A family affair

The Bergs settled in Richmond Hill, a middle-class Queens neighborhood. Karen finally had the big house she wanted, but its stately exterior belied a modest existence. They had moved back from Israel without enough money for a car, according to former student Dorothy Clark. She and another former student recalled that Karen dressed their sons in secondhand clothing.

The house doubled as the American headquarters of what would soon be known as the Kabbalah Centre. The basement served as a dining hall and the living room as a synagogue. Classes were held around a pingpong table, one of the Bergs’ few pieces of furniture, recalled Michel Obadia, a Manhattan hair salon owner who studied at the center.

As in Israel, the students were mostly alienated Jews who liked Philip’s combination of approachability and orthodox background. He would teach that the oft-told stories of Adam, Abraham and other Torah figures contained hidden wisdom about how the universe worked. Over two hours, Obadia recalled, Philip would discuss what the Zohar taught about a particular esoteric topic -- how to find the middle ground between judgment and grace, for example.

Obadia said students would speak up about how the abstract principle applied to their own lives.

“He had the language, the formulas, for you to pierce through and all of a sudden start to understand things,” said Obadia, who left the center more than 20 years ago but can still recite many of Philip’s teachings.

He said that at the close of class, many students would strap on phylacteries -- small boxes that contain Torah passages -- and pray together.
Their congregation was growing, but the Bergs were determined to reach even more people. They turned to publishing. In Israel, they had discovered that students wanted their own kabbalah texts and would pay for them. This was a revelation to Philip, who was used to impoverished yeshiva scholars hunkered over communal books, as he later recalled in testimony in a civil lawsuit.

The books sold in Israel were dense and difficult, and written in Hebrew. Berg turned to Clark’s husband for help in making the teachings more accessible. Kenneth Clark was a Chicago Tribune reporter covering entertainment in New York. The two men got together every Wednesday night at the Bergs’ dining room table.

“His idea was to get this into common language that anybody could understand,” Kenneth Clark recalled in court testimony years later.

Philip would explain a portion of kabbalah to Clark, who had been raised a Southern Baptist and knew no Hebrew. Clark would look for ways to make the ancient teachings relevant. When Philip described kabbalah’s conception of the age-old conflict between good and evil, Clark suggested comparing it to the "Star Wars" movies.

Books he wrote with Clark and other ghostwriters allowed Philip to reach beyond Queens and Israel, and the Bergs soon had branches in cities with large Jewish communities, including Miami, Toronto and Paris.

They also established a religious order called the chevre , “friends” in Hebrew. The chevre , primarily young Israelis, took vows of poverty and lived dormitory-style in a house near the Bergs’ Queens home and later in cities around the world. By day, they knocked on doors in Jewish business districts, carrying Zohars and delivering a pitch about the center to raise funds. At night, they roamed Jewish neighborhoods.

“We would say, ‘We are teaching Jewish spirituality.’ Most people would say, ‘I'm not interested.’ Some would say, ‘What's it about?’” recalled Shaul Youdkevitch, a high-ranking teacher who had a falling-out with Karen in 2008 after three decades as a chevre .

The chevre tried to persuade people to make a donation or buy a Zohar for $360, according to Youdkevitch and other former members of the order. Many of the people they solicited did not read Hebrew, but the chevre assured them that wasn’t a problem: Just passing a hand over the Zohar’s letters can give spiritual insight, and its physical presence provides protection from harm. (The talismanic powers of the Zohar remain a central tenet of Kabbalah Centre teachings.)

In the mid-‘80s, the center began emphasizing donations as a way to ensure members’ well-being, spiritual and otherwise. Consistent with Jewish tradition, followers were urged to give generously beyond the expected tithe of 10% to 20% of their income.

Teachers departed from tradition in telling donors their money should go only to the center: Spreading kabbalah was more vital than the work of homeless shelters and other charities. The center taught that tithing protected donors against financial setbacks, and that additional donations would stave off divine punishment in the form of illness, family strife and other problems.

Karen kept close tabs on fundraising, Youdkevitch and other former members said.

“She was sitting on every chevre in the world: ‘Where are you? How much money are you bringing in?’” he recalled her inquiring. “She would say you have to be outside all day.”

Philip focused on spiritual matters. He prayed six to eight hours a day and continued to write books with Clark. In 1988, Philip published “Power of Aleph Beth.” The first sentence mentioned “Star Wars” director George Lucas and the cover featured a sci-fi design with Hebrew characters floating under a dark planet.

The book used modern worries such as nuclear war and drug abuse to give kabbalah teachings a contemporary feel.

There was also a nod to a world-famous pop star.

“We are living in a material world and I’m a material girl,” began the second chapter. Nearly a decade before Madonna attended her first kabbalah class, she served as what Clark called “a made-to-order metaphor for what kabbalah does not teach.”