twins resumed their act, rehearsing in their office in Brooklyn and performing at weddings at night. Their own children join in some stunts, too, jumping into their fathers’ arms from a height.

Today, the twins have developed different roles for themselves. Yisrael is much more accomplished on the unicycle, and Yaakov on the stilts. They learn new stunts through endless practice.

“We buy the props, practice, fail, and try again, not giving up until it’s perfect,” Yaakov says.

In the case of the more dangerous tricks, such as the “human torch,” the Gourions take safety precautions, such as working near a pool of water. The DVDs are a way to showcase these spectacular tricks without posing danger to a large crowd of campers or wedding celebrants.

“My mother still doesn’t like all the tricks that involve fire,” Yaakov says with a sigh. “She wishes we would leave those out.”

They claim they have arguments and disagreements, but at the core, their work involves close cooperation and trust. For example, the popular dummy trick involves Yaakov acting as if he were hypnotized, falling forward and then backwards. If Yisrael misses catching him, he could fall on his head.

“It is very painful, but the show must go on,” says Yaakov. “And despite the fact that he’s missed me more than once, I still trust him and let myself fall.”

Book Ends

Who: Rabbi Michael J. Weingarten and Rabbi Mark Weingarten

Where: Syracuse, New York, and New York, New York

Occupation: Authors of The King’s Vineyard: Pirchei Hagefen al HaTorah, medical students

Hearing a shared story is revealing not just for what is said, but how. My conversation with the Weingarten twins begins with a discussion of who should talk first and where to begin the story,

“Michael is the star of the show— I mean, the sefer,” says Mark Weingarten. “It was his idea, so let him begin.”

“No, Mark, you go first, and I’ll take over. You have a good way with words.” Michael then tells me, “He’s very articulate. He’ll tell it better.”

Settled.

Now, where to begin.

“Michael thought of the ideas that became the sefer over the course of eight years of learning,” says Mark. “When it was in manuscript form, he recruited me to copyedit.”

Despite those modest words, many of the essays contain Mark’s Torah thoughts, too. The King’s Vineyard: Pirchei Hagefen al HaTorah is the fruit of that regular learning of the weekly parshah.

“While I learned shnayim mikra v’echad targum, I jotted down the questions I had,” Michael says.

As the rabbi of Young Israel of Forest Hills from 2016 to 2017, he would share those questions and offer potential answers before leining on Shabbos morning. Friends kept encouraging him to write the original thoughts down.

Together, the two brothers decided to compile a sefer in memory of their grandfather, Dr. Alvin Lashinsky, who had a profound influence on their lives.

“Growing up, we lived five houses away from our grandparents,” says Mark. “We knew little of Saba’s contribution to establishing the Queens Jewish community —he was founder of the Queens Jewish Community Council — and even less about him being chief of dermatology at a New York hospital. We just knew him as our little league baseball coach who never missed a game and as the person who came by every day to spend time with us.”

To his grandsons, the combination of a wholesome, “normal” approach with dedication to growth came to define Dr. Lashinsky’s legacy.

Their childhood in Queens laid a solid foundation for their subsequent careers. They both attended YCQ elementary school, but when it came to high school the Weingarten twins parted. Mark, the older twin, went to DRS, in the Five Towns, while Michael went to MTA, Yeshiva University’s high school division. Playing ice hockey on the same team was the one notable collaboration of their teen years.

It was during the two years Michael and Mark spent together at Yeshivat Kerem B’Yavneh that they first learned together b’chavrusa.

“We took that close relationship of ours to Torah,” Michael says. “Using both our minds together let us accomplish what one alone could not.”

But what about the common perception that twins always know what the other is thinking? Aren’t they already “one mind”?

The Weingartens laugh. When they were kids in day camp, their bunkmates wanted to test that theory.

“They used to test us by asking, ‘Okay, what is your twin brother thinking right now?’ ” says Michael. “We had planned our answers before, but we used to play along, fooling them. But to some extent, it is true. I think we do know what the other twin is thinking, more than non-twin siblings.”

While their personalities are very different — Michael is described as “a true redhead” — both are effusive and warm, with an easy laugh. Their approaches to learning are similar. The chavrusashaft was therefore a runaway success.

“Both of us are drawn to bekius,” Michael elaborates, “and both of us have an interest in Mishnayos and in Tanach.”

Returning to New York, both twins joined Rav Hershel Schachter’s shiur at Yeshiva University. They were chavrusas throughout their semichah learning.

“The way I see it,” says Michael, “our learning together and collaborating on writing divrei Torah is a continuation. We must have learned together with the malach before birth.”

When they learn together, the two brothers often come up with the same ideas, questions, or resolutions.

“Although our personalities are so different, we can finish a lot of each other’s sentences,” says Mark.

Their friends like to claim that Mark and Michael are two versions of the same core. Their middos and temperaments differ, but their inner essence is the same.

After gaining semichah, both twins were drawn to the rabbinate. Rabbi Michael took up his post in Forest Hills, while Rabbi Mark gave shiurim at Lincoln Square Synagogue. Then, their paths curved: separately, but almost at the same time, both twins decided to follow their father and grandfather into careers in medicine. Today, Michael is at SUNY Upstate Medical University, and Mark is at Mount Sinai. Twin-wise, this meant a shift in their relationship.

“We used to see each other every day at YU, but now communication has moved to phone and e-mail,” Michael says.

Working on the sefer in this fashion was a challenge, as was synthesizing their sometimes differing viewpoints.

“We wanted to be mindful so that we would make space for each other’s opinions,” says Mark, “but the project definitely helped us grow in our relationship.”

Their Torah essays published in the sefer have different angles. For Mark, the joy in writing the sefer came mostly from the pieces that “explore how the halachah gives meaning to our human experiences “

Michael, on the other hand, has creatively tried to apply conceptual and technical principles in the Gemara to questions from the Chumash. With haskamos from Rav Hershel Schachter and Rav Baruch Simon, though, this is a serious Torah manuscript, with no space for favoring creativity over emes.

“For once, it was good to be the younger twin,” says Michael, “I have a few more essays in the sefer than Mark, and I think it’s because I got those extra three minutes learning Torah with the malach.”

Isn’t there a different, more famous, Torah story about twins — with one of them being a redhead?

Michael laughs. “I’m married to Yehudis, who was one of Eisav’s wives too,” he says, “and last year I dressed up as Eisav for Purim. We gave out lentil soup. People loved it.”

A Meaty Relationship

Who: Yossi Haziza and Tamir Haziza

Where: London, England

Occupations: Joint managers of Menachem’s Kosher Butchers

Although not identical twins, Yossi and Tamir Haziza, joint managers of Menachem’s Kosher Butchers in Golders Green, London, are similar enough for many people to mix them up. At work in the busy store at the heart of Golders Green Road, they both wear kippot, white butcher coats, and jeans, and there is little to tell them apart.

“It happens all the time,” Tamir says. “A customer is chatting with my brother about an order. Then Yossi steps into the back and the customer comes over to me to continue the conversation, and I don’t know what they are talking about. Then Yossi reappears. And if it’s a new customer, they’ll be like, ‘Oh, my gosh, there are two of you!’”

As the only sons of Menachem Haziza, an immigrant from Morocco who established his butcher shop in 1992, Yossi and Tamir always knew it was likely they’d end up working together in the family business.

Tamir took a detour first, though. “As a kid, I was mad on technology,” he says. “I was a geek when I was at school — but a cool geek! And yes, we hacked into the school systems. I went on to get my degree in IT and to write software. I worked for someone and then went freelance, but it took about three years for me to realize that I would do better to go into my dad’s business.”

“There was always going to be space for him here in the business if he wanted it,” says Yossi, the older twin.

His own route to the butcher’s store was direct. Although he attended a local college when he was 17, he would come straight from class to work in the store. That was over 20 years ago. Yossi feels there wasn’t much choice of career but says he’s fine with it.

“To be honest, I fit right in here,” he says. “I like the customers, many of them are old friends whom I’ve known for years — since I was a schoolboy. I like the jokes and the banter and the atmosphere. I need people. I can’t see myself seated in front of a computer in some office all day.”

Yossi learned all about the meat trade on the job. He says he can cut steak or stir-fry for customers, but that is not his real responsibility.

“We employ around 20 staff, and obviously, professional butchers,” he says. “They cut the meat. Our job is to manage our staff and deal with our customers.”

Daily tasks for Yossi include ordering the meats and catering supplies.

Tamir’s IT expertise enabled him to computerize the business, and he’s proud of how efficient the store’s software is today.

“No more handwritten orders and invoices; we have automatic invoicing on the scale,” says Tamir. “Managing customer accounts, which used to take six hours, is now done in minutes, with statementing software that I developed.”

His workday is mainly spent in the back, dealing with accounts and the monthly billing e-mails. But like his brother, Tamir can also cut meat and serve customers.

Three years ago, Yossi donated a kidney to his father, and since then, Menachem Haziza has stepped into the role of a more passive patriarchal overseer. He still comes to the business regularly, but his sons have relieved him of much of the stress related to overseeing a full-service meat and poultry butcher shop.

“It’s all about personal service, cutting to our customers’ requirements,” Tamir says.

Current popular high-end products include rack of lamb with French trim and Asado ribs. Then there’s the high-quality finish.

“We don’t just cut chicken and shove it in the window — everything we sell looks nice and is eye-catching,” Tamir says with pride.

Their personal relationships with the customers are so good that many of them ask if the Hazizas are in the store before they come in.

“It’s not, ‘Give me my chicken and let me go,’ it’s always a friendly visit,” Tamir says. “If our staff say we’re not in, people often reply, ‘We’ll be back tomorrow.’ ”

Obviously, the customers appreciate the friendly banter and jokes. While the twins differ somewhat in personality — both of them agree that Tamir is slightly more serious — they absolutely share the same sense of humor. This was most evident during their high school years at “Hasmo” — the Hasmonean High School in Hendon.

“We played jokes left, right, and center, and if one of us got a detention, the other could take it instead,” Tamir reminisces. “Biggest mistake they ever made was putting us in the same class. We wound up the teachers a lot, but I have to say those were good years.”

Recently, Menachem’s has expanded into kosher catering. Two in-store chefs prepare their cholent, kugel, and chopped liver, which are much in demand at shul and community events. The younger generation of Hazizas has also successfully attracted Jewish nursing homes and cruise liner companies as customers. The recent Shabbat UK weekend found Menachem’s at the heart of the action, supplying many of the communities with their meats. The family, who are members of Hendon’s Porat Yosef Moroccan synagogue, take pride in their kashrut standards, supervised by the London Beis Din and the London Board of Shechita and certified with the additional hiddur of Chalak Bait Yosef.

Sundays are one of their busiest days, they say, because Jewish families who live as far away from London as Essex or Birmingham come into Golders Green to do their kosher shopping, bringing the family in for a day out or a kosher restaurant lunch. Then, there are Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, when the store gets packed with local customers, as well as the pressure of large orders. They work 65 to 70 hours a week, rising at five in the morning, and four o’ clock on Fridays and Erev Chag.

“It’s all fun, but it’s still very stressful,” Yossi puts it. “We’re on our feet, running the place, so physically it takes a toll. I don’t know if I’d want my kids to go into this business.”

One perk of having a twin to cover is that both brothers can easily take time off for vacations at non-peak seasons.

“We’ve never fought, or had serious competition, since, thank G-d, we were given everything we need,” Tamir says.

Yossi qualifies this, saying, “Of course, we have our disagreements. He thinks he’s right and I think I’m right. But we always patch it up in a moment. And in my opinion, there’s nothing like a business managed with family. You can’t beat the level of trust when you’re working with a twin brother.”

Twin Missions

Who: Rabbi Avrohom Harris and Rabbi Baruch Harris

Where: Seattle, Washington, and Memphis, Tennessee

Occupations: Rebbeim and mohelim

They live 2,000 miles apart and rarely see each other, but according to Rabbi Avrohom and Rabbi Baruch — identical twins, chavrusas for 15 years, both involved in high school chinuch in out-of-town communities, and both mohelim — they are a pretty close-knit pair.

Even their voices are virtually the same, and they definitely enjoy the opportunity to share this phone call, reminiscing and gently sharing jokes and camaraderie.

Baruch and Avrohom grew up in Queens, New York, where they were in the same yeshivah classes throughout their childhood. Theirs is a real Chofetz Chaim family, with the twins’ uncle, Rabbi Dovid Harris shlita, a rosh yeshivah in Rabbinical Seminary of America, Yeshivas Chofetz Chaim in Queens. Avrohom and Baruch spent a year in WITS together, learned together on and off through beis medrash years, and spent some months “branching” in the Chofetz Chaim yeshivah in Dallas. They both agree that there was some rivalry as they grew up, but it was a “very close rivalry, maybe part of the closeness.” During those yeshivah and beis medrash years, the two shared a lot of friends, but not exactly the same chevreh, a sort of Venn diagram with two overlapping circles.

When they married, it was within seven weeks of each other, and their wives have very similar first names: Avrohom’s wife is named Penina Malka, while Baruch is married to Malka.

According to Penina, “Our husbands were so close, we knew we had to be friends, or we were in trouble.”

Both couples settled in Queens for their kollel years, but their tight relationship didn’t prevent them from acting upon their ideals and going to different cities to spread Torah. Baruch moved to Memphis, where he is the assistant Judaic principal of the high schools, while Avrohom opened a new yeshivah in Seattle this year.

Nurture rather than nature seems to be at play in their similar callings. Avrohom and Baruch are different, personality-wise, with Baruch the more outgoing. They explain that their decisions are very much a product of the household they were raised in and the yeshivos that developed their outlook. Chofetz Chaim places a strong emphasis on harbatzas haTorah, and their father is himself a rebbi and principal, so going into chinuch was a natural choice.

Getting mistaken for each other is a normal part of their lives.

“Once, I walked into a shul and a guy came over and gave me a hug,” says Avrohom. “I had no idea who he was, but I quickly realized he must know Baruch.”

Another common identical twin phenomenon is people getting insulted when one twin doesn’t return their eager wave, when really it’s the other twin that they know. Then there were the strange looks Avrohom kept getting when he took a walk with his wife on his first visit to the Memphis community. The locals were used to seeing Rabbi Harris with a different Mrs. Harris!

Nowadays, the twins see each other very rarely. Last year, when Baruch was honored at a dinner in Memphis, Avrohom flew in to surprise him.

“I was sitting at my desk, working, the night before the event, and suddenly the doorbell rang, and there he was! Amazing! But we haven’t seen each other since.”

They catch up on the phone every week, and then there’s the collaboration on parshah sheets and teaching materials. Being in the same field means they can use each other as sounding boards and offer advice.

“Avrohom sends me his weekly yeshivah updates and pictorial review for me to copyedit,” Baruch says. “He also created a fantastic worksheet, a six-step, systematic approach to teaching Gemara, and I use that every day in my own classroom.”

Their father, Rabbi Shlomo Yonason Harris — who was the twins’ high school principal and ninth-grade rebbi — taught his students to recognize five basic steps of reasoning in the Gemara; Avrohom refined this into six and created a graphic representation.

What about the bris milah angle? How did they get into that, and was it a joint or separate decision?

“We were both in kollel, looking into doing harbatzas haTorah out of town, and I felt milah was a valuable addition to chinuch and kiruv,” says Avrohom. “It’s obviously something many young families need. It can also supplement a chinuch income.”

“Oh, I do the milah much more l’sheim Shamayim, I don’t have that kind of cheshbon,” Baruch teases. “I’m just being machnis people to the bris of Avraham Avinu.”

Teasing aside, they say that they both traveled to London separately, during the same year, to learn bris milah from the same mohel and trainer.

When they do get together, their wives say there is such strong happiness and closeness that it’s almost a giddiness.

“Avraham is my best audience,” Baruch says, and the laughter on the line from Seattle verifies his words.

A long time ago, in camp, a rebbi quoted a gemara from Chullin. His young charges asked which blatt the gemara was on, and at the same second the two Harris twins spontaneously blurted out a joking answer: “Daf ayin-beis, amud beis.”

Years later, their minds, their goals, and their sense of humor still follow along the same tracks.

Joint Venture

Who: Mendi Rosenbaum and Levi Rosenbaum,

Where: Melbourne, Australia

Occupations: Accountant and mashgiach

They have collaborated on extensive shlichus and kashrus missions, and played as teammates on their local cricket team, where the captain and umpires could not tell them apart. Teamwork comes naturally to Mendi and Levi.

“We don’t have to talk that much or explain things to each other,” explains Mendi, the senior by eight minutes. “We just catch on to what the other is doing, because we think in similar ways.”

Growing up together as the oldest of eleven children, their free time was spent in an endless series of soccer and cricket games in the garden at home.

“We didn’t have to invite a friend over for company because we always had each other,” Mendi says. “We were roommates, and best friends.”

Intriguingly, while Mendi says he is “pretty useless with his left hand,” Levi was only seven or eight when he taught himself to bat left-handed. Looking back, he thinks that he probably did this “to create some individuality” for himself.

Because Yeshiva College in Melbourne had a firm rule about placing twins in separate classes, the Rosenbaums didn’t spend their school days glued together. Yet everything was, and still is, a competition.

“We would ride our bikes to school and every single day was a race,” says Levi. “We had an ongoing table tennis tournament, keeping constant count of who had won more games. We competed against each other in subjects we both liked, trying to outdo each other’s grades despite the different classes.”

In high school, there was some crossover, and the twins found themselves together. “There was one class where we used to switch places every time the teacher turned his back,” Levi recounts. “He never figured out what the guys found so funny.”

Levi went on to beis medrash in Montreal, while Mendi learned in New York. When they caught up with each other in bein hazmanim, they realized they had independently come to a decision to learn for semichah at the same program in Pretoria, South Africa.

“It’s not surprising that we ended up together there,” Levi explains. “Because we both have a competitive mindset, we each wanted to attend what we considered the best option.”

Starting out with different partners, which soon fell through, they joined up to learn as chavrusas for two years.

At the career crossroads, Levi and Mendi spoke to the same couple of advisors. As they have similar business-oriented minds, both Rosenbaums ended up opting for accounting degrees. This time, though, the choice of where to study wasn’t theirs. The Board of Education sent them to different universities. Mendi went to study accounting at Swinburne University, while Levi was accepted at Monash University for a degree with majors in economics and accounting. Teamwork still won out, though.

“During our first year, we found we had the same textbooks and could study together, making it all more fun,” Levi says.

Along the way, Mendi took on some kashrus supervision at a small local winery.

“I started working with the owner, and when he found out I had a twin, he wanted to get him involved too,” Mendi says.

When Levi came on board, the boss, and even Mendi himself, were surprised by the “twin effect.”

“We found that Levi grasped the process I had put in place much quicker than others who had been there for a while,” says Mendi. “He caught on exactly to what we were doing, because we think in a similar way.”

The same dynamic also played itself out relationship-wise.

“I had a very good relationship with the boss,” Mendi explains, “so Levi was automatically comfortable with him. Right away, it was as if they had already known each other for a year.”

Today Levi is the head mashgiach at the winery.Friendships are also sometimes built up by this “piggyback” method.

“When Levi was in Montreal and I was in New York, one of his friends came into New York for Shabbos,” Mendi says. “He came over to me and started talking, and I said, ‘Mate, I don’t know who you are.’ But we got talking and we ended up being friends pretty quickly, because he already had a good friendship going with Levi.”

The two Rosenbaums have been on shlichus missions together several times, sharing the work over Yamim Tovim spent in Byron Bay, in Miami and in Queens. “Nobody knew who was giving the drashah and who was the chazzan,” Mendi says. “Nobody knew if they’d met both of us, or only one, and some people didn’t even realize that there were two of us.”

Both are married now, but shidduchim for the identical twins were a difficult parshah.

“My mother said we were the most scrutinized bochurim ever,” Mendi says. “Everyone felt they had to know exactly how Mendi is different from Levi. Instead of taking a look to know if we were generally good guys, they examined us to find out the differences, so they’d know which one their suggestion made more sense for.”

Now that Mendi works as an accountant and Levi is still at university, workmates don’t generally know they have a twin. People who don’t know them well often mix them up, or, worse, lump them together. It doesn’t help that they tend to dress in similar styles.

“I think that’s because our mother chose our clothing growing up, so we got used to wearing the same kind of thing,” says Levi.

Still, the tendency to be melded into “one Rosenbaum” can be annoying, Levi admits.

“Some people in shul will say, ‘I need one of the Rosenbaums,’ or ‘I met one of the Rosenbaum twins,’ ” he says. “But being viewed as one person used to be more annoying, when we had just left school. Now that we have absolutely separate professional identities and separate families, we’re so used to it that we just run with it. And people who know us better do think of us separately.”

Levi and Mendi live in the same community, and they meet each other at all the Shabbos tefillos at Melbourne’s Young Yeshiva, where Levi is a gabbai. They’re also still together on the cricket pitch every day during the summer season, enjoying their longest-lasting joint venture. Levi is wicket keeper and Mendi is a batsman for the Maccabi Ajax Cricket Club. They say the team’s captain sometimes mixes up their names during play. As for the umpires, they take the easy way out. They refer to both twins, as well as their younger brothers, who are also on the team, as “Rosey.”

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 757)