Daniel S. Brenner is an American rabbi. [1] Brenner is Vice President of Education at Moving Traditions. [2] Brenner was the founding executive director of Birthright Israel NEXT [3] and he directed graduate-level training programs at Auburn Theological Seminary [4] and at CLAL- the National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership, [5] both in New York City. In 2009, he was named by Newsweek Magazine as one of the fifty most influential rabbis in America. [6]
Brenner graduated with a BA in philosophy from the University of Wisconsin, [7] studied in Jerusalem at the Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies, and received both an MA and rabbinic title from the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College. [8]
After ordination, Brenner studied with Rabbi Irving Greenberg at CLAL-the National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership as part of the Steinhardt Fellowship. Brenner served on the faculty of CLAL from 1998–2003, authoring a work on palliative care with Joseph Fins, the chief of medical ethics of Weill Cornell Medical College and a series on spirituality with Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi. [9]
In 2003, Brenner became the first rabbi to direct the Center for Multifaith Education at Auburn Theological Seminary, a Presbyterian seminary in Manhattan. [4] [10] At Auburn, Brenner played a role in the creation of a doctoral program at New York Theological Seminary for clergy who work within a religiously diverse context. It is the first doctoral level program of its kind in the United States. Brenner also created a program with Columbia University's Center for the Study of Science and Religion for religious leaders. He received a Simon Rockower Award for Excellence in Jewish Journalism in 2004 for the article Talking with Presbyterians about Israel he wrote for New Jersey Jewish News. [11]
Brenner became the vice president of the Birthright Israel Foundation in 2007. [12] He then founded and became executive director of Birthright Israel NEXT, an organization with the mission of engaging young adults in Jewish community life. Under Brenner's leadership, Birthright Israel NEXT launched NEXT Shabbat [13] and grew into a national organization that involved over 50,000 young Jewish adults each year. [14]
Brenner joined Moving Traditions in 2011. [2] Brenner is a published playwright. [15] In 2012, he served as the official rabbi for The Wall Street Journal's Passover wine tasting. [16] In 2016 he started a dance craze called "Klezmer Aerobics". [17] [18]
The subject of homosexuality and Judaism dates back to the Torah. The book of Vayikra (Leviticus) is traditionally regarded as classifying sexual intercourse between males as a to'eivah that can be subject to capital punishment by the current Sanhedrin under halakha.
Reconstructionist Judaism is a Jewish movement based on the concepts developed by Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan (1881–1983) that views Judaism as a progressively evolving civilization rather than just a religion. The movement originated as a semi-organized stream within Conservative Judaism, developed between the late 1920s and the 1940s before seceding in 1955, and established a rabbinical college in 1967. Reconstructionist Judaism is recognized by many scholars as one of the five major streams of Judaism in America alongside Orthodox, Conservative, Reform, and Humanistic.
A rabbi is a spiritual leader or religious teacher in Judaism. One becomes a rabbi by being ordained by another rabbi—known as semikha—following a course of study of Jewish history and texts such as the Talmud. The basic form of the rabbi developed in the Pharisaic and Talmudic eras, when learned teachers assembled to codify Judaism's written and oral laws. The title "rabbi" was first used in the first century CE. In more recent centuries, the duties of a rabbi became increasingly influenced by the duties of the Protestant Christian minister, hence the title "pulpit rabbis", and in 19th-century Germany and the United States rabbinic activities including sermons, pastoral counseling, and representing the community to the outside, all increased in importance.
The relationships between the various denominations of Judaism are complex and include a range of trends from the conciliatory and welcoming to hostile and antagonistic.
The Jewish Theological Seminary (JTS) is a Conservative Jewish education organization in New York City, New York. It is one of the academic and spiritual centers of Conservative Judaism and a center for academic scholarship in Jewish studies. The Jewish Theological Seminary Library is one of the most significant collections of Judaica in the world.
Steven Greenberg is an American rabbi with a rabbinic ordination from the Orthodox rabbinical seminary of Yeshiva University (RIETS). He is described as the first openly gay Orthodox-ordained Jewish rabbi, since he publicly disclosed he is gay in an article in the Israeli newspaper Maariv in 1999 and participated in a 2001 documentary film about gay men and women raised in the Orthodox Jewish world.
The Reconstructionist Rabbinical College (RRC) is a Jewish seminary in Wyncote, Pennsylvania. It is the only seminary affiliated with Reconstructionist Judaism. It is accredited by the Commission on Higher Education of the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools. RRC has an enrollment of approximately 80 students in rabbinic and other graduate programs.
Brad Hirschfield is a rabbi, author, and president of the National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership (CLAL). Hirschfield was ranked three years in a row in Newsweek as one of America's "50 Most Influential Rabbis" and recognized as a leading “Preacher & Teacher” by Beliefnet.com.
Dan Ehrenkrantz is an American Reconstructionist rabbi, currently serving as the outgoing president of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College in Wyncote, Pennsylvania.
Jacob J. Staub is a rabbi, author and poet. In 1977 he was ordained as a rabbi at the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College. He was Academic Dean of the College from 1989 to 2004, and the editor of the Reconstructionist magazine from 1983 to 1989. In 2009 he was Professor of Jewish Philosophy and Spirituality and Chair of the Department of Medieval Jewish Civilization at the Reconstructionist Rabbinic College. He founded at RRC the first program in Jewish Spiritual Direction at a rabbinical seminary. He has written two books on Gersonides' philosophy of creation and Reconstructionist Judaism. He has written essays on Mordecai Kaplan's thought.
The first openly lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender clergy in Judaism were ordained as rabbis and/or cantors in the second half of the 20th century.
The Jewish Reconstructionist Federation (JRF), founded in 1955, was the synagogue arm of Reconstructionist Judaism, serving more than 100 congregations and havurot spread across North America. In June 2012, the Reconstructionist movement underwent a restructuring that merged JRF with the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College to form a new national organization initially named RRC and Jewish Reconstructionist Communities. The merged organization was initially headed by Rabbi Dan Ehrenkrantz, a 1989 graduate of the College, and currently by Rabbi Deborah Waxman who took over in 2014. In January 2018, the merged organization changed its name to Reconstructing Judaism.
Sara Hurwitz is an Orthodox Jewish spiritual leader aligned with the "Open Orthodox" faction of Modern Orthodox Judaism in the United States. She is considered by some to be the first female Orthodox rabbi. She serves at the Hebrew Institute of Riverdale as Rabba and she is the president and co-founder of Yeshivat Maharat, both in Riverdale, New York.
Jack Cohen was an Israeli-American Reconstructionist rabbi, educator, philosopher and author. Cohen held a PhD from Columbia University in the philosophy of education. In 1943 he was ordained as a rabbi by the Jewish Theological Seminary of America (JTS) and, soon after, started to teach courses there. Cohen was one of the distinguished students of Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan, the founder of Reconstructionist Judaism, and was one of the founders of Kehillat Mevakshei Derech, a synagogue in Israel. Cohen was Honorary Chairman at Kaplan Center for Jewish Peoplehood and director of the Hillel Foundation at the Hebrew University for 23 years.
Linda Joy Holtzman is an American rabbi and author. In 1979, she became one of the first women in the United States to serve as the presiding rabbi of a synagogue, and the first woman to serve as a rabbi for a solely Conservative congregation, when she was hired by Beth Israel Congregation of Chester County, which was then located in Coatesville, Pennsylvania.
Rabbi Jason Klein is the Senior Rabbi of Congregation Beit Simchat Torah.
This is a timeline of women rabbis:
Deborah Waxman is an American rabbi and the president and CEO of Reconstructing Judaism. Waxman was inaugurated as the president of both on October 26, 2014. The ceremony took place at the National Museum of American Jewish History in Philadelphia. Waxman is believed to be the first woman rabbi and first lesbian to lead a Jewish congregational union, and the first lesbian to lead a Jewish seminary; the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College is both a congregational union and a seminary. She previously served as the vice-president for governance for the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College. In 2015 she was named as one of The Forward 50.
This is a timeline of LGBT Jewish history, which consists of events at the intersection of Judaism and queer people.
Elizabeth (Liz) Bolton is a rabbi, feminist, and activist. Hired in 2013 by Reconstructionist synagogue Or Haneshamah, she is Ottawa’s first female and openly gay rabbi. In the late 1980’s, she led efforts to address the exclusion of women from the cantorate in Canada.
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