With Whiskers in Common, Hasidim Court Hipsters

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A “Unite the Beards” video produced by the Lubavitcher movement to court bearded non-Hasidim.

Is everyone trying to bring religion to Brooklyn hipsters?

First the Brooklyn Diocese of the Roman Catholic Church began running ads suggesting that Jesus was “the original hipster.” Now a group of Hasidic Jews have seized upon the beards - metaphorically, anyway - of the hip, young demographic as a way of reaching out to them.

The Lubavitcher movement has released a “Unite the Beards” video built around the hopeful premise that the two groups have more in common than just facial hair. And on Tuesday night, at Chabad of North Brooklyn, the Lubavitcher outpost on Bedford Avenue in Williamsburg, there was a forum, advertised on fliers up and down the boutique-lined strip, on the theme “Hasid and hipster, not as different as you think.”

But perhaps the difference is significant enough. Maybe it was the lack of Pabst Blue Ribbon beer (or alcohol at all) or special brewed coffee (there was plenty of instant), but the attendance of bearded hipsters was sparse, and possibly nonexistent.

There were plenty of bearded Hasidim among the several dozen attendees listening to Rabbi Manis Friedman’s lecture. “The Torah says, tradition teaches us that facial hair actually grows from the head towards the heart,” he said. “The beard is actually a flow of energy that connects the mind and heart.”

Michael Nagle for The New York Times There were few if any obvious hipsters in attendance at a “Unite the Beards” forum at a Lubavitcher center in Williamsburg on Tuesday.

But a reporter present for the first half of the meeting had trouble spotting anyone who could pass for the stereotypical bearded hipster.

Ah, but these categories are difficult to define, said Rabbi Shmuly Lein, who helps run the center.

“It depends on what you define as a hipster,” he said on Wednesday. “Not every hipster has a beard; not every beard has a Hasid.”

He added, “It’s true, we did not get any motorcycle hipsters with tattoos and big beards - no over-the-top-looking hipsters.” But those types, he said, are “more in Bushwick now, not as much on Bedford.”

As for the Catholic campaign, Monsignor Kieran Harrington, a diocese spokesman, said the diocese’s Web site had had “400 times the normal traffic” since the ads began running April 1. The ads, posted at bus stops and phone booths, show a pair of red Converse sneakers sticking out from under a white robe,

Told about the “Unite the Beards” effort, Monsignor Harrington chuckled and said, “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.”