Related Research Articles
A hazzan or chazzan is a Jewish musician or precentor trained in the vocal arts who helps lead the congregation in songful prayer. In English, this prayer leader is often referred to as a cantor, a term also used in Christianity.
The Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion is a Jewish seminary with three locations in the United States and one location in Jerusalem. It is the oldest extant Jewish seminary in the Americas and the main seminary for training rabbis, cantors, educators and communal workers in Reform Judaism. HUC-JIR has campuses in Cincinnati, Ohio, New York City, Los Angeles, California and Jerusalem. The Jerusalem campus is the only seminary in Israel for training Reform Jewish clergy.
Sally Jane Priesand is America's first female rabbi ordained by a rabbinical seminary, and the second formally ordained female rabbi in Jewish history, after Regina Jonas. Priesand was ordained by the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion on June 3, 1972, at the Plum Street Temple in Cincinnati. After her ordination she served first as assistant and then as associate rabbi at Stephen Wise Free Synagogue in New York City, and later led Monmouth Reform Temple in Tinton Falls, New Jersey from 1981 until her retirement in 2006. She is featured in numerous books including Rabbis: The Many Faces of Judaism and Fifty Jewish Women who Changed the World.
Jewish feminism is a movement that seeks to make the religious, legal, and social status of Jewish women equal to that of Jewish men in Judaism. Feminist movements, with varying approaches and successes, have opened up within all major branches of the Jewish religion.
Gertrude Weil was an American social activist involved in a wide range of progressive/leftist and often controversial causes, including women's suffrage, labor reform and civil rights.
Joseph Krauskopf was a prominent American Jewish rabbi, author, leader of Reform Judaism, founder of the National Farm School, and long-time (1887–1923) rabbi at Reform Congregation Keneseth Israel (KI), the oldest reform synagogue in Philadelphia which under Krauskopf, became the largest reform congregation in the nation.
The cantor in the Reform movement is a clergy member who fills a diverse role within the Jewish community. Cantors lead worship, officiate at lifecycle events, teach adults and children, run synagogue music programs, and offer pastoral care. Cantors typically serve along with other clergy members, usually rabbis and occasionally additional cantors, in partnership to lead synagogue communities. The Reform cantor is a professional office with a prescribed educational path and professional organization. Cantors are "invested", a term borrowed from the idea of priestly vestments, at the conclusion of study. "Investiture" confers the status of clergy to cantors, just as "ordination" does for rabbis.
Women of Reform Judaism (WRJ), formerly known as the National Federation of Temple Sisterhoods, is the women's affiliate of the Union for Reform Judaism. As the primary women's organization in the Reform Jewish movement, WRJ represents over 65,000 women. WRJ advocates for social justice, raises funds for charities and rabbinic scholarships, and educates congregational leaders.
Stacy Offner is an openly lesbian American rabbi. She was the first openly lesbian rabbi hired by a mainstream Jewish congregation, and the first female rabbi in Minnesota. She also became the first rabbi elected chaplain of the Minnesota Senate, the first female vice president of the Union for Reform Judaism, and the first woman to serve on the [U.S.] national rabbinical pension board.
Janet Marder was the first female president of the Reform Movement's Central Conference of American Rabbis (CCAR), which means she was the first woman to lead a major rabbinical organization and the first woman to lead any major Jewish co-ed religious organization in the United States; she became president of the CCAR in 2003. She was also the first woman and the first non-congregational rabbi to be elected as the President of the Pacific Association of Reform Rabbis.
Martha Neumark (1904–1981) was an notable figure in the history of women's ordination as rabbis for being the first Jewish woman to be accepted into a rabbinical school.
Tehilla Lichtenstein was a cofounder and leader of Jewish Science, as well as an author. She was born in Jerusalem and immigrated to America when she was eleven years old. Her parents were Hava (Cohen) and Rabbi Chaim Hirschensohn. She earned a B.A. degree in Classics from Hunter College and an M.A. degree in literature from Columbia University.
This is a timeline of women rabbis in the United States.
Peninsula Temple Sholom (PTS) is a Reform Jewish Congregation in Burlingame, California. It was founded in 1955, and since then, has constantly grown its congregation and has expanded its facilities to include a social hall, a Religious School and a Preschool. For five decades, its services were led by Rabbi Gerald Raiskin, who changed the legacy and history of the temple until his passing in 2006. Throughout the years, PTS clergy and lay leaders have continued to lead services for hundreds of reform Jews in the Bay Area and is an influential place for them to find community and practice Reform Judaism.
Jane Evans (1907–2004) was the executive director of the National Federation of Temple Sisterhoods from 1933 to 1976. She was its first full-time Executive Director, as from 1913 until 1933 the National Federation of Temple Sisterhoods was led by volunteer presidents. Evans also became president of the National Peace Conference in 1950. Evans supported ordination for women. On April 29, 1957, she spoke to 1,000 delegates at a biennial general assembly meeting of the Union for Reform Judaism in favor of ordaining women, a speech which the New York Times called a "strong plea," though the UAHC took no action. While Evans was still executive director of the National Federation of Temple Sisterhoods in 1963, it approved a resolution at its biennial assembly calling on the UAHC, the Central Conference of American Rabbis, and the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion to move forward on the ordination of women.
This is a timeline of women rabbis.
Reform Congregation Keneseth Israel is the sixth oldest Reform Jewish synagogue in the United States. It began in Philadelphia in 1847, and was at a number of locations in the city before building a massive structure on North Broad Street in 1891. In 1900 KI, as the Congregation is known, was one of the largest Reform Congregations in the United States. It remained at the North Broad Street address until 1956 when the Congregation moved north of the city to suburban Elkins Park, Pennsylvania.
Judith Kaplan was an author, musicologist, composer, theologian and the first person to celebrate a bat mitzvah publicly in America.
Angie Irma Cohon was a Jewish author and educator, known for her seminal book, Introduction to Jewish Music in Eight Illustrated Lectures.
References
- 1 2 3 "Stella Heinsheimer Freiberg - Jewish Women's Archive". jwa.org. Retrieved 20 August 2018.
- 1 2 3 4 Susan Hill Lindley; Eleanor J. Stebner (2008). The Westminster Handbook to Women in American Religious History. Westminster John Knox Press. p. 83. ISBN 978-0-664-22454-7.
- 1 2 "Stella Heinsheimer Freiberg - Jewish Women's Archive". jwa.org. Retrieved 20 August 2018.