Rabbi Linda Portnoy Goldberg

iginal officiant left the state for family reasons, and there was no news at the time of provisions for extending marriage licenses and ceremonies had to be performed in person. We wrote to Rabbi Linda about a week before our license expired and she performed the ceremony the DAY before it expired! We flip-flopped so much on what we wanted in the ceremony- first, we wanted the full Jewish ceremony and then realized we really wanted our parents there in person to watch and participate in those rituals which was not possible... Rabbi Linda was SO incredibly patient, kind, and accommodating with us during that process of ceremony design. Rabbi Linda allowed us to come to her lovely backyard and deck with two witnesses for a socially distanced ceremony. Her husband took photos and a video, our parents watched on Zoom and the rabbi performed an absolutely lovely short and sweet legal ceremony for us! Though she helped with a very quickly planned ceremony during the time of Coronavirus, I have no doubt that every ceremony she is a part of is handled with the same level of care, attention to detail and genuine enthusiasm for the love of helping couples unite in matriomny.

r small ceremony even though there was the pandemic. She made sure to have zoom calls leading up to the day and took all precautions necessary to keep us safe. Her speech about my husband and I was so beautiful and meaningful!

deck as a place for our ceremony. We can’t be more grateful and appreciative. You and your husband have made our day so special!! Thank you, thank you, thank you! We love you and hope to see you again one day!!:) I highly recommend her to everyone who wants to have an amazing day and happy life!

wedding review website, I came across Rabbi Linda's profile and gave her a cold call. From our first conversation, I could tell she was someone that would make us feel comfortable and that we would be excited to work with. We met with Linda in person a few times and had a couple of additional phone/video calls prior to our wedding date. We are so happy that we found and were able to work with Rabbi Linda. People remarked at how lovely and personal our ceremony was (which was something very important to us). We wanted our guests to remember that they were there to celebrate the love of two specific individuals and we knew that the ceremony set the tone for the remainder of the evening. I would highly recommend Rabbi Linda to a couple planning their wedding. As practicing but not overly religious Jews, we wanted to incorporate many traditions and prayers into our wedding ceremony, but also chose to exclude some other traditions. For example, our ceremony included Hebrew and English, but we did not do the traditional seven circles. What was great about working with Linda was that she was able to fully customize based on our desires and was able to provide suggestions where we did not have a strong opinion. She understood what we were looking for and had great options of specific wording for each part of the ceremony (and of course was open to us providing our own). It made the process easy, while also preserving the "special" feeling of making it our own. The day of the wedding can be hectic, especially as it gets closer to the ceremony, since that is the time when more and more people start to gather with the bride and groom. I can say one of the amazing things about working with Rabbi Linda is that she makes you (and your family and friends present) feel extremely comfortable with her - which was pretty notable considering we had only met her just a few times. Rabbi Linda was wonderful. She officiated a memorable ceremony and we are very happy she was able to be a part of our special day.

multiple pre-wedding meetings, and visiting her house to chat with her was one of the most fun parts of the wedding planning process. Many of our guests assumed she was a family rabbi that had known us our whole lives given how personal her speech was. She also worked with us to personalize every element of the ceremony to make sure it was exactly what we wanted. We had an interfaith wedding and wanted a rabbi to officiate but didn't want it to be too religious. For each tradition, she told us the traditional way, a nontraditional way, or said we could scrap it entirely. We ended up keeping more traditions than we expected because her creative adaptations were so beautiful. One of the most emotional parts of the whole day was having our family members give us the Seven Blessings, which was one of her ideas. Many said it was the best ceremony they had ever been to. The Catholic side of the family, most of whom had never been to a Jewish wedding, said they were tempted to convert based on Rabbi Linda's ceremony alone. She even had her husband record the ceremony on his phone when she learned we didn't have a videographer! We cannot thank her enough for making our wedding the most special day of our lives.

She has a great sense of humor and was incredibly kind and patient throughout the entire process. Thank you, Rabbi Linda, for making our wedding day so special!

it or not, in 2019 America, I found it so difficult to find a Rabbi who would marry us as an "interfaith" couple even though I am not religious and neither is my husband. From our first phone call, Rabbi Linda made us feel so comfortable and excited to be getting married. She is a great listener, is extremely organized and pays so much attention to every family/ceremony detail. She helped answer every single one of our questions, religious or otherwise, and was available every time we needed her. Our ceremony perfectly captured our simple style, and yet was so tasteful which she made it her very own way custom to us. She was especially helpful in finding ways to include my in-laws and my husband's brothers in our ceremony so that everyone felt included. She proof-read our program and helped us pick a Ketubah that was just what we were looking for. I HIGHLY recommend Rabbi Linda. She is ALWAYS smiling and upbeat as well as willing to meet with us every time we needed to. I look forward to using her in the future when our children are born someday! Thank you, Rabbi!

our lives!

onal touches. Not only did we love it, our guests all raved about it the entire night! Some even said it was the best ceremony they’d ever seen. The entire process was great - Linda is accommodating, extremely kind, caring, professional, and she also has a great sense of humor :). It was everything we could have hoped for and more!

felt as if I had known her for years as she was so friendly and genuine. Rabbi Linda and her husband Michael made my wife and I feel like a part of the family. She was extremely organized and flexible and as a result, the wedding ceremony was flawless. I am extremely grateful that she was able to celebrate an important life event with us.

l - she really got to know us! Throughout the cocktail hour, our guests were asking how we found Rabbi Linda and how beautiful the ceremony was. Even some of our non-Jewish friends commented about how interesting and inclusive the ceremony was. We wanted short, meaningful and sweet and that is exactly what we received. We cannot say enough great words!!

ind, caring, and professional. I could not recommend her enough for your special day.

his wife live and have traveled abroad, we had a guest from Sweden. Whereas Swedish ceremonies are secular/Christian, he found this wedding ceremony to be very special and sought me out to tell me so. In other words, Rabbi Linda reaches all faiths in her service while maintaining the true essence of a Jewish wedding. My 93 year old mother was thrilled. Thank you Rabbi Linda for putting your heart and sould into the wedding.

nterfaith couple and a second marriage for both of us, Rabbi Linda created a nice balance we were looking for but kept the meaning and tone of a Jewish ceremony we wanted. She took the time to get to know us, how we met, what was important to us, was sensitive to both sides of the family and children, and gave us many ideas and options on our nuptials and the flow of the ceremony. She welcomed us into her home and we really felt like family. We adore Rabbi Linda and were so happy she officiated one of the most important days of our lives.

d paths with her, and that we had the honor of her marrying us at our wedding. WE GENUINELY FELT THAT OUR WEDDING WAS AS IMPORTANT TO RABBI LINDA AS IT WAS TO US. It does not get much better than that. Everyone at our wedding was blown away by the ceremony, and how personal it felt. She truly listened to what it was that we wanted, and she honored our wishes and vision for our wedding. Rabbi Linda is person who exudes warmth and love and we feel so fortunate to know her. She and her husband are incredibly kind and lovely people, and she embraced my husband and I with open arms and an open heart. She accommodated our busy schedules and was incredibly flexible and responsive via phone and e-mail. Thank you so much Rabbi Linda for helping to make our wedding the most special day of our life.

her a ceremony that felt right for us while respecting the important traditions. We didn't have a prior relationship with her, so she made a point of meeting with us multiple times (including by Facetime to work around our schedule and the distance between us), in order to get to know us better. As a result, the ceremony included a wonderful section in which Rabbi Linda told our story that helped make the ceremony feel very personal. Multiple guests have made a point of telling us how much they enjoyed the ceremony, thanks in large part to Rabbi Linda.

bbi Linda was the perfect choice. She met with us in person several times prior to the wedding and twice over Skype. In addition, she was in constant communication over e-mail and very quick to reply to any inquiries. Rabbi Linda expertly guided us through the history and meaning of various Jewish wedding rituals, and we were also able to incorporate some additional elements into our wedding that reflected the non-Jewish parts of our backgrounds. Rabbi Linda let us make our own selections for certain aspects of the ceremony such as The Seven Blessings and add our own elements such as vows to make it a ceremony that was meaningful to us as a couple. From our very first meeting with Rabbi Linda we felt we were in very good hands. Importantly, Rabbi Linda was instrumental to the success of our wedding ceremony. She conducted a rehearsal immediately prior to the ceremony and made sure that guests understood what their roles were. Even though both of us were very nervous, Rabbi Linda's presence made us feel at ease throughout the entire event. She conducted a masterful and personalized ceremony, with a beautiful speech that allowed the guests to learn about our backgrounds, circumstances of our marriage, and convey the emotional impact of a wedding. We had many compliments from guests about our ceremony. One of our guests told us that she had only cried at two weddings and ours was one of them. We recommend Rabbi Linda to anyone looking for a warm and knowledgeable Rabbi to officiate at their wedding.

up to our wedding. Linda was extremely accommodating to our busy schedules, and she regularly agreed to do Face Time calls when necessary. She was patient, and she respected our decisions regarding our ceremony. She is warm and friendly, and she is a beautiful public speaker. Many of our guests told us how much they loved our ceremony and how much they loved our rabbi. She even got through our outdoor ceremony just in time before a huge rain storm came in across the Hudson River. You will be very happy for choosing Rabbi Linda as your ceremony officiant. We both hope that we will continue to stay in touch with her through the years, and that is a sign of a great rabbi!

flexibility to choose which traditions we wanted and didn’t want in our ceremony. Linda was incredibly helpful in this regard, not only in customizing the ceremony to our liking, but explaining what each tradition involves, the history and meaning behind them, and walking us through how they would fit into our ceremony. We learned a lot from her. She was patient as my wife and I debated which traditions we wanted to include, sometimes changing our minds multiple times. She enlightened us to some wonderful aspects of Jewish weddings that we were unaware of. For instance, we didn’t know what a ketubah was, but now we have a beautiful, meaningful document/piece-of-art mounted in our living room. Additionally, she was always available with quick responses to our questions and was willing to meet in person periodically and over skype/facetime. Whenever we had a question, her answers were thorough and informative. Secondly, we thought she did a fantastic job tailoring the ceremony to my wife and I and our story. Early in the process, Linda had us each write her a note about the what other means to us. She wove some of the details of our story into our ceremony in a beautiful and tasteful way. Lastly, she was a joy to work with. It’s clear that she loves doing this and it isn’t just a job for her. She has a warm and welcoming personality which was essential for us, making it easy to talk to her and easier for my wife and I to open up about one another. We knew within moments of speaking with her for the first time that we wanted her to be our officiant and we absolutely made the right choice.

ral hours with her going through the aspects of the traditional Jewish wedding ritual, discussing which aspects we wanted to include, which we wanted to adapt and which didn’t feel right to us. Linda’s knowledge deepened our experience of our marriage ceremony. Her attitude was both scholarly and inclusive. She also took special care to include aspects from Lee’s tradition, even researching it herself, and in the end, seamlessly melded both traditions into a special ceremony that was unique to us. All along the way, she was perfectly prepared, down to having copies of our vows for us to read. And her gentle, open, yet learned manner at the ceremony made everyone in attendance feel the love and care with which all three of us undertook the process. We recommend her to any couple, and especially to couples looking for a unique ceremony especially tailored to them.

hour since we were having such a great time. She gave us the ceremony of our dreams, and catered every aspect to exactly what we wanted. Rabbi Linda didn't just give us a cookie cutter ceremony, but actually got to know us and gave us a personalized ceremony that made us both (and all our guests) laugh and cry!

like we had a stranger officiating our wedding. From the beginning, we were both so impressed with how organized she was: she had pre-printed materials for us describing the wedding ceremony and different alternatives we could choose from if we needed help, she created a detailed timeline that we could follow to make sure we she were ready for the big day, and she was very clear about what information she needed from us while keeping detailed notes on everything we told her about ourselves and our families. She was very flexible if we had our own ideas or vision for how we wanted things to go. We are both not super religious or traditional and that was fine with her. Throughout the whole night and still to this day people have been telling us how it was one of the most beautiful ceremonies they'd ever seen. Rabbi Linda did such a great job narrating each part of the ceremony and the meaning behind it. She used our meetings with her as well as the emails we had written about each other to seamlessly work in plenty of personal details, which made all of our guests feel more connected to us and kept a light and fun atmosphere to the ceremony. We are both so grateful to Rabbi Linda for creating such beautiful memories for us!

and progressive Jewish ceremony that matched our values and which deeply reflected us as a secular but culturally Jewish couple. Linda more than rose to the occasion. She took the time to get to know us personally, shared information with us on Jewish traditions for us to consider without ever being pushy or imposing herself and guided us through the process of drafting our own ketubah, vows and Seven Blessings. She is incredibly responsive (it seems like she answered every email within 30 min and often sooner!) and was incredibly generous with her time. This is the rabbi that you want by your side on your wedding day and throughout the wedding process. She is warm, patient, kind and a beautiful writer and speaker. Dozens of our guests have told us how blown away they were by our ceremony. Over and over again we hear how moved they were, how intimate it was and how much they learned about my husband and me and our relationship through the words that Linda and we shared. For our part, the ceremony was an even more profound and affecting moment than we could have imagined. There is so much to plan during a wedding that you can fear that the reason for the wedding itself--the ceremony and the commitment you are endeavoring to make---may begin to feel like an afterthought. Linda constructed a ceremony that brought both of us to tears and felt like a sacred, reverent moment. We will be forever grateful to her for leading us on this beautiful path and we will always consider her a dear friend. We cannot thank her enough and certainly cannot recommend her any more strongly. I simply can't imagine anyone else having done as perfect a job and it was a privilege being ushered into this new chapter of our lives by her.

rganized and the easiest person to talk to. Rabbi Linda clearly loves what she does and she crafted such a beautiful ceremony, we’re still getting so many compliments. We couldn’t imagine our special day with out her. Thank you!

rised! We knew after our first meeting with her that her presence at our wedding would be a true gift. We are a bi-cultural couple with a toddler. She and her lovely husband Michael welcomed the three of us into their home with open arms. During our first meeting with Rabbi Linda our immediate sense was one of being guided and cared for. We can't imagine anyone we could have trusted more to be in sync with our wishes, attentive to both our cultures, respectful of what was most important to us, generous with her time, sincere in her dedication and love of what she does, and completely informed on every technical detail (i.e. Marriage license) that needed to be completed and when! Rabbi Linda might be the most organized person we've ever met and in the chaos around wedding planning, this was so grounding for us. It feels impossible to really put into words our gratitude for Rabbi Linda's warmth, thoughtfulness, and commitment to us and our process as we prepared for marriage. She handled us and our ceremony with a love and grace that will remain in our hearts forever. We believe that in meeting Rabbi Linda we were not only blessed with a great officiant but even more so the opportunity to receive guidance from a truly present, deeply conscious, and joyous human being.

abbi Linda Goldberg. She took an ordinary ceremony and turned it into an extraordinary event. She is so diligent and passionate about what she does. She invited us to discuss what our objectives for the ceremony were, asked what we wanted, and she in return suggested so many things that we were oblivious to. We are an interfaith couple but decided to go for a traditional Jewish ceremony, not very long, so the Protestant side of the family would understand what the Jewish ceremony and traditions meant. She gave us many choices and did the whole ceremony in Hebrew and translated it into English. She asked us to write personal descriptions of each other and to send them to her separately via email. She then incorporated seamlessly and beautifully both our sentiments into a wonderful narrative. Through her passion and enthusiasm, she brought two totally diverse and different families together and created an ambiance of love, warmth and friendship, and this helped to break the ice between the two families. Rabbi Linda Goldberg is a generous woman who gives her time, passion and herself to make the event the most special of your life. To say that we highly recommend her is an understatement. She went above and beyond anything we could have ever expected, and we honestly feel she and her husband have become true friends for the rest of our lives.

er been to. She is thorough, intelligent, thoughtful and the list goes on. We highly recommend Rabbi Linda!

elped us craft a ceremony that mixed traditions old and new, making us feel as though the ceremony reflected our values while still making our more religious relatives feel at home. She is very smart (a former CEO-turned-rabbi), exceedingly warm and sensitive to the needs of her clients. We would recommend her to anyone!

so that everyone understood the significance of each part. She was a pleasure to meet with, and we felt like we got to know each other over the six months that we met with her- she is caring, considerate, and warm. She also is extremely well organized and professional- she gave us a timeline with everything that we needed to complete for the wedding the first time we met with her. Everyone commented how beautiful the ceremony was and how personal the story of us as a couple was.

l. Everyone who attended was mesmerized, educated and inspired regardless of their religious affiliations. From my experience, I must say that rarely occurs during a wedding ceremony. She spent several meetings getting to know the couple and passed on some sage advise about marriage and family warmly shepherding this young couple as they entered this new phase of their relationship. I can't recommend Rabbi Linda Portnoy Goldberg strongly enough. She is the real deal!