Now he's added another title: Torah maven.

He's the first to hold it in a thousand years, he says.

Freeman explains (and the Jewish Encyclopedia corroborates) that the profession of maven, also called meturgeman, began when Jews were in exile in Babylon. Most of the Jewish population had ceased to understand Hebrew since Aramaic had become the vernacular.

"The teachers knew the old stories in Hebrew, but the people didn't understand them," Freeman said in a recent phone conversation. "There needed to be an intermediary, someone who could translate the Hebrew of the teachers and rabbis into Aramaic. A team would go out and interpret and translate for the people.

"I call it the third oldest profession in Judaism, right after rabbi and prostitute," he says with a laugh.

By all accounts, the Torah maven's interpretation was lively, employing contemporary language and vivid storytelling.

The profession died out about a thousand years ago, Freeman says; now he and others are trying to bring it back.

His own inspiration comes from Amichai Lau-Levie, a nephew of one of Israel's chief rabbis and the founder and executive director of Storahtelling Ritual Jewish Theater, a popular form of Torah service that incorporates performance art, music, drama, dance and drumming.

"Storahtelling involved very big elaborate Torah services," Freeman says. "It got to be a bit much for congregations. It was too expensive to bring them in."

So Freeman - a longtime Jew-by-choice-studied with Lau-Levie to become a kind of one-man Storahteller. Now he plies his venerable trade at his synagogue, Aitz Hayim Center for Jewish Living in Highland Park, one Shabbat a month and hires out to other congregations across the country the rest of the time.

What he provides, he says, is basically a Torah reading that incorporates dramatic commentary, stagecraft and sometimes live music -- just as the historical mavens did. (Visit Freeman's Web site, http://aaronfreeman.com, or torahmaven. com, to see an entertaining YouTube clip of the process.)

"Considering that we are the people of the book, it's fairly disturbing that the Torah service tends to be the part of the service when people start talking," Freeman says. "The goal is to make it more entertaining. I tell the story, do the characters, use funny faces, funny voices. Our goal is to bring the story alive right there in the synagogue, to make it lively and interesting so my kids will want to show up. A lot of people want to be entertained."

He sometimes partners with the Midwest's only other Torah maven, Milwaukee's Marge Eiseman, or combines his maven ritual with a Shabbaton program that includes classes, lectures and workshops.

Freeman says that although most Jews don't even know what a Torah maven is, the idea seems to be catching on. "These are wonderful stories -- wild, incredible stories. Most Jews have never seen them told as exciting stories. People respond very well when you bring them to life," he says.

Congregations or other institutions that would like to hire their own Torah maven can contact Freeman through his Web site or by calling (773) 230-7861.