(JTA) — Hundreds of Conservative Jews have signed an open letter opposing their movement’s support for U.S. recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. The letter, first published Sunday night, has garnered some 250 signatures in its first 36 hours online. All of the signatories are affiliates or alumni of the Jewish Theological Seminary, the movement’s…
Activists held a protest on Monday outside the Jewish Theological Seminary in Manhattan against the contractor that the rabbinical school hired to manage a massive construction project on campus. JTS, the flagship seminary of Conservative Judaism, hired the contractor Gilbane to build a new library and residence hall as part of a major refiguring of…
During the turmoil of the election campaign, the death of Jacob Neusner, one of the most influential Jewish thinkers of the past century, received relatively little attention. Neusner, who died in October, was one of the giants who established Jewish studies in the 20th century, and a central figure in the history of critical scholarship…
If rabbinic leaders are supposed to be the spiritual backbone of the Jewish family, the schools that train them have not set much of an example when it comes to supporting working parents. Even though Jewish communal groups put a huge emphasis on family life and Jewish continuity, most of the nation’s rabbinical seminaries still…
Lev Meirowitz Nelson grew up at a Conservative Jewish day school and a Conservative synagogue. When he decided to apply for rabbinical school, however, he didn’t even consider a Conservative seminary. Instead, Nelson applied to Hebrew College, the new, progressive, nondenominational seminary in Boston, where he was ordained in 2013. It’s a path that more…
(JTA) — When Eric Woodward started rabbinical school at the Conservative movement’s Jewish Theological Seminary, he assumed he would be be the only student who grew up celebrating Christmas along with Hanukkah. But midway through his training, when Woodward started a discussion group for students of interfaith families, more than 20 people showed up. Not all…
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…
A few years ago, while discussing my rabbinical school application with my rabbi, I lamented that all the money that my parents spent on culinary school and the years I worked in the food industry had been a waste. Especially now that I was going to be a rabbi. She said to me – one…
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