Adult Education
Hebrew | Jewish Thought | The Book of Isaiah | Adult Bar/Bat Mitzvah
Y'mei Limmud | Learn to Lead Shabbat Services
Inquiries about classes? Contact the synagogue office:
773-752-2770 or info@rodfei.org.
Interested in learning Hebrew?
Master teacher Rivka Kahana offers two classes on most Sunday mornings: Intermediate-Advanced Hebrew at 10:30 and Advanced Hebrew at 11:30 in Room 209; Mrs. Kahana will announce meeting dates. New students are always welcome, including teenagers. Beginning Hebrew classes are available at KAM Isaiah Israel. Please contact office for tuition and other details for these classes.
Jewish Thought
Our book this year is Judaism and Modern Man (1951), by Will Herberg (1901‑1977), American Jewish writer, intellectual, theologian and sociologist of religion.
Raised in a secular, socialist Jewish family in Manhattan, a union organizer and a follower of Jay Lovestone of the American Communist Party, Herberg turned in the 1940s to Jewish religion. He documented this change in his classic essay, "From Marxism to Judaism: Jewish Belief as a Dynamic of Social Action" (Commentary magazine, 1947), which we shall also read in this course.
Herberg influenced many important Jewish thinkers with his existential approach to Judaism, which challenged the "naturalist" or "transnaturalist" approach to Judaism of the founder of Reconstructionist Judaism, Rabbi Mordecai M. Kaplan (1881‑1983). Herberg's other famous book was Protestant, Catholic, Jew (1955), which is a classic of American sociological works.
Rabbi Gertel's class in Jewish Thought has, over the past several years, studied the works of Jewish thinkers of various historical periods, including Saadia Gaon, Maimonides, Joseph Albo, Hermann Cohen, Emil Fackenheim, Mordecai M. Kaplan, Abraham Joshua Heschel, and Eliezer Berkovits. We also read the thought of nineteenth-century American rabbis from Rabbi Gertel's 2006 anthology, Jewish Belief and Practice in Nineteenth Century America.
Taught by Rabbi Elliot Gertel on Wednesdays at 7:15 p.m. beginning on October 26.
The Book of Isaiah
Join us as we discuss selected texts from the Book of Isaiah this year. We will be looking at the great prophet's words from religious, political, and social points of view. No special preparation or knowledge of Hebrew is necessary, but you will need a Hebrew Bible to follow along.
Taught by Dr. Judith Phillips-Balter on Sundays at 10:00 a.m. in the Ringel Room beginning on October 23.
Adult Bar/Bat Mitzvah
Interested in celebrating your Bar or Bat Mitzvah as an adult? It's never too late to learn new skills such as chanting from the Torah or Haftarah or to learn more about our rich tradition of prayer, text, and ritual. Contact Cantor Rachel Rosenberg (cantor@rodfei.org) if you would like to pursue this rewarding opportunity for study with the option of celebrating this milestone from the bimah in the future.