This is the Forward’s coverage of rabbis, the spiritual leaders of Jewish congregations.
Rabbis
The Latest
-
News Young Rabbis Love Israel But Lean to Left of Elders
When Rabbi Daniel Gordis, an influential essayist living in Israel, argued in the pages of Commentary magazine that young, non-Orthodox, American rabbis were increasingly anti-Israel, his controversial article was met with anger — and disbelief. To rabbinical students and their deans in particular, his observations and the conclusion he drew from them simply did not…
-
Life Interfaith Caravan Is Full of Female Rabbis
As the first woman to be ordained a Conservative rabbi, Amy Eilberg occupies a major place in the annals of Jewish women’s history. She has recently been squeezing her self into a very small space in the hopes of making another kind of history. Since September 11, she and seven other interfaith clergy have been…
-
News Rabbis Go Hollywood for High Holy Days Sermon Tips
Comedy writer Janet Leahy was working on an episode of “The Simpsons” a couple of years ago, when her rabbi asked her for three jokes to punch up his Rosh Hashanah sermon. With this year’s High Holy Days looming, Leahy sat on the sun-drenched terrace of the Stephen S. Wise Temple and listened attentively to…
-
Life Torah and Toddlers: Parenting’s Jewish Lessons
Rabbi Ilana Grinblat has written a new book, “Blessings and Baby Steps,” (Behrman House, 2011) which synthesizes insights into Torah and lessons learned from giving birth to, and parenting, her two young children. Grinblat teaches Midrash at the American Jewish University’s Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies in Los Angeles, where she received ordination in 2001….
-
The Schmooze Thousands Attend Funeral of Murdered Rabbi
Rabbi Elazar Abuchatzeira was laid to rest on the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem, following his stabbing murder by a visitor to the Yeshiva in Beer Sheva where the rabbi was greeting guests just after midnight Friday morning. Thousands attended the funeral procession of the revered Kabbalist, which began in the ultra-Orthodox neighborhood of Meah…
-
Life Be Ima — The Bima Can Wait
I don’t have time to write this blog because I have an infant on my lap. But I am driven to write because I do not hear my voice represented in the discussions about motherhood and the rabbinate. Recently Rabbi Jill Levy, who was ordained at the Jewish Theological Seminary, wrote on The Sisterhood about…
-
Life Making Room for Ima on the Bima
It did not feel like a compliment when someone told me that I was the “prettiest” rabbi he had ever seen. Nor did it feel like a compliment when a congregant said he was really impressed with me although he always thought “ima” — Hebrew for mother — “did not belong on the bima.” I…
-
The Schmooze ‘Dr. Death’ Jack Kevorkian Dies at 83
“Dr. Death” has finally lived up to his name. Jack Kevorkian, who has spent decades campaigning for the legalization of euthanasia, has died at 83. Kevorkian, who expired — unassisted — in a Detroit hospital, served eight years in prison and was arrested multiple times for helping more than 130 patients commit suicide between 1990…
Explore
Most Popular
- 1
News Israeli President Isaac Herzog’s selection as JTS commencement speaker roils graduating class
- 2
Opinion American Jews have a Hasan Piker problem. Solving it is going to hurt
- 3
Opinion How Israel became a country where teenagers murder each other in cold blood
- 4
Sports NBA coach Steve Kerr: ‘Israel sought revenge for Oct. 7 and now 72,000 Palestinians have been killed’
In Case You Missed It
-
Yiddish World New documentary captures the lively history of Yiddish theater in America
-
Opinion Is supporting peace illegal in Israel? A shocking arrest carries a warning
-
Culture The handwriting analysis that convicted Alfred Dreyfus is for sale
-
Yiddish World Yiddish street signs: Commemoration or marginalization?