Congregation Shearith Israel - Birthing of Major Jewish Institutions

Birthing of Major Jewish Institutions

As the American Reform Judaism made headway and changes on the synagogue scene in the late 19th century, many rabbis critical of the Reform movement looked for ways to strengthen traditional synagogues. Shearith Israel, and its rabbi, Henry Pereira Mendes, was at the fore of these efforts. Rabbi Mendes cofounded the American Jewish Theological Seminary (JTS) in 1886, in order to train traditional rabbis. Shearith Israel was the first home to the school. In JTS's earliest days, it taught and researched rabbinics similarly to traditional yeshivas, in contrast to the Reform Hebrew Union College. It is not certain whether at the time JTS hewed very closely to existing yeshiva-style, but significant deviations would be out of character with Shearith Israel and Rabbi Mendes.

Twelve years later, in 1896, Mendes was acting president of JTS, and promoted the formation of Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America (OU), a synagogue umbrella group that provided an alternative to the Reform movement's Union of Hebrew Congregations of America. As JTS grew, it needed a full-time head, and Mendes was replaced by Solomon Schechter. However, Schechter developed a somewhat less traditional ideology, which became the basis for Conservative Judaism (also known as Masorti). The split was not great initially, and there was a great deal of cooperation in the Orthodox and Conservative camps but, over time, the divide became clearer, and Schechter formed the United Synagogue of America (now the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, or USCJ) to promote synagogue affiliation with his conservative-but-unorthodox ideology. Shearith Israel stayed in the Orthodox camp, eventually repudiating its association with its offspring, JTS.

In a sense, then, Shearith Israel was the birthplace of three of the largest and most significant Jewish religious organizations in America: JTS, the OU, and USCJ. Shearith Israel remains a member of one of the three: the Orthodox Union.