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Background | Recent Scholarship | Lectures

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Educational and Professional Background

BA, summa cum laude, Queens College
Ordained, Rabbinical Seminary of America

At Loyola Law School, Rabbi Yitzchok Adlerstein holds the Sydney M. Irmas Adjunct Chair in Jewish Law and Ethics. As such, he teaches Introduction to Jewish Law and Contemporary Issues in Jewish Law and arranges yearly events on Jewish and religious law. Rabbi Adlerstein is the Director of Interfaith affairs t the Simon Wiesenthal Center, and a founder and co-principal of the Jewish Mediation Service. He serves on the faculty at the Yeshiva of Los Angeles, is a contributing editor to Jewish Action magazine, a member of the Beth Din Committee of the Rabbinical Council of California, the founding editor of Cross-Currents, a blog of Torah and current affairs, and a press liaison for the Orthodox rabbinate of Southern California. Rabbi Adlerstein won the 2000 Rabbinical Leadership Award from the Rabbinical Council of California.

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Recent Scholarship

The Torah: With Ramban’s Commentary (2005 and ongoing) (editoral staff))

“Peacemaking and the Religious Practitioner,” Pepperdine Mediation Law Journal (forthcoming)

“Israel’s Next Battle: Labor Unions,” (with Abraham Cooper), Jewish World Review, January 4, 2007.

“Do Mainline Protestants Want to “Supersede” Israel?” (with Abraham Cooper and Harold Brackman), Midstream, Nov. 1, 2005.

Be'er HaGolah: Maharal of Prague's Classic Defense of Rabbinic Judaism (2000)

“Scientific Advance and the Jewish Moral Conscience ,” The Torah u-Madda Journal, Sept. 2000.

“Redemption And The Power of Small Things: Rav Yosef Lipovitz's Ethical Refraction of Megilat Rut,” Jewish Action, Summer 1998.

“Symposium: The Sea Change in American Orthodox Judaism,” Tradition, 32:4 (1998).

“Holy Alliance: Reflections on Contemporary Science From the Tents of Torah,” Jewish Action, Fall 1991 (Reprinted in The Jewish Action Reader, vol. 1, Orthodox Union, 1996).

“Revealer of Hidden Things,” Jewish Action, Summer 1993, pp. 88-91.

“The Power and Elegance of Aggada According to Maharal,” Jewish Action, Summer 1991.

“Price Controls and Consumer Advocacy,” Journal of Halacha and Contemporary Society 13 (1987)

Commentaries/Op Eds

“Christians and the Jewish State,” Jewish Action, Winter, 2006.

“Defund Terrorists,” (with Michael Broyde) The National Law Journal, Sept. 25, 2006.

“Truth Trumps Presbyterian Divestment Resolution,” (with Abraham Cooper) Los Angeles Jewish Journal, June 30, 2006.

“Why Birmingham Matters,” (with Abraham Cooper) The Jewish Press, June 28, 2006.

“Dammed If You Do,” (with Michael Broyde) The National Law Journal, August 22, 2005.

“The Return of Supersession,” Jewish World Review, July 1, 2005

“A Pope Like No Other,” Jewish World Review, April 2, 2005

“Kabbalist Theory of Everything,” Los Angeles Jewish Journal, December 17, 2004.

“The Resolution That Put the “PC” in PCUSA,” Christianity Today, August 1, 2004.

“A Tradition That Embraces Looking To The Heavens,” Forward, January 23, 2004.

“Solomon, He Ain't,” (with Michael Broyde), The National Law Journal, Feb. 3, 2003.

“In Praise of Hypocrisy,” Los Angeles Jewish Journal, October 25, 2002.

“Who Are The Journalists?” (with Yitzchak Etshalom) Los Angeles Jewish Journal, October 4, 2002.

“The Presence of Greatness,” Los Angeles Jewish Journal, July 26, 2002.

“Conservation and Appreciation,” Los Angeles Jewish Journal, May 3, 2002.

“Jewish Law Understands and Permits Retaliation by Shaq,” (with Michael Broyde) Los Angeles Daily Journal, January 30, 2002.

“Mapping Genes, Losing Soul,” Forward, July 7, 2000.

“The Problem’s in the Packaging,” Forward, March 10, 2000.

“The Nature of Judaism,” Los Angeles Times, March 29, 1997.

“On Judaism,” Tradition, 1997.

“When Words Kill,” First Things, June/July 1996.

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Lectures

The Sheitel and the Burka: How Jewish and Islamic Law Interacted, Shomrei Emunah, Pearlstone Annual Kallah, Baltimore, March 2007

Special Handling: Religious Outreach to the Intellectually Accomplished and to Spiritually Conected People, Association For Jewish Outreach Programs, Baltimore, January 2007

Peacemaking and the Religious Practitioner, Pepperdine Law School, Religion and the Law Keynote Address, Feb. 2006

Voices from The Other Side: What People Say About Orthodoxy, Association Of Jewish Outreach Professionals, January 2001

What People Say About Orthodoxy, Association of Jewish Outreach Professionals, January 2001

Jewish Continuity, David Shapell College of Jewish Studies, Jerusalem, July 15, 1999

Doing the Right Thing: How Judaism Combines Ethics and Law, Encounter, University of London, Oct. 1999

Copernicus and the Jews: Dealing with Difficult Science, Encounter, University of London, Oct. 1999

Beyond the Letter of the Law, David Shapell College of Jewish Studies, Jerusalem, July 26, 1998

Maharal, Israel, and Redemption, Beth Jacob Congregation, Beverly Hills, January 1998

Maimonides, Portland Jewish Community Annual Lecture, May 1997

Orthodoxy on the Line, Congregation Ohr HaTorah (Reform), Los Angeles, Oct. 8, 1996

Counting the Sefiros: Meeting The Needs Of The Mystically Inclined, Association of Jewish Outreach Professionals, January 1995

Approaches in Dealing with Modern Science, Association of Jewish Outreach Professionals, January 1992

Teaching Agadah to The Skeptic, Association of Jewish Outreach Professionals, January 1991