He found Frieda Katz, a tutor in Brooklyn, and showed up in her kitchen with $35 in savings from his job picking berries at a farm stand. “I said, ‘How many lessons will this buy me?’” he recounted. “She looked at the money and she looked at me, and she said, ‘All of them.’”

That self-directed learning, he explained, became a form of healing. “For some reason, getting prepared for bar mitzvah felt like it was part of a repair process,” he said. “The same thing happened when we found CTI” — Congregation Tifereth Israel, in Glen Cove.

“It was this kind of powerful reparation in some way.” Blitz’s early initiative — fueled by curiosity and a deep desire to understand his heritage — set the tone for a life of learning, self-reinvention and a persistent sense of purpose. This year, Blitz was elected president of CTI, Long Island’s oldest continuously active synagogue.

He and his wife, Mozelle Dayan, joined CTI two years ago after spending nearly three decades at a synagogue in Hicksville. The decision to make the move was sparked by friends who encouraged the couple to attend a Friday night Shabbat service at CTI. “We came, and we loved it from day one,” Blitz said.

They were immediately impressed by the warmth of the community, including Rabbi Irwin Huberman and the synagogue’s cantor, Gustavo Gitlin, who personally welcomed them after services.

Before long, Blitz and Dayan sold their home in Hicksville and moved to Glen Cove to be within walking distance of CTI. “Let’s have an adventure at this point in our lives,” he recalled saying. Blitz soon became an active participant in synagogue life, attending every service, volunteering for fundraising efforts and joining committees.

When he was asked to consider taking on a leadership role, however, his answer was no. “I felt like I was fairly new,” he explained. “I didn’t want anything to interfere with my enjoyment of what the synagogue is to me.” But in recent months, when a nominee for president had to step aside, Blitz reconsidered. “If I’m really committed to this place, and this is what they need, I’ll consider it,” he said.

He was nominated, and elected unanimously by the congregation. Huberman praised Blitz as a rare leader who “possesses all of the different components: leadership, role modeling, love of Israel and a love of learning.”

A veteran educator and a prolific author, Blitz spent more than three decades at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, where he chaired the Interdisciplinary Studies program for a decade. He designed and taught boundary-pushing courses that combined literature, criminal justice, philosophy and cosmology, among other subjects.

Blitz has a Ph.D. in interdisciplinary studies. He was also chosen by Nobel laureate Toni Morrison to be the lead researcher for her book “Beloved.”

“We would have these long marathon sessions in her office,” he said. “She said, ‘You need to surprise me every time you step in my office.’”

His ability to blend creativity with rigor didn’t go unnoticed. Morrison later referred him to Pulitzer Prize-winning author William Kennedy, and Blitz spent part of his doctoral studies doing research for both literary giants.

At John Jay he found his intellectual home teaching experimental interdisciplinary courses, and also served as poet-in-residence. While his résumé reads like a whirlwind, Blitz insists that the variety of his career has never felt overwhelming.

“When I write a resume, it does look like I’m insanely busy,” he said. “But it
doesn’t feel that way.” That mindset, paired with his academic ambition, led him to
repeatedly take bold leaps. “I’ve actually also always taken the
chutzpah step,” he said.

And his passions extend beyond the classroom. He is a high-ranking instructor of Krav Maga, the hybrid martial art used by the Israel Defense Forces, and has trained law enforcement and security forces worldwide.

He co-founded Blitz Krav Maga, taught self-defense to security guards at Madison Square Garden and Radio City Music Hall, and led instructor training for elite IDF veterans. His martial arts journey began in earnest in the early 1990s, and he has since earned an extremely rare third-degree black belt in Krav Maga.

Despite his accomplishments, Blitz is quick to point out that the through line of his life has always been a hunger for knowledge. Now living just a short walk from the synagogue, he is rooted in both faith and community. “We have this really close community of friends that we never dreamed of,” he said of Glen Cove. “It’s been incredible.”