Inspiring Rabbis 2016: 32 Men and Women Who Move Us Most
First, I should tell you that I walk every Shabbos from the East Village of Manhattan to Brooklyn Heights just to learn from Rabbi Ari Raskin. His Torah insights, his ability to break open Hasidic texts are revelatory to all who come to hear him. It is his humanity, his care and gentle support offered…
In 2013, Rabbi Farkas gave a High Holiday sermon asking us to look around our community and take stock of the overwhelming number of homeless people living on the streets in southern California. A group of us from the synagogue rallied to his call and formed the Valley Beth Shalom Homelessness Task Force. Under the…
Walk into our campus Chabad for Friday night dinner, and it is likely that Rabbi Hershey will greet you by name — you and every other of the 150 students who attend weekly. He and his wife, Chana, go out of their way to know and be known by each and every Jewish student. WashU…
Rabbi Fox is, at the age of 40, Rosh Yeshiva, head of school. His career has put him in the position of many firsts. He was the first student to courageously attend a new rabbinical school, Yeshivat Chovevei Torah, and after seven years in a pulpit in New Jersey, he became the first to head…
At one Friday night dinner hosted by Base DWTN, Avram Mlotek said that back in early 20th-century Poland, around his grandparents’ Shabbos table, the whole family regrouped. Traditionally, all the relatives — the Communist brother, the Socialist sister, the Hasidic cousins and the secular cousins — came back to the Shabbos table. This Shabbos table…
In the 1950s, if you asked your rabbi about kidney donation, he would have been unsure about what Jewish law said about the procedure. To be on the safe side, he might have said it was forbidden. Now, rabbis are more likely to call it a mitzvah. The shift over the past decades has to…
After Belda Lindenbaum — champion of women’s Torah scholarship — passed away, Ruth delivered a passionate, gratitude-filled eulogy from the bimah. My young daughter, who learns with Ruth weekly, turned to me and asked, “Why is it such a big deal for girls to learn Torah?” With enormous pride at the chutzpah of the question,…
Rabbi Larry Rothwachs is a tzaddik. To look at him, you see a handsome, diminutive, traditional-looking Orthodox Jew. He answers questions with wisdom and compassion, and when something is out of his area of expertise, he humbly defers to those upon whom he relies for counsel. Rabbi Rothwachs typically shares our life cycle events, as…
For the first time in my life, and in the nine years of my Jewish professional life, I find myself yearning to go to shul. Rabbi Justin has figured out how to encourage Jewish learning in a way that is relevant and important, while also being accessible for the “lay learner.” While I have truly…
I can personally attest to Rabbi Shaffin’s ability to change lives, as he very literally changed mine. Nearly three years after I had begun my path toward conversion but had been unable to find someone who both inspired me and was willing to really welcome me into the Jewish community, Rabbi Royi took me in…
Rabbi Goldstein has been able to unite a diverse community of Jews with a wide range of beliefs and practices in a fairly small town with compassion, humor and education. He inspires believers and nonbelievers alike, showing what Judaism has to offer to anyone who identifies with the Jewish community. I feel honored that he…
