 |
Moshe Kletenik is an American rabbi who was President of the Rabbinical Council of America.
|
Moshe Kletenik is an American rabbi who was President of the Rabbinical Council of America.
He was born in Chicago in 1954. His parents are Rabbi Shya and Rochelle Kletenik. After studying in the Hebrew Theological College and Yeshivas Brisk of Chicago, he received "Yoreh Yoreh" semicha from Rabbi Ahron Soloveichik . Kletenik received semicha in the areas of gittin and Even Ha'ezer and "Yadin Yadin" semicha from Rabbi Gedalia Dov Schwartz in 2004 and 2009 respectively. [1]
He has served as a congregational rabbi, at Shaare Torah Congregation of Pittsburgh in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and in Seattle at Bikur Cholim Machzikay Hadath Congregation from 1994 until June 2013. He is currently the Av Beth Din and Mesader Gittin for the Vaad HaRabbanim of Greater Seattle. [1] [2]
Kletenik was President of the Rabbinical Council of America [3] and a member of the Faith Advisory Board to Governor Christine Gregoire of Washington State. He has written extensively on contemporary issues of Jewish law, especially Jewish medical ethics, and published in journals such as Hadarom, Hapardes and Aspaklaria and the RCA Sermon Anthology Series which he has co-edited. Kletenik lectures at medical ethics conferences such as Bar Ilan University. [4]
Kletenik presently heads the Semicha Standards Committee of the RCA. [5] This committee "determine[s] which institutional and private semichot are acceptable for membership in the RCA."
Kletenik brokered the conversion deal between the RCA and Israeli Chief Rabbinate. He defended this controversial deal in an editorial. [6]
Under his leadership, the RCA approved a resolution at its April 2010 conference which prohibited the ordination of women as rabbis, as well as "the recognition of women as members of the Orthodox rabbinate, regardless of the title." [7] The resolution was passed in response to the decision by the Hebrew Institute of Riverdale to ordain Sara Hurwitz with the newly established title 'Rabba', formally recognizing her role as a member of its rabbinical staff.
He is married to Rivy Poupko Kletenik and has four children, including Gilah Kletenik. [8]
Semikhah is the traditional Jewish name for rabbinic ordination.
The Rabbinical Council of America (RCA) is one of the world's largest organizations of Orthodox rabbis; it is affiliated with The Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America, more commonly known as the Orthodox Union (OU). It is the main professional rabbinical association within Modern Orthodox in the United States. Most rabbis of the RCA belong to Modern Orthodox Judaism.
Baruch Aaron "Bernard" Poupko was a Russian-born American scholar, author, and lecturer. A refugee who escaped persecution in his native Russia, he went on to become a prominent figure in the Jewish community in the United States whose career largely focused on advocating for Soviet Jews.
Telshe Yeshiva (Chicago) (or Telshe Chicago or Telz Chicago) is a Yeshiva (Jewish Talmudical and Rabbinical School) in Chicago, Illinois. In 1960, Rabbi Chaim Mordechai Katz, Rosh Yeshiva of the Telshe Yeshiva in Cleveland, Ohio, established Telshe Chicago as a branch of the Telshe Yeshiva (named after the Lithuanian town of Telšiai).
Zalman Nechemia Goldberg was a rabbi, posek, and rosh yeshiva Ashkenazi in Israel. The scion of a Lithuanian Jewish family, Goldberg was also a son-in-law of Shlomo Zalman Auerbach.
Menachem Genack is an Orthodox rabbi and the CEO of the Orthodox Union Kosher Division, a supervisory organization of kosher food. As such he oversees the kosher certification of over 1.3 million products and over 14,000 facilities in 104 countries.
Rabbi Reuben Joshua Poupko is the Rabbi of Beth Israel Beth Aaron Congregation, an Orthodox synagogue in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. He is the son of Gilda Twerski Novoseller Poupko, scion of the Poupko Hasidic dynasty, and Rabbi Baruch Poupko, rabbi for over 60 years of Congregation Shaare Torah in Pittsburgh. Poupko is married to Mindy Shear of Montreal, where they reside with Mindy’s son Shalev. Rabbi Poupko has 5 children: Adina, Hindy, Tamar, Eliezer and Avi. Poupko is the twin brother of Rivy Poupko Kletenik.
Congregation Beth Israel is an independent, traditional egalitarian Jewish congregation, located at 229 Murdock Avenue in Asheville, North Carolina. Founded in 1899 as Bikur Cholim, it was an Orthodox breakaway from Asheville's existing synagogue. It hired its first full-time rabbi in 1909, opened a religious school in 1911, and acquired its first building, which burnt down in 1916, in 1913.
Samuel A. Turk (1917–2009) was an American-born pulpit rabbi whose writings and issues and organizational activism made a mark beyond the congregation he served for 40 years.
Sephardic Bikur Holim Congregation (SBH) is a Sephardic Jewish congregation with a synagogue in the Seward Park neighborhood of Seattle, Washington. The name Bikur Holim means visiting or comforting the sick, an important mitzvah. The first official name of the congregation was Spanish Hebrew Society and Congregation Bikur Holim, shortened to "Sephardic Bikur Holim". For a time in the 1930s, after amalgamation with another congregation, it was known as Bikur Holim Ahavath Ahim Congregation.
Congregation Bikur Cholim Machzikay Hadath is a synagogue in the Seward Park neighborhood of Seattle, Washington. It is the oldest synagogue in Washington state.
Langston Hughes Performing Arts Institute (LHPAI) is a cultural, community, and artistic center in the Central District of Seattle, Washington, USA. It was founded in 1969 and named after the writer and leader of the Harlem Renaissance, Langston Hughes. It is at 104 17th Avenue South and was built as a synagogue in 1915 designed by Marcus Priteca. He was also the architect of many theaters. It is designated as a Seattle landmark.
Rabbi Sholom Rivkin was an Israeli-born American rabbi. He was the last Chief Rabbi of St. Louis, Missouri, and the last chief rabbi of one of only a few cities in the United States that has ever had a chief rabbi. He held the post of Chief Rabbi from 1983 until 2005 and was Chief Rabbi Emeritus until his death in 2011. He was also a chief judge on the Beth Din of the Rabbinical Council of America, and head of the Vaad Hoeir of St. Louis, the governing body of the St. Louis Orthodox Jewish community. He was an expert in Jewish law, especially family and divorce law, and was consulted by rabbis and rabbinical courts around the world.
The Seattle Hebrew Academy is a private Kindergarten–grade 8 school, located in the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Seattle.
Simon Glazer was an Orthodox rabbi who flourished at the turn of the twentieth century. He was known for founding and leading two major organizations of American Orthodox rabbis.
Itamar Rosensweig is a rabbi and maggid shiur at Yeshiva University in New York City and a dayan at the Beth Din of America, where he also serves as the editor of Jewishprudence: Thoughts on Jewish Law and Beth Din Jurisprudence. Rabbi Rosensweig is also the resident scholar at Congregation Ahavath Torah in Englewood, NJ and teaches Jewish Business Law and Ethics at YU's Sy Syms School of Business. Previously, he taught an advanced Talmud shiur at Columbia University's Kraft Center, and presently serves as the maggid shiur at the University of Pennsylvania Hillel. He is the son of Rabbi Michael Rosensweig, and grandson of Yaffa Eliach.
Yitzhak Israeli is a Sephardi rabbi, Talmudic scholar, and Orthodox halakhist. He is the Av Beit Din of Torah U'Mishpat in Brooklyn, New York. He serves as the Rabbi of the Sephardic Center of Mill Basin, a predominantly Syrian Jewish congregation.