Rabbi Search Goes On; Abduction Is Ruled Out By ARI L. GOLDMAN Published:
January 28, 1989

Almost two weeks after the disappearance of a Manhattan Hasidic rabbi, his
family, friends and neighbors are continuing a citywide search for him,
visiting shelters for the homeless, hospitals and Jewish neighborhoods
where he may have gravitated.

Rabbi Felix Friedlander, 66 years old, has been missing since Jan. 15,
when he left his 18-year-old son a few doors from his small synagogue,
the Lisker Congregation at 163 East 69th Street.

On Thursday, the Federal Bureau of Investigation concluded that Rabbi
Friedlander had not been abducted, Joseph Valiquette, an F.B.I. spokesman
in New York City, said. He said the case was now being handled by the
Missing Persons Bureau of the Police Department.

Rabbi Friedlander has a heart condition and diabetes, and his wife,
Judith, said he had been ''feeling low'' about his failure to raise
money to complete a ritual bath in the synagogue basement.

Groups of people, many of whom have slept or eaten as guests in the
synagogue over the years, have organized search parties since the
disappearance of the rabbi, a Holocaust survivor from Hungary who is
the heir to a Hasidic dynasty known as Lisker.

''We've always had an open-door policy here,'' Mrs. Friedlander, the
daughter of the previous Lisker rabbi, said in the living room of their
apartment over the synagogue. ''People have remembered and come back in
the hundreds to help.'' Help From Hospitals

She told of a homeless man who used to drop by for a meal who organized
a group from his shelter to search Central Park. Doctors and nurses at
nearby Sloan-Kettering and New York Hospitals, where Rabbi Friedlander
was a chaplain, have circulated his picture among the staff.

Because the synagogue is near large hospitals, some Hasidic and other
Orthodox Jews, who do not travel on the Sabbath, sleep and eat there
without charge on Friday nights to be near relatives in the hospitals.

Volunteers have posted thousands of black-and-white ''Missing'' signs
on lampposts and in store windows around the city.

The posters give the basic facts about Rabbi Friedlander: his nicknames of
Bumi and Avrum; his height, 5 feet, 7 inches; his weight, 165 pounds; his
blue eyes and graying beard, and the medications he takes for his heart
and blood sugar conditions, Lanoxin and Micronase. Anyone with information
is asked to call the 19th Precinct at 860-1550. Led Dynasty for 11 Years

The police have been looking for the rabbi since his family reported
him missing, just hours after his disappearance. Assistant Chief Aaron
H. Rosenthal, commanding officer of Manhattan detectives, said officers
had talked with neighbors, joggers and merchants in the area. But he said,
''With the passage of time, people's memories are less acute, and that
makes the job harder.''

The police said there had been one reported sighting of the rabbi,
walking near the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Drive, not far from his home,
on the afternoon of his disappearance.

Rabbi Friedlander took over the leadership of the Lisker dynasty from his
father-in-law, Rabbi Solomon Friedlander, 11 years ago. About a year ago,
the rabbi set about building a mikvah, or ritual bath, which Orthodox
Jewish women use before resuming sexual relations with their husbands
after they menstruate. ''It was a promise he made to my father,''
Mrs. Friedlander said.

The project, however, is far from complete. The rabbi spent $120,000 on
the venture, but needed at least that much more to finish, his wife said.

Mrs. Friedlander said she was hopeful her husband would return to finish
what she calls ''his life's work.'' She added: ''Only when he returns
will we know what really happened.''

Photo of Judith Friedlander with a poster to aid the search for her
husband, Rabbi Felix Friedlander, who disappeared Jan. 15. (NYT/Neal
Boenzi)