Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh

https://jewishpgh.org/info/gefsky-scholar/

 Talking Point Archive

Listen to Rabbi Danny Schiff on Talking Point

From his upbringing in Melbourne, Australia surrounded by Holocaust survivors, to his inspiring leadership in Pittsburgh after the Tree of Life synagogue shooting, and his decision to make Aliyah to Israel, Rabbi Danny Schiff brings a unique and remarkably impartial perspective to the Diaspora, Jewish ethics, and the future of the Reform and Conservative movements. In our Jewish Leadership series, Rabbi Schiff shares his projections for the future of the Reform and Conservative movements in America, offering insightful analysis of their historical roles and how our collective community needs continue to evolve in the post-modern digital age. Could Judaism be reimagined in the 21st-century by going back to basics?

Rabbi Danny Schiff 

Rabbi Dr. Danny Schiff is the Federation Scholar at the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh. He is a noted teacher and researcher in Jewish ethics.

Born in Sydney, Australia, Rabbi Dr. Schiff grew up in Melbourne. He graduated with a B.A. from the University of Melbourne. Rabbi Dr. Schiff received ordination, as well as his Master of Arts in Hebrew Letters degree, from the Hebrew Union College – Jewish Institute of Religion (H.U.C. – J.I.R.). He also received his Doctor of Hebrew Letters degree, as well as an honorary Doctor of Divinity degree from H.U.C. – J.I.R.. Additionally, Dr. Schiff earned an M.A. in Museum Studies from Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.

Rabbi Schiff previously served as the Community Scholar for the Agency for Jewish Learning in Pittsburgh, as rabbi of B’nai Israel in White Oak, Pennsylvania, and as rabbi at Temple Beth Israel in Melbourne.

He is the author of Abortion in Judaism, published by Cambridge University Press and Judaism in a Digital Age published by Palgrave Macmillan. He is a former President of the Museum of Jewish Ideas, and board member of the City of Pittsburgh Ethics Board and the Society of Jewish Ethics.

www.DaraHorn.com

Talking Point Archive

Listen to Dara Horn on Talking Point 

Award-winning author Dara Horn has written some of the most creative and compelling books on Jewish history and collective identity in recent years. Discover how Horn’s work sheds light on contemporary challenges as she continues our ongoing analysis of Jewish miseducation, rising antisemitism, and the systematic erasure of Jewish identity. We’ll discuss the failings of DEI and Holocaust education; IHRA; why people revere dead Jews while ignoring the needs of living ones; lies our bubbes and zaydes told us; the origins of Jewish guilt; and what 21st century Jews can learn from Jewish communities during the American Civil War who maintained their Jewish communal identity even while fighting on different sides.

Dara Horn 

Dara Horn is the award-winning author of six books, including the novels In the Image (Norton 2002), The World to Come (Norton 2006), All Other Nights (Norton 2009), A Guide for the Perplexed (Norton 2013), and Eternal Life (Norton 2018), and the essay collection People Love Dead Jews: Reports from a Haunted Present (Norton 2021).

One of Granta magazine’s Best Young American Novelists (2007), she is the recipient of three National Jewish Book Awards, among other honors, and she was a finalist for the Kirkus Prize, the Wingate Prize, the Simpson Family Literary Prize, and the Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction. Her books have been selected as New York Times Notable Books, Booklist’s 25 Best Books of the Decade, and San Francisco Chronicle’s Best Books of the Year, and have been translated into twelve languages.

Her nonfiction work has appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, The Atlantic, Smithsonian, Tablet, and The Jewish Review of Books, among many other publications.

Horn received her doctorate in comparative literature from Harvard University, studying Yiddish and Hebrew. She has taught courses in these subjects at Sarah Lawrence College and Yeshiva University, and held the Gerald Weinstock Visiting Professorship in Jewish Studies at Harvard. She has lectured for audiences in hundreds of venues throughout North America, Israel, and Australia.

She currently serves as Creative Adviser for The Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History.

She lives in New Jersey with her husband and four children.

Talking Point Archive