Fathers and Sons: Hebrew Union College and Eastern European Orthodox Jews at Turn of 20th Century - Lecture by Dr. Ira Robinson

On Wednesday February 8, 2017 at 4pm, Dr. Ira Robinson, Chair in Canadian Jewish Studies and Director of the Institute for Canadian Jewish Studies, will be giving a seminar on "Fathers and Sons: Hewbrew Union College and Eastern Orthodox Jews at the Turn of the Twentieth Century".

A standard perspective on the American Reform movement's relationship with the wave of Eastern European Jewish Immigrants to North America at the turn of the twentieth century evokes an image of two ships passing in the night. Eastern European Jews were seemingly either too Orthodox or too anti-religious for a meaningful relationship to develop. It is furthermore widely understood that an important group of acculturated American Jewish leaders at the turn of the twentieth century, most of whom were affiliated with Reform synagogues, determined that they would financially support the reorganization of the Jewish Theological Seminary as a sort of moderate Orthodox voice that could reach out and help to acculturate Eastern European Jews in a way that Reform could not.

This presentation seeks to nuance this perspective by presenting evidence with respect to Hebrew Union College and its relationship with students of Eastern European Orthodox background at the end of the nineteenth century and the first decades of the twentieth century.

The seminar will take place at the American Jewish Archives, Cincinnati campus of Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of Religion