Woman makes history at college and in Judaism

Rabbi Deborah Waxman leafed through her mail before unwrapping a small orange, the punch line to a fabled Jewish myth.

Deborah Waxman (Reconstructionist Rabbinical College handout

As it went, a rabbi once teased that a woman rabbi was like an orange on a ceremonial seder plate used during Passover. Neither belonged.

The orange was a sly affirmation from a friend, mailed to Waxman as a symbol of the history she made by becoming the first woman and the first lesbian to lead a major movement of Judaism.

Waxman, 47, took over in January as head of the Reconstructionist movement and president of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College in Wyncote, the movement's seminary. buy dissertation writing services. She will be inaugurated as the movement's leader Sunday at the college.

"To have a woman lead a seminary and lead a movement is still, even in this age, a marker," said Beth Wenger, a professor of American Jewish history at the University of Pennsylvania.

Waxman is charged with connecting Jews within and outside the Reconstructionist movement.
"I think that the questions that we ask in Judaism and the way that we ask them are constantly evolving," said Waxman, a 1999 graduate of the college.

"As far as answers, I want to absorb them and reflect them, and I want it to be for the service of other people and of the Reconstructionist movement."

More than 40 percent of American Jewish adults under age 30 have no denominational attachment, according to a 2013 study by the Pew Research Religion and Public Life Project, and 63 percent identified as Orthodox, Conservative, or Reform. Fewer than 1 percent identified as Reconstructionists in the study.

"It's a small but growing movement with a lot of energy in the moment," Wenger said. "It's got respect for tradition, but also an interest in evolving and changing."

There are about 100 Reconstructionist congregations in the United States and Canada. Waxman visited 14 in her first nine months as president, speaking on the movement's growth and stance on critical issues.

"Sometimes I'm having very precise conversations about challenges on the ground, and sometimes I'm having much more global conversations about pluralism and Jewish identity," Waxman said.
The movement "was the first to work for equality for women, push for the rights of gay and lesbian Jews, and first to think about intermarried Jews and how to welcome them in rather than chasing them out," said Rebecca Alpert, a religion professor at Temple University and a 1976 graduate of the seminary.

Waxman, who lives in Elkins Park with her partner, Christina Ager, a convert from Lutheranism, understands the attention that comes from her orientation.
"I'm never unaware of it," she said. "I know the pioneers that came before me, who made it possible for me to be in this role."

But leading a movement of Judaism was not always on her to-do list.

Waxman grew up in a conservative Jewish neighborhood in West Hartford, Conn., but her family was influenced by Reconstructionist ideals.

They arranged to have her bat mitzvah, a coming-of-age ritual for girls, as one of the first in Connecticut to be celebrated on a Saturday.

After graduating from Columbia University as a religion major in 1989, Waxman served for 11 years as High Holidays rabbi for a small, informal congregation outside Syracuse, N.Y.

In 2003, she joined the seminary faculty and was named vice president for governance. There she laid the groundwork for the college's first strategic planning initiative and institutionwide assessment plan.

In 2010, Waxman earned her Ph.D from Temple University in American Jewish history, basing her dissertation on the founder of the Reconstructionist movement, Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan.

Kaplan believed Jewish life needed to be reconstructed to survive in the next generation, an idea he articulated in his 1934 book, Judaism as a Civilization.

"At the time of its publication, women had just received their right to vote, yet had no rights in American Judaism," Waxman said.

The work's success garnered Kaplan a following that urged him to establish a seminary.
Initially hesitant to break off from the other movements, Kaplan gave his blessing in 1968. Founded near Temple, the rabbinic college upgraded in 1982 to the 27,500-square-foot Wyncote mansion of John Charles Martin, publisher of several newspapers in the 20th century, including The Inquirer for a brief period.

The halls are a maze of classrooms, offices, and lounges. The college enrolls about 50 students at a time, offering five- and six-year graduate programs. Graduates receive the title of rabbi as well as a master of arts degree.

Waxman's inauguration this weekend is in keeping with Reconstructionism's world view.
"There isn't a ritual that exists for our movement," Waxman said. "But we are creating one, like we love to do, and like we feel we're empowered to do."

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