INFORMATION ABOUT THE NEW JEWISH ACADEMY
~a center for teacher training and human sciences research~
What is the New Jewish Academy?
The New Jewish Academy is a center for teacher-training and human sciences research, a non-profit organization fiscally sponsored by Upstart, an accelerator dedicated to impact-driven Jewish social entrepreneurship.
Our mission is to set a teaching and learning movement in motion – to every desiring person an opportunity to belong to the life of Torah, in a community of friends, and to every desiring adult Jewish educator an opportunity to participate in a teaching profession, with fellow teachers, as a craft, and a way-of-life.
Who serves on the Board of Trustees for the New Jewish Academy?
Elkan Gamzu, Director/Clerk, Leslie Belay, Director/Treasurer and Avi Bernstein-Nahar, President.
What is the rationale for such an ambitious enterprise?
Let’s suppose, looking around, you noticed an illness spreading rapidly through the North American population. If you had the antidote, you would act with great urgency to provide it.
If the disorder had already become widespread, would you try to deliver the antidote yourself? No, you would recruit the national guard and show them how to deliver it. You would recruit the most talented and dedicated people you could find; you would devote yourself to seeing that they were well-trained; and you would try to ensure that their impact was not just temporary, but that they evolved into a society of professionals who would be focused on the health and well-being of the community once the threat had passed.
This is the Jewish predicament at this moment. We are hurting: we are strangers in our own library, disoriented in our own Jewish world. Longitudinally, synagogues are contracting, and more of us than ever, especially people under 40, describe themselves as “religious nones.” Anti-semitism is once again out of control. The state of Israel is in crisis, and more than ever, the diaspora is uncertain how to support it. On the heels of October 7, a deep wound has opened and it’s festering.
This is a moment for action. We’ve been here before.
What is The New Jewish Academy Program?
In 5786 – Curriculum for Senior Members of the Academy
Dates and Times Forthcoming
The Marburg Tradition in America? – Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik on Repentance
Rabbi Soloveitchik was intimately familiar with the work of Hermann Cohen, though it can be controversial in the orthodox community to say so, as Cohen, once a serious student at the Jewish Theological Seminary of Breslau, is strongly associated with the history of liberal Judaism. Yet, the Rav’s deeply stirring approach to Tschuvah undeniably bears Cohen’s imprint. Together we will study Professor Cohen and Rabbi Soloveitchik on Yoma 84b and 86b, and ask to what extent the leading voice of modern orthodoxy in the last generation had quietly brought the Marburg tradition with him from Brisk to America, helping all of us to “renew our days as of old.”
What shall become of Alt/Neu Land?: A New Zionism out of the Sources of the Old Anti-Zionism
In 1916, he was the most influential anti-Zionist teaching in a European University. Today, I believe he would be a Zionist. His reasoning, however, would be novel and his politics probably not what you think. Together we will study a truly fiery exchange between Martin Buber and Hermann Cohen in the popular press, and I will tell you why I think it’s time for a New Zionism and, were he alive today, why Professor Cohen would be first onboard.
In 5787 – Curriculum for Senior Members of the Academy
Upon matriculation rabbis and scholars become candidates for teaching certification and senior associate status at The Academy. To arrange an informational meeting to learn more, please book here.
Teaching Judaism after Moses Mendelssohn and the Jewish Enlightenment
As a teacher in the community of Israel, you stand on the shoulders of our near-ancestors. We share questions with them and ignore their programmatic answers at our peril. Develop your calling and then teach! Deepen your understanding of Abraham Geiger, Leopold Zunz, Samson Raphael Hirsch, Ezriel Hildesheimer, Hermann Cohen, and their legacies. Revolving Focus. Can be repeated.
Teaching Judaism after Cataclysm and Catastrophe
As a teacher of Torah in the 21st century, you walk in the footsteps of Hermann Cohen, Franz Rosenzweig, Abraham Joshua Heschel, and Judith Plaskow, among others. Together we fellow teachers sit atop a 3000 year old interpretive tradition that has continually evolved and adapted. The near-ancestors are trying to tell us how! Revolving Focus. Can be repeated.
To Love the Torah Even More than God: Becoming a Theological Reader of the Torah-Text
21st century colleagues are addressing us, if we would only attend! I will feature Yochanan Muffs, Yisroel Knohl, Amy-Jill Levine, Benjamin Sommer and others as key educational resources. Learn to trace your hermeneutical practices back to the TaNaKh itself (e.g. Deutero-Isaiah), and discover the deep roots of a hermeneutical perspective on Jewish tradition. Revolving Focus. Can be repeated.
Best Practices in Teaching: Using Bilingual Materials to Encourage Students to Fall-in-Love with the Torah-Text
Make use of the Schocken Bible and the Tanakh as translated by Robert Alter. These translators, who stand on the shoulders of translators, Leopold Zunz, Martin Buber, and Franz Rosenzweig, bring a kind of “Hebraism” in reach of even your least linguistically nimble students. They will fall in love with the text once it is actually visual and audible to them! Come find out how. Revolving Focus. Can be repeated.
Forming Yourself as both Rabbi and Scholar-Teacher: Topics in Theology of Education
What is your theology of education? Why would you even need one? Michael Rosenak famously maintained that no Jewish educator should be without one. I take Rosenak’s view as a charge to develop a leading theological idea or two that orients your teaching. If you believe a relationship with God can shape your moral life, become a connoisseur of texts and commentaries on ethical monotheism. If you believe Yom Kippur can be a life-changing experience more people could be moved by with the right theological preparation, feature teachings around “Return.”. This course will help you define or deepen your sense of purpose as an educator. Can be repeated with permission of the instructor.
“So That They Learn What You Have to Teach!” – A Practicum
Knowing what you want to teach is fundamental but not the bedrock of good teaching. True pride of place goes to the topic, how do I want to teach what I have to teach? The answer to this question is difficult. It requires skills not even the most knowledgeable teachers always have; and for anyone, it requires practice. You want to teach? Come and learn how! Can be taken in a group setting or in a one-on-one format. Can be repeated with permission of the instructor.
In 5786 – 87 – For Educators and Congregational Leaders
Torah Chevre at Your Place: Serious Fun with Friends
A Torah Chevre is an intentional learning community sanctifying time through study and friendship. Engaged in learning and listening, you will have the opportunity to tap into ancestral wisdom and carve out novel understandings special to you and your community. Available by Communal Subscription.. For information about engaging The New Jewish Academy to help you start your own Torah Chevre, please, please write me for more information at avi@thenewjewishacademy,org
College Readiness for Young Jewish Leaders: A Socratic Approach
The next generation of gifted young Jewish people heading off to college need to be much more prepared than their parents or grandparents. We owe them readiness training. They will be asked to explain what Judaism is, what Zionism is, and they will be asked to respond to outlandish anti-semitic conspiracies. They may also be evangelized. Are they ready? They can rise to the occasion and meet this moment and we can show them how.
What shall become of Alt/Neu Land?: A New Zionism out of the Sources of the Old Anti-Zionism
In 1916, he was the most influential anti-Zionist teaching in a European University. Today, I believe he would be a Zionist. His reasoning, however, would be novel and his politics probably not what you think! Together we will study a truly fiery exchange between Martin Buber and Hermann Cohen in the popular press, and I will tell you why I think it’s time for a New Zionism and, were he alive today, why Professor Cohen would be first onboard.
If you are interested in learning more about how you and your community can benefit from the Academy’s work in the coming year, let’s make time to talk. We’ll only be taking on a limited number of senior academy members and congregations in our first year so please don’t delay if you think this might be a good fit!
To learn about associated costs and possible customizations, please book a meeting here or write me at avi@thenewjewishacademy.
Avi Bernstein-Nahar
Founder and President
THE NEW JEWISH ACADEMY
~a center for teacher training and human sciences research~
“What we need more than anything else is not textbooks but text-people,” Abraham Joshua Heschel
What is a Torah Chevre?
A TORAH CHEVRE is an intentional community, sanctifying time through study and friendship. This chevre will meet in Newton Centre five times a year – in advance of Passover (Song of Songs), Sukkot (Ecclesiastes) and Shavuot (Book of Ruth), and in the course of the month of repentance (Elul) and the Days of Awe. You are invited to join. Avi will offer further context and elaboration on May 31. Hope you can make it!
A TORAH CHEVRE IS A PLACE OF LERNEN (לערנען). Discursive Learning (e.g. lots of back-and-forth) is the beating heart of Jewish civilization. If it fades, the civilization withers. It is the acquisition of knowledge to be sure, but it goes beyond knowledge acquisition; it carries moral and spiritual connotations. Engaged in LERNEN, we tap into ancestral wisdom and carve out novel understandings particular to us.
DISSEMINATING THE TORAH CHEVRE IDEA is core to the mission of The New Jewish Academy: Our aim is to set a teaching and learning movement in motion. The goal – to provide every desiring person an opportunity to belong to the life of Torah, in a community of friends, and every desiring educator an opportunity to participate in a teaching profession, not merely as a career, but with fellow teachers and learners as a way-of-life.
A TESTIMONIAL: “It’s the feeling of belonging that stands out – we become a family for the hours that we are together. We listen to our chaverim read it aloud. We bend over our books and peer into the Torah text. We squint our eyes and strain our ears so as to take in every last word – both the Torah on the page and the Torah on our lips; and Avi conducts the thing like an orchestra. Gently he encourages us to make music of the text, like a symphony, where one of us is never equal to the sum of us.” Marla, Newton, MA
THE TORAH CHEVRE at Newton Center is a benefit of membership in the Friends of THE NEW JEWISH ACADEMY~a center for teacher training and human sciences research~
What is a Friends of The New Jewish Academy and how will it work?
Boston and New York Friends groups will lend financial, and operational support to THE NEW JEWISH ACADEMY, and advocates for it in their communities.
A Suggested Giving Framework for FRIENDS OF THE NEW JEWISH ACADEMY appears below.
The Kaplan Circle: $1.8K to $3.5K Mordechai Kaplan pioneered the understanding that Judaism is not only a religion, but an entire civilization. In other words it is a broad and deep precious legacy that we cannot afford to lose.
The Shakla V’etarya Society: $3.6K to $5.9K These Aramaic words, shakla (taking) and v’etarya (and giving) refer to the back-and-forth movement of persons in deep conversation (listening and reply, listening and reply, where the questions are as important as the answers). Shakla V’etarya is characteristic of Jewish civilization at its best.
Abraham Joshua Heschel Society: $6K to $9.9K “More than textbooks we need text-people” I Asked for Wonder, 1983. Syntax slightly altered.
The Song of Songs Society: $10K to $99.9K “Love can outrun Death – Azah K’Mavet Ahavah,” Song of Songs 8:6, a creative translation.
Judith Plaskow Society: $100K to $249.9K Plaskow’s clarion call for women to “stand again at Sinai” was the perfect note to hit in 1990, and was instrumental in bringing women alienated from the Jewish experience back to the literary sources of Jewish civilization.
The Alasdair Macintyre Society: Founding Members and Foundations giving 250K and above become members of the Alasdair MacIntyre Society. MacIntyre famously defined a tradition as “an historically extended, socially embodied argument…about the goods which constitute” the way of life of those having it. A living tradition is a dynamic, self-correcting trans-generational conversation about its own foundations, values, and purposes. Of its participants it asks a pilgrimage, the exact destination being part of what’s contested between the various parties that inevitably form. Nevertheless, in a healthy tradition, the parties engage in the argument “for the sake of heaven,” and feel privileged for having the opportunity to do so.
To make a contribution, go to our dedicated giving page here.
Thank you for your interest in THE NEW JEWISH ACADEMY!