Jewish Center (Manhattan)

The Jewish Center is one of America's premier Orthodox synagogues and Modern Orthodox congregations, in New York City.

Not to be confused with the Congregation Beth Israel West Side Jewish Center, an Orthodox synagogue also on the West Side of Manhattan.
131 West 86th Street

History

The synagogue was founded in 1918 by prosperous Jews moving into the Upper West Side of Manhattan, a neighborhood that was just being built along the new IRT subway line. The large synagogue is in a tall Neo-Classical building at 131 West 86th Street that contains a large number of social halls, classrooms, auditoriums and offices in addition to the Neo-Classical main sanctuary.[1] The synagogue was the first in America to be built not only to serve as spiritual home to its members, but also as a cultural, social and recreational home. The synagogue's members affectionately refer to the synagogue as "The first Shul with a Pool."[2] It continues to support a variety of educational and social programming.

The first rabbi was Mordecai Kaplan, who left in 1921 because his positions were too reform oriented for the Orthodox congregation.[3] The congregation then hired Rabbi Dr. Leo Jung, who later became involved in the founding and support of almost every major Orthodox organization in the United States and abroad, including the Union of Orthodox Hebrew Congregations, Agudath Israel, Torah Umesorah, Bais Yaakov movement (in Poland and the United States) and Chabad. Rabbi Dr. Norman Lamm, later Chancellor at Yeshiva University, took over the pulpit in 1959. The fourth rabbi was Rabbi Isaac Bernstein, an Irish scholar. Rabbi Jacob J. Schacter was rabbi from 1981 to 2000, and now serves as Resident Scholar at The Center for the Jewish Future at Yeshiva University. Rabbi Dr. Ari Berman, founding rabbi of The Jewish Center Young Leadership minyan, and currently president of Yeshiva University, served as the sixth rabbi of the Center before making aliyah in 2008.

Present

The current rabbi is Yosie Levine, an alumnus of Columbia University and Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary.

References
  1. Berman, Andrew (August 8, 2019). "Uncovering the stories behind downtown's overlooked synagogues". 6sqft. Retrieved April 2, 2020.
  2. Mellits, Joshua (September 5, 2018). "Jewish Revival In Harlem Testing Gentrification Script". The Jewish Week. Retrieved April 2, 2020.
  3. Scult, Mel (1993). Judaism Faces the Twentieth Century: A Biography of Mordecai M. Kaplan. Wayne State University Press p. 154. ISBN 978-0-8143-2280-2.

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