Convening for its centennial conference under the cloud of a recent survey indicating a steep drop in affiliation, the Conservative synagogue movement is trying to use the landmark gathering to mark a fresh beginning. A hundred years after the group’s founding with an ideal of combining Jewish tradition with modern life, Conservative leaders are hoping…
Deb Tambor ended her own life in response to being ostracized by her family in the upstate Hasidic enclave of New Square, N.Y. in Rockland County, her friends say. And though most Hasidim who leave insular communities don’t end their own lives, they face many of the same challenges. Tambor, who grew up in New…
Prague is beautiful at all times of day, but especially in the morning when things are quiet and the sun is coming up. As we headed south, the road took us through a pastoral landscape of low, green, rolling hills fenced off into small farms with random clumps of forest here and there. Every few…
The revelation that Yeshiva University hired a convicted sex offender even while facing charges that it covered up decades of sexual abuse has raised questions about the policies of other Jewish institutions at which he previously worked. The Jewish Theological Seminary, which employed the man a decade ago, says it did not know then about…
Yeshiva University has let go a recently hired Hebrew teacher following a Forward report that the teacher, Akiva Roth, had previous convictions for sexually inappropriate behavior with boys. Y.U. said it had “erred” in hiring of Roth by “permitting the new hire to begin teaching before the screening process had been completed.” Y.U. would not…
(JTA) — Bud Izen wasn’t prepared for the reaction he received the first time he brought his two girlfriends with him to synagogue in Eugene, Ore. The rabbi stopped the trio in the parking lot outside the synagogue and grilled Izen’s partners about whether or not they were really Jewish. Izen hasn’t been back since,…
For the third time in two years, Moody’s, the credit ratings service, has downgraded Yeshiva University’s debt, citing the school’s deep operating deficits, weak cash flow and uncertainty about a pending $380 million lawsuit filed against it. Just a few years ago, Moody’s gave Y.U. a healthy Aa3 credit rating. Moody’s latest report, released October…
Hundreds gathered at Congregation Beth Elohim in Park Slope on Thursday for the funeral of a 12-year-old boy killed Brooklyn boy who was struck by a van and killed on Tuesday evening outside his home near Prospect Park. Amidst audible sobs in the packed synagogue, friends and family of Samuel Cohen-Eckstein stood to bid him…
Reconstructionist Judaism has a new leader. For the first time, she is a woman — and a lesbian. In fact, Rabbi Deborah Waxman, who will take the reins of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, the newly merged seminary and congregational apparatus of the Reconstructionist movement, is the first woman to ever head a Jewish congregational organization….
In the coming weeks, the 70th anniversary of the rescue of the Danish Jews during World War II will be marked with speeches and toasts, gala performances and torchlight processions. The story of how the Danes helped their Jewish compatriots to safety on the coast of Sweden is always heart-warming. The fishermen who ran the…
In her new book, “Wonder Women: Sex, Power, and the Quest for Perfection,” Debora Spar, president of Barnard College, offers a somewhat controversial new lesson for women: Don’t even bother trying to do it all. After feminism spent decades trying to convince women that, yes, they can have a corner office, a fulfilling family life,…
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