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Adas Israel Congregation (Washington, D.C.)
Encyclopedia
Adas Israel, located in the Cleveland Park
neighborhood, is the largest Conservative
synagogue in Washington, D.C.
The congregation was founded in 1869 by 69 members of the Washington Hebrew Congregation
who objected to that congregation's move towards Reform Judaism
.
Sermons were given in German
until the congregation dedicated its first building in 1876 at Sixth and G streets. That building has been restored by the Jewish Historical Society of Greater Washington and is now the Lillian & Albert Small Jewish Museum
. The building, the oldest surviving synagogue building in Washington, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the D.C. Inventory of Historic Sites, and the Historic American Buildings Survey. It is among the oldest synagogue building
s still standing in the United States.
It is also an official project of the Save America’s Treasures program.
Jacob Voorsanger served as rabbi from 1876 to 1877, before going on to a distinguished career as the rabbi of Congregation Emanu-El (San Francisco, California).
After the assassination of President James Garfield
, Adas Israel led the effort that founded a hospital in memory of the slain President. The hospital later merged into the Washington Hospital Center
.
Adas Israel participated in the meeting that led to the founding of the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America in 1898, but did not join the organization. Instead, it hired Rabbi Morris Mandel
, the first rabbi ordained by the Jewish Theological Seminary of America
. The congregation did not, however, join the Conservative Movement until 1948.
In 1908 the congregation built the Sixth & I Historic Synagogue
.
In the 1930s the congregation rescued Rabbi Hugo Schiff and his wife by bringing them from Karlsruhe
, Germany. Schiff became assistant rabbi. Entry visas could sometimes be obtained for Jews who had offers of employment.
The present building, at Connecticut Avenue and Porter Street, was dedicated in 1951.
The current rabbi is Gil Steinlauf.http://www.adasisrael.org/AboutUs/leadership.htm
or chavurah
in Washington, DC, organized entirely by volunteer leadership and affiliated with Adas Israel Congregation
. Its primary activity is Friday night services and dinner.
Of equal importance to the two-table policy itself is the language and framing. It is very intentional that one table is called "vegetarian" and the other is called "vegetarian with a hechsher
." Neither table is called "kosher" (implying that the other table isn't kosher).
The system was created to solve the problem that Ben Dreyfus states in his Mah Rabu Blog: “If the whole world were table 1, then people who had specific requirements regarding hechshers or utensils wouldn't be able to eat. And if the whole world were table 2, then people whose kitchens did not meet this standard wouldn't be able to cook, and would feel like less-than-full members of the community. And if the community were to work out some compromise between tables 1 and 2 (everything must have a hechsher except cheese, etc.), then (a) lots of time would be spent hammering this out, and (b) at the end of the day, some people still wouldn't be able to eat, and some people still wouldn't be able to cook.
The two-table system has been called by Ben Dreyfus in his Hilchot Pluralism an approach to kashrut for independent Jewish communities. It has since been popularized by many different independent minyan
im such as Kol Zimrah and Tikkun Leil Shabbat
as well as others.
Cleveland Park
Cleveland Park is a residential neighborhood in the Northwest quadrant of Washington, D.C.It is located at and bounded approximately by Rock Creek Park to the east, Wisconsin and Idaho Avenues to the west, Klingle and Woodley Roads to the south, and Rodman and Tilden Streets to the north...
neighborhood, is the largest Conservative
Conservative Judaism
Conservative Judaism is a modern stream of Judaism that arose out of intellectual currents in Germany in the mid-19th century and took institutional form in the United States in the early 1900s.Conservative Judaism has its roots in the school of thought known as Positive-Historical Judaism,...
synagogue in Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
History
Washington Hebrew Congregation
The Washington Hebrew Congregation is a Jewish congregation formed on April 25, 1852, in Washington, D.C., by twenty-one members.Solomon Pribram was elected the first president. By 1854, there were forty-two members...
who objected to that congregation's move towards Reform Judaism
Reform Judaism (North America)
Reform Judaism is the largest denomination of American Jews today. With an estimated 1.5 million members, it also accounts for the largest number of Jews affiliated with Progressive Judaism worldwide.- Reform Jewish theology :Rabbi W...
.
Sermons were given in German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
until the congregation dedicated its first building in 1876 at Sixth and G streets. That building has been restored by the Jewish Historical Society of Greater Washington and is now the Lillian & Albert Small Jewish Museum
Lillian & Albert Small Jewish Museum
The Lillian & Albert Small Jewish Museum, located in the Judiciary Square neighborhood of Washington, D.C., houses the oldest surviving synagogue building in the District. It was erected in 1876 by the Adas Israel Congregation. The museum is operated by the Jewish Historical Society of Greater...
. The building, the oldest surviving synagogue building in Washington, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the D.C. Inventory of Historic Sites, and the Historic American Buildings Survey. It is among the oldest synagogue building
Oldest synagogues in the United States
The designation of the oldest synagogue in the United States requires careful use of definitions, and must be divided into two parts, the oldest in the sense of oldest surviving building, and the oldest in the sense of oldest congregation...
s still standing in the United States.
It is also an official project of the Save America’s Treasures program.
Jacob Voorsanger served as rabbi from 1876 to 1877, before going on to a distinguished career as the rabbi of Congregation Emanu-El (San Francisco, California).
After the assassination of President James Garfield
James Garfield
James Abram Garfield served as the 20th President of the United States, after completing nine consecutive terms in the U.S. House of Representatives. Garfield's accomplishments as President included a controversial resurgence of Presidential authority above Senatorial courtesy in executive...
, Adas Israel led the effort that founded a hospital in memory of the slain President. The hospital later merged into the Washington Hospital Center
Washington Hospital Center
Washington Hospital Center is the largest private hospital in Washington, D.C.. It serves as a teaching hospital for Georgetown University School of Medicine....
.
Adas Israel participated in the meeting that led to the founding of the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America in 1898, but did not join the organization. Instead, it hired Rabbi Morris Mandel
Morris Mandel
-Biography:Morris Mandel was born in 1911 in Lublin, Poland. His family moved to the United States when he was three. His son Allen Mandel, is a rabbi. Mandel wrote advice columns for The Jewish Press, "Human Emotions" and "Youth Speaks Up," for close to five decades...
, the first rabbi ordained by the Jewish Theological Seminary of America
Jewish Theological Seminary of America
The Jewish Theological Seminary of America is one of the academic and spiritual centers of Conservative Judaism, and a major center for academic scholarship in Jewish studies.JTS operates five schools: Albert A...
. The congregation did not, however, join the Conservative Movement until 1948.
In 1908 the congregation built the Sixth & I Historic Synagogue
Sixth & I Historic Synagogue
The Sixth & I Historic Synagogue is a non-denominational, non-membership, non-traditional Jewish synagogue located at the corner of Sixth Street and I Street, NW in the Chinatown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. It is one of the oldest synagogues in the city...
.
In the 1930s the congregation rescued Rabbi Hugo Schiff and his wife by bringing them from Karlsruhe
Karlsruhe
The City of Karlsruhe is a city in the southwest of Germany, in the state of Baden-Württemberg, located near the French-German border.Karlsruhe was founded in 1715 as Karlsruhe Palace, when Germany was a series of principalities and city states...
, Germany. Schiff became assistant rabbi. Entry visas could sometimes be obtained for Jews who had offers of employment.
The present building, at Connecticut Avenue and Porter Street, was dedicated in 1951.
The current rabbi is Gil Steinlauf.http://www.adasisrael.org/AboutUs/leadership.htm
Ruach Minyan
Ruach Minyan is an independent minyanIndependent minyan
Independent minyan is a term that describes a number of lay-led Jewish worship and study communities that have developed independently of established denominational and synagogue structures within the organized Jewish community. Some began in the late 1990s and most since the year 2000, though...
or chavurah
Chavurah
A chavurah or havurah is a small group of like-minded Jews who assemble for the purposes of facilitating Shabbat and holiday prayer services, sharing communal experiences such as lifecycle events, and Jewish learning...
in Washington, DC, organized entirely by volunteer leadership and affiliated with Adas Israel Congregation
Adas Israel Congregation (Washington, D.C.)
Adas Israel, located in the Cleveland Park neighborhood, is the largest Conservative synagogue in Washington, D.C.-History:The congregation was founded in 1869 by 69 members of the Washington Hebrew Congregation who objected to that congregation's move towards Reform Judaism.Sermons were given in...
. Its primary activity is Friday night services and dinner.
About
Ruach Minyan is a traditional, spirited, lay-led, egalitarian Kabbalat Shabbat and Ma’ariv service that combines a traditional, songful Friday evening service with Shabbat dinner.History
The group was originally founded as Van Ness Minyan in 1998, as that is the location of the building where the original founding members lived. Founding members included Ruben Lamdany, Leon & Lara Fleischer, & Nancy & Eric Nelkin. They were looking for a place to gather and pray together on Friday night and then celebrate Shabbat with a joint dinner and so decided to create their own minyan. The founding members of the Van Ness Minyan were also members of Adas Israel and attended the Traditional Egalitarian Minyan at Adas Israel on Shabbat mornings. After a period of dormancy, the Van Ness minyan was revived by Eric Gurevitz. In 2006 Rabbi Alana Suskin, Associate Rabbi at Adas Israel, discussed the idea of creating a partnership between the Van Ness Minyan and Adas Israel and helped us come up with the name Ruach Minyan.Innovations
The most notable innovation of the Van Ness Minyan--the predecessor to Ruach Minyan--is the creation of the Two-Table System for Potlucks. The two-table system, created by Eric Gurevitz and Jonathan Levine of the Van Ness Minyan, captures the two "extremes"--those who only eat food made in a Hechshered-only kitchen, and those who eat any food served. The two-table system was created so that everyone in the community could have something to eat and for everyone to cook without any person compromising, so that each member would feel he or she is a full member of the community. These rules assume a cultural milieu in which it is acceptable to make every potluck meal dairy or vegetarian and no one is making distinctions about which hechsher they trust.Of equal importance to the two-table policy itself is the language and framing. It is very intentional that one table is called "vegetarian" and the other is called "vegetarian with a hechsher
Hechsher
A hechsher is the special certification marking found on the packages of products that have been certified as kosher . In Halakha , the dietary laws of kashrut specify food items that may be eaten and others that are prohibited as set out in the commandments of the Torah...
." Neither table is called "kosher" (implying that the other table isn't kosher).
The system was created to solve the problem that Ben Dreyfus states in his Mah Rabu Blog: “If the whole world were table 1, then people who had specific requirements regarding hechshers or utensils wouldn't be able to eat. And if the whole world were table 2, then people whose kitchens did not meet this standard wouldn't be able to cook, and would feel like less-than-full members of the community. And if the community were to work out some compromise between tables 1 and 2 (everything must have a hechsher except cheese, etc.), then (a) lots of time would be spent hammering this out, and (b) at the end of the day, some people still wouldn't be able to eat, and some people still wouldn't be able to cook.
The two-table system has been called by Ben Dreyfus in his Hilchot Pluralism an approach to kashrut for independent Jewish communities. It has since been popularized by many different independent minyan
Independent minyan
Independent minyan is a term that describes a number of lay-led Jewish worship and study communities that have developed independently of established denominational and synagogue structures within the organized Jewish community. Some began in the late 1990s and most since the year 2000, though...
im such as Kol Zimrah and Tikkun Leil Shabbat
Tikkun Leil Shabbat
Tikkun Leil Shabbat is an independent minyan or chavurah in Washington, DC, organized entirely by volunteer leadership and sponsored by Jews United For Justice, DC's local Jewish social justice organization. The name of the community is a reference both to Tikkun Leil Shavuot and tikkun olam...
as well as others.
Recent awards
Ruach Minyan was chosen in 2008-2009 and in 2009-2010 as one of the six Innovative Young Adult Davening Communities by the Conservative Movement's Kesharim Committee and was awarded grants for each of these years.External links
- http://www.adasisrael.org/
- http://www.rabbisteinlauf.blogspot.com/