34 Notable alumni of
Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of Religion
Updated:
Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of Religion is 1908th in the world, 653rd in North America, and 614th in the United States by aggregated alumni prominence. Below is the list of 34 notable alumni from Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of Religion sorted by their wiki pages popularity. The directory includes famous graduates and former students along with research and academic staff.
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Delphine Horvilleur
- Occupations
- writerjournalistrabbiphilosopher
- Biography
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Delphine Horvilleur is France's third female rabbi, and (as of 2024) editorial director of the quarterly Jewish magazine Tenou’a - Atelier de pensée(s) juive(s) (Tenou'a - Workshop on Jewish thought). She leads a congregation in Paris, and is currently co-leading the Liberal Jewish Movement of France, a Jewish liberal cultural and religious association affiliated to the World Union for Progressive Judaism, which she joined in 2008. She is also an author.
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Zalman Schachter-Shalomi
- Occupations
- university teacherrabbi
- Biography
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Meshullam Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, commonly called "Reb Zalman" (full Hebrew name: Meshullam Zalman Hiyya ben Shlomo HaCohen), was an American Rabbi, writer, and activist, and one of the founders of the Jewish Renewal movement and an innovator in ecumenical dialogue.
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Angela Warnick Buchdahl
- Occupations
- rabbi
- Biography
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Angela Buchdahl is an American reform rabbi. She was the first East Asian-American to be ordained as a rabbi, and the first East Asian-American to be ordained as a hazzan (cantor). In 2011 she was named by Newsweek and The Daily Beast as one of America's "Most Influential Rabbis", and in 2012 by The Daily Beast as one of America's "Top 50 Rabbis". Buchdahl was recognized as one of the top five in The Forward's 2014 "Forward Fifty", a list of American Jews who had the most impact on the national scene in the previous year.
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Judah Leon Magnes
- Occupations
- rabbi
- Biography
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Judah Leon Magnes was a prominent Reform rabbi in both the United States of America and Mandatory Palestine. He is best remembered as a leader in the pacifist movement of the World War I period, his advocacy of a binational Jewish-Arab state in Palestine, and as one of the most widely recognized voices of 20th century American Reform Judaism. Magnes served as the only chancellor of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (1925–1935), and later as its first president (1935–1948).
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Abba Hillel Silver
- Occupations
- rabbi
- Biography
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Abba Hillel Silver was an American rabbi and Zionist leader. He was a key figure in the mobilization of American support for the founding of the State of Israel.
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Arik Ascherman
- Occupations
- rabbi
- Biography
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Arik Ascherman is an American-born Israeli Reform rabbi, and executive director of the Israeli human rights organization Torat Tzedek-Torah of Justice. For 21 years, starting in 1995, he served as co-director (1995–1998), executive director (1998–2010), director of special projects (2010–2012) and president and senior rabbi (2012–2017) for Rabbis for Human Rights, an Israeli organization.
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Lawrence Kushner
- Occupations
- rabbi
- Biography
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Lawrence Kushner is a Reform rabbi and the scholar-in-residence at Congregation Emanu-El in San Francisco, California.
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Richard Jacobs
- Occupations
- dancerchoreographerrabbi
- Biography
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Richard Jacobs is a Reform rabbi and the president of the Union for Reform Judaism (URJ), the congregational arm of the Reform movement in North America which represents an estimated 1.5 million Reform Jews in nearly 900 synagogues across the United States and Canada. He is the first Union president to have served most of his career as a congregational rabbi. Before being installed as URJ president in June 2012, he served for nine years at Brooklyn Heights Synagogue and then for twenty years at Westchester Reform Temple in Scarsdale, New York.
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Alysa Stanton
- Occupations
- psychotherapistrabbi
- Biography
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Alysa Stanton is an American Reform rabbi, and the first African American female rabbi. Ordained on June 6, 2009, in August 2009 she began work as a rabbi at Congregation Bayt Shalom, a small majority-white synagogue in Greenville, North Carolina, making her the first African American rabbi to lead a majority-white congregation. Stanton converted to Judaism at age 24 and first studied and worked as a psychotherapist.
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Edgar Magnin
- Occupations
- rabbi
- Biography
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Edgar Magnin was rabbi and spiritual leader of Wilshire Boulevard Temple (previously Congregation B'nai B'rith), the oldest Jewish congregation in Los Angeles, California. Magnin served at the temple for 69 years and was considered one of the most prominent Jewish leaders in the United States, sometimes called the "Rabbi to the Stars" because of his close connections to the Hollywood film industry.
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Reuben Zellman
- Years
- 1970s
- Occupations
- music directorrabbi
- Biography
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Reuben Zellman is an American teacher, author, rabbi, and musician. He became the first openly transgender person accepted to the Reform Jewish seminary Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in 2003.
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Dan Cohn-Sherbok
- Occupations
- rabbi
- Biography
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Dan Mark Cohn-Sherbok is a rabbi of Reform Judaism and a Jewish theologian. He is professor emeritus of Judaism at the University of Wales.
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Gunther Plaut
- Occupations
- military chaplainjournalistrabbisoldier
- Biography
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Wolf Gunther Plaut, was an American Reform rabbi and author of a Torah commentary who was based in Canada. Plaut was the rabbi of Holy Blossom Temple in Toronto for several decades and from 1978 was its senior scholar.
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David Ellenson
- Occupations
- rabbi
- Biography
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David Ellenson was an American rabbi and academic who was known as a leader of the Reform movement in Judaism. Ellenson was director of the Schusterman Center for Israel Studies and visiting professor of Near Eastern and Judaic studies at Brandeis University and previously president of the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR). He previously served as president of HUC-JIR from 2001 to December 31, 2013, and was later chancellor emeritus of that college until his death. Ellenson had served as interim president following the death of his successor, Aaron D. Panken until the inauguration of Andrew Rehfeld, the 10th and current President.
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Joshua L. Liebman
- Years
- 1907-1948 (aged 41)
- Occupations
- rabbi
- Biography
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Joshua Loth Liebman was an American Reform rabbi and best-selling author, best known for the book Peace of Mind, which spent more than a year at #1 on the New York Times Best Seller list.
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Leonard Farbstein
- Occupations
- lawyerpolitician
- Biography
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Leonard Farbstein was an American lawyer and politician who served seven terms as a U.S. Representative from New York from 1957 to 1971.
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Hannah Rosenthal
- Years
- 1951-.. (age 75)
- Occupations
- politician
- Biography
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Hannah Rosenthal is a former American government official and Jewish non-profit executive who served as the U.S. Special Envoy for Monitoring and Combating Antisemitism from 2009 until 2012 during the Obama administration.
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Lewis Browne
- Years
- 1897-1949 (aged 52)
- Occupations
- novelist
- Biography
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Lewis Browne was a writer, philosopher, lecturer and world traveller. A rabbi, Browne turned to writing popular histories and biographies including This Believing World (1926), The Graphic Bible (1928, illustrations by Mark Rothko), and The Wisdom of Israel (1945). His 1943 novel See What I Mean? was regarded as a counterpart to It Can't Happen Here by Sinclair Lewis, Browne's frequent debate partner on the 1940s lecture circuit. Browne was considered one of the foremost authorities on the problems of comparative religion.
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David Max Eichhorn
- Years
- 1906-1986 (aged 80)
- Occupations
- rabbi
- Biography
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David Max Eichhorn was an American rabbi of Reform Judaism, a director for Hillel, a chaplain in the Army, an author, and an authority within Reform Judaism on the subjects of interfaith marriage and religious conversion.
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Joshua L. Goldberg
- Occupations
- rabbimilitary officer
- Biography
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Joshua Louis Goldberg was a Belarusian-born American rabbi, the first to be commissioned as a U.S. Navy chaplain in World War II (and only the third to serve in the Navy in its history), the first to reach the rank of Navy Captain (the equivalent of Army Colonel), and the first to retire after a full active-duty career.
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Joseph Krauskopf
- Occupations
- rabbi
- Biography
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Joseph Krauskopf was a prominent American Jewish rabbi, author, leader of Reform Judaism, founder of the National Farm School (now Delaware Valley University), 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.
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Michael A. Meyer
- Occupations
- historianuniversity teacher
- Biography
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Michael Albert Meyer is a German-born American historian of modern Jewish history. He taught for over 50 years at the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in Cincinnati, Ohio. He is currently the Adolph S. Ochs Emeritus Professor of Jewish History at that institution. He was one of the founders of the Association for Jewish Studies, and served as its president from 1978 to 1980. He also served as International President of the Leo Baeck Institute from 1992 to 2013. He has published many books and articles, most notably on the history of German Jews, the origins and history of the Reform movement in Judaism, and Jewish people and faith confronting modernity. He is a three-time National Jewish Book Award winner.
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Tanya Segal
- Occupations
- theatrical directorrabbidirectorsinger
- Biography
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Tanya Segal an Israeli rabbi, is the first full-time female rabbi in Poland and the first female rabbi in the Czech Republic. Segal is also a professional theatrical director, actress, singer and guitar player.
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Steven Schwarzschild
- Years
- 1924-1989 (aged 65)
- Occupations
- rabbiphilosopher
- Biography
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Steven S. Schwarzschild was a rabbi, philosopher, theologian, and editor.
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David Philipson
- Occupations
- translatorrabbiBible translatorwriter
- Biography
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David Philipson was an American Reform rabbi, orator, and author.
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Walter Zanger
- Occupations
- tour guide
- Biography
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Walter Zanger, was an American-born Israeli author, tour guide and television personality. He was a contributor to newspapers, encyclopedias and magazines, and served as a member of the editorial board of the Jewish Bible Society.
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Kinneret Shiryon
- Occupations
- rabbi
- Biography
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Kinneret Shiryon is the first female rabbi in Israel. She is the spiritual leader of Kehillat Yozma, Modi'in's Reform congregation, which she helped establish in 1997; Kehillat Yozma is the first non-Orthodox congregation in Israel to receive state funding for its synagogue.
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Moshe Zemer
- Occupations
- rabbi
- Biography
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Moshe Zemer was a Reform Rabbi in Israel between 1963-2011. He was the co-founder of Jewish Reform institutions in Israel and served in key positions in them, including as chair of MARAM (The Council of Progressive Rabbis), board member of the Israel Movement for Progressive Judaism, board member of the Union for Progressive Rabbis in the United States, and a senior lecturer of Jewish Studies at the Hebrew Union College in Jerusalem.
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Jonah Wise
- Years
- 1881-1959 (aged 78)
- Occupations
- rabbi
- Biography
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Rabbi Jonah Bondi Wise was an American rabbi and leader of the Reform Judaism movement, who served for over thirty years as rabbi of the Central Synagogue in Manhattan and was a founder of the United Jewish Appeal, serving as its chairman from its creation in 1939 until 1958.
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Gary P. Zola
- Years
- 1952-.. (age 74)
- Occupations
- rabbi
- Biography
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Gary Phillip Zola is the former executive director of The Jacob Rader Marcus Center of the American Jewish Archives and Edward M. Ackerman Family Distinguished Professor of the American Jewish Experience & Reform Jewish History at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR) in Cincinnati. Since 1998, he has served as the second executive director of The Jacob Rader Marcus Center of the American Jewish Archives (AJA), succeeding his teacher and mentor, Jacob Rader Marcus (1896–1995). He is also editor of The Marcus Center's award-winning semi-annual publication, The American Jewish Archives Journal.
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Stuart Weinblatt
- Born in
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United States - Biography
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Stuart Weinblatt is a conservative rabbi who was ordained in 1979 at the Hebrew Union College. He is Chairman of the Zionist Rabbinic Coalition, which he founded in 2020 and Rabbi Emeritus of Congregation B'nai Tzedek, a conservative synagogue he established in 1988, which now has about 600 families. Rabbi Weinblatt has held a number of leadership posts in local and national organizations, including as President of the Rabbinic Cabinet of the Jewish Federations of North America, and as the first chairman of the Jewish National Fund's affinity group "Rabbis for Israel."
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Gail Karp
- Occupations
- singer
- Biography
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Gail Ilene Posner Karp served as the cantor of the Reform Jewish synagogue Temple Emanuel in Davenport, Iowa from 1987 - 2016. She is also employed by the Department of Defense.
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Jennie Mannheimer
- Years
- 1872-1943 (aged 71)
- Biography
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Jennie Mannheimer, also known professionally as Jane Manner, was an American elocutionist, acting coach, and teacher of speech and drama.
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Jonathan V. Plaut
- Occupations
- rabbi
- Biography
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Jonathan V. Plaut was an American Reform rabbi and author. Plaut was the rabbi of Temple Beth Israel in Jackson, MI.
