Each year, Congregation Adath Jeshurun in Elkins Park creates a theme to tie together its annual offering of adult education courses. For 5786, which spans the end of 2025 and the beginning of 2026, the theme combines Jewish history, American history and the synagogue’s Philadelphia roots: “Honoring America’s 250th: The Impact of Jews in America.”
Rav Shai Cherry, the congregation’s rabbi, said that celebrating the semiquincentennial of the country is a great way to show not just the ways that the United States has benefited Jews, but also how Jews have benefited the United States.
“Once we hit on the idea, then the subject flowed very easily. We wanted to use some of the major historical moments of U.S. history — the Civil War, the Revolutionary War — in order to highlight some lesser-known Jewish moments, because we really didn’t have a mass Jewish immigration until 1881. So the Revolutionary War and the Civil War are generally not as frequently discussed in American Jewish circles,” Cherry said.
Adath Jeshurun plans to focus about half of its programming on American Jewish history from before the early 1880s. The shul will also discuss more modern contributions to American culture made by Jews since the end of mass migration in the 1910s, much of which will center around the fields of art, music and science.
Dave Denby is giving one of the planned talks, one of more than a dozen events that fit under this theme. He is a New York Times bestselling author who is presenting a program based on his new book, “Eminent Jews: Bernstein, Brooks, Friedan, Mailer.” He said that he is focusing on post-war America and Judaism because, through all of his research, he has found that it is a time when Jews had a newfound freedom that they had never experienced before.
“I wanted to see how these four extraordinary individuals would live their lives at a time when Jews had a kind of freedom they had never had anywhere before,” he said. “That’s a big statement, but I have read enough about Jewish history to feel confident about it. They were very public figures who had great means to express themselves.”
Other topics coming this year and next include “American Jews and Social Justice,” “Jews and the Development of Religious Liberty in the American Revolution and Early Nation” and “Women in the Civil War.” There will also be concerts, like the event with Rav Hazzan Howard Glantz and Nashirah, the Jewish Chorale of Greater Philadelphia, as well as the Zamir Chorale of Boston.
Cherry said that the synagogue is “trying to show how [Jewish] religious tradition and Jewish history have really informed our contributions here in America.”
“So whether we’re looking at the labor movements or slavery, we’re going back to look at how those issues were treated in the Bible and in the Talmud and in medieval Jewish history,” Cherry said.
Denby said that this is an apt theme for the year because the United States has offered Jews a special sort of home.
“Jews have always had to live in suffering — they survived the suffering of some dominant cultures, whether it was Spain or England,” he said. “In two places — Israel and the United States — they felt they belonged.”
Denby cited a letter from George Washington to the Touro Synagogue in Newport, Rhode Island, thanking them for their support. It quoted the Old Testament, saying “every one shall sit in safety under his own vine and fig tree and there shall be none to make him afraid.”
Denby said that this message is all the more important right now, as antisemitism rises across the country.
“I’ll even raise the question when I talk, ‘What can a book like this, which is largely celebratory, have to say to American Jews at this very moment?’” he asked. “I don’t know that I have the answer, except to say that the four subjects, Mailer, Friedan, Brooks and Bernstein, were utterly fearless. They were unafraid. It’s partly that they were able to be unafraid because of the cultural conditions — the reduction in antisemitism, Jewish prosperity and so on and so forth — but they also personally were very gutsy individuals who constantly took extraordinary risks and exposed themselves. We can’t all be like that, but the message — do not be afraid in general — is a wonderful one.”
Cherry himself will be presenting in October, speaking about Jews in the American Labor Movement, as well as in February, when he will discuss “Jews and Slavery.” This is a complex subject, as Jews were on both sides of the issue in the 18th and 19th centuries. But as the rabbi said, these difficult conversations need to be had.
“It’s always been a priority in Jewish discussions to present not the straw man but the Iron Man for both positions, and so the Talmud is filled with the best possible arguments, which presents the best available evidence, on all sides of an issue in order for us to make the best sort of evaluation or decision about whatever it is we’re discussing,” Cherry said.
Whether it’s the Civil War, sports or even Jewish summer camp, the Adath Jeshurun community is excited to learn about American Jews and their place in the first 250 years of the nation.
“Everyone who knows about it seems to be excited for something different,” Cherry said.
