Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
News

Jacob Lieberman Wants To Change the Jewish World

“I didn’t come to be a rabbi because I wanted to change the Jewish world about transgender issues,” said Jacob Lieberman, 34, a fourth-year student at the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, in Wyncote, Pa. “I came because I have Jewish ideas that I want to help to infuse into our society.”

Lieberman’s aim to make Judaism “meaningful, accessible and relevant” was sparked by a high school trip to Vilna, Lithuania, where he connected with teens who were hungry for Judaism but had little experience with it. On a visit to a synagogue in Old Vilnius with several dozen young Lithuanian Jews, he realized just how inaccessible the service was to people unfamiliar with Hebrew or even worship. “I felt like synagogue is supposed to be a place where people find a path to Judaism, not a door they have to have a key to unlock to see the riches behind,” he recounted.

When Lieberman entered rabbinical school — after nine years in the labor and gay rights movements — he again focused on issues of access, this time for his own community of transgender Jews. In his first year at RRC, Lieberman and his adviser, Rabbi Jacob Staub, started the Transgender/Genderqueer Committee, an unofficial school group made up of five students and five faculty members. (“Genderqueer” is an umbrella term for people who don’t identify as solely male or female.) The group created a “Transgender 101” training for the school’s staff. It also worked with the Reconstructionist Rabbinical Association to craft a resolution, issued in March, in support of transgender rabbis and transgender partners of rabbis. “It is quite soon that folks like myself will be coming up for employment,” Lieberman said. “The RRA is saying we want transgender and genderqueer folk to have as much of a shot at employment as we do.”

In the fall, Lieberman and another transgender student on the committee, Leiah Moser, will meet with local Reconstructionist synagogues to talk about their path to the rabbinate.

Lieberman looks forward to the day when the Jewish community reaches what he calls the “2.0 version of transgender inclusion,” when trans people are treated like everyone else. “It’s a sign that we’ve made progress when we no longer say, ‘Trans people are welcome in my community,’ but instead say, ‘Of course you are welcome in my community; you are welcome to become rabbis, and you are going to do the best you can, just like everyone else does.’”

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.

If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

With your support, we’ll be ready for whatever 2025 brings.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.