Jewish homesteaders?

I think there is atleast one synagogue in Huntington,WV also.

I don't know much about Judism,but welcome to the site,ailsaek!

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When thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burned; neither shall the flame kindle upon thee ~ Isaiah 43:2

Yes it is a mitzvah to care for your animals.

Well you can either search for land that suits you - and then look for a synagogue, or do it the other way around. Find a synagoge you like, and then search for land within a reasonable distance.

You can search for conservative synagogues by state or zip code here: http://www.uscj.org/Synagogues5011.html

Hi - we're conservative Jews (on the Conserva-dox side, but we do ride on Shabbos). We picked upstate NY - reasonably priced land, still a reasonable number of Jews. We live about 30 minutes from our shul, near Schenectady, but there's also a movement afoot to start another in the nearest large town, Cobleskill. Our town doctor is Israeli, there are a few other Jewish farmers out here - our neighbors who have an alpaca farm as non-practicing, but at least Jewish, and the community is very supportive and respectful for the most part.

I would recommend you choose both land and a community together - religious isolation is no fun, and having other people to offer support if you encounter problems (a town near here, for example, has a traditional "prayer breakfast" every year for all the high school graduates - all Christian, and when a Jewish family objected to the school sponsoring such an event it was helpful to have other Jews in the community stand up and say, "nope, they aren't the only ones."). What you are doing (homesteading) will be strange to most Jews, and you'll be strange to most homesteaders, but it is a good thing.

And unfortunately, televised Shabbos services wouldn't work for us - sabbath worship is collective - there are certain prayers you can only say with a minyan (10 adult Jews) present, and we don't watch tv on the Sabbath anyway. But even if the shul is a little distant, often local minyans can come about. We have one that meets 1x a month on Friday evenings - it is very nice.

Sharon

I'm not homesteading yet, but I'll second what Sharon said about religious isolation being less than ideal. I'm at a university now with a very small Jewish population (maybe... eight of us in the campus Jewish Society, including me, and I'm a Jew-in-progress), and while it's nice in that we're close by virtue of being a very minor minority, it can be a drag sometimes to feel like there are comparatively few religious options on offer. I would definitely try to find land and a Jewish community of some kind simultaneously.

Someone mentioned Bangor, and while I don't know much about their Jewish community, there are several synagogues in the southern Maine area (a couple Reform, one non-denominational, and a Chabad in Portland). There are some farms and such down that way, though I'd expect property prices to be higher than they would be further north.

There's also a Yahoogroup for frum, rural Jews, started by this guy. He's a Breslover Hasid who's doing some homestead-y type stuff out in Minnesota. So yes, it can be done.

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דעלך סני לחברך לא תעביד- זו היא כל התורה כולה, ואידך- פירושה הוא, זיל גמור.
-ר" הלל