Welcome to the Forward’s coverage of rabbis, the spiritual leaders of Jewish congregations.
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Fast Forward Reconstructionist Synagogue Quits Movement Over Intermarried Rabbis
A Florida synagogue has voted to leave the Reconstructionism over the movement’s decision to allow rabbis to marry outside the Jewish faith. The members of Kol Haneshamah synagogue in Sarasota, Florida, voted by a 63-to-35 margin to end its Reconstructionist affiliation and become an independent congregation not affiliate. Twelve members abstained and 13 votes were…
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Fast Forward Rebbe Schneerson Death Certificate Is Auctioned — Top Bid Just $1,936
The death certificate of Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson — the revered Chabad leader often referred to as “the Rebbe” — is on the auction block. The official certificate, issued Aug. 2, 1995, and mailed by the New York Department of Health to Schneerson’s niece in Israel, is being auctioned by Virtual Judaica on its website…
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News Trailblazing Orthodox Rabbi Lila Kagedan Stands on ‘Shoulders of Giants’
(JTA) — When Rabbi Lila Kagedan spends her first Shabbat at the Mount Freedom Jewish Center in Randolph, New Jersey, later this month, she will be making history. A recent graduate of Yeshivat Maharat, Kagedan, 35, is the first person ordained at the Orthodox women’s clergy training institute in New York to adopt the title…
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Fast Forward New Jersey Synagogue Reveals It Hired First Orthodox Woman ‘Rabbi’
An Orthodox synagogue in New Jersey has hired Lila Kagedan, the first Yeshivat Maharat graduate to go by the title “rabbi.” Mount Freedom Jewish Center, in Randolph, New Jersey, announced in a news release Monday that Kagedan is joining its “spiritual leadership team.” The news release did not use the word “rabbi,” instead referring to…
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News Marc Gafni Defends Return to Spotlight as Backlash Gathers Steam
Marc Gafni, a once-promising Jewish leader dogged by allegations of sexual improprieties stretching back years, has returned to the public eye as a leader of a California think tank. But his stunning re-emergence, trumpeted in a recent New York Times article, has elicited a new wave of condemnations from Jewish leaders. Rabbi David Ingber, an…
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Life First Woman Orthodox ‘Rabbi’ Is Hired by Synagogue
The first graduate of Yeshivat Maharat to take the title “rabbi” said she has been hired by an unnamed American Orthodox synagogue. Lila Kagedan, who was ordained this summer by the seminary created by Open Orthodox Rabbi Avi Weiss to train Orthodox female clergy, told the London-based Jewish Chronicle this week that she was recruited…
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News Reconstructionist Synagogue Rebels Against Allowing Intermarried Rabbis
In September, the Reconstructionist movement adopted a policy that was as groundbreaking as it was controversial: Henceforth, the movement stated, it would ordain students in its rabbinical seminary who were in interfaith relationships. Now, the first signs of discontent are beginning to appear, as a Florida congregation prepares to vote on January 18 on dropping…
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Opinion How Jewish Leaders Can Keep the LGBT Debate Honest
A funny thing is happening in Jacksonville, Florida. In the wake of one of the most dishonest civil rights debates in recent memory — Houston’s cash-soaked, lie-filled controversy over whether to expand its human rights ordinance to protect LGBT people from discrimination — the city of Jacksonville has taken a different route. They’re talking honestly…
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