David Ellenson

David Ellenson (June 25, 1947 – December 7, 2023) was an American rabbi and academic who was known as a leader of the Reform movement in Judaism. Ellenson was director of the Schusterman Center for Israel Studies and visiting professor of Near Eastern and Judaic studies at Brandeis University and previously president of the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR). He previously served as president of HUC-JIR from 2001 to December 31, 2013, and was later chancellor emeritus of that college until his death. Ellenson had served as interim president following the death of his successor, Aaron D. Panken until the inauguration of Andrew Rehfeld, the 10th and current President.

Early life and education Ellenson was born on June 25, 1947, in Brookline, Massachusetts, and grew up in an Orthodox Jewish family in Newport News, Virginia. He was president of the student body at Newport News High School in 1964–65.

Ellenson graduated from the College of William and Mary with a B.A. in 1969. In 1972, he earned a M.A. in religious studies from the University of Virginia. He was then ordained at HUC-JIR in 1977 and received his Ph.D. from Columbia University in 1981.

Career Ellenson was first appointed a member of the faculty in Jewish Religious Thought at Hebrew Union College in 1979.

David Ellenson and his daughter Ruth Andrew Ellenson, editor of The Modern Jewish Girl's Guide to Guilt, both won the National Jewish Book Award in 2006, the only father and daughter to do so in the same year since Abraham Joshua Heschel and Susannah Heschel.

President George W. Bush appointed Ellenson to serve on delegation to accompany him to Jerusalem for the celebration of the 60th anniversary of the State of Israel in May 2008.

In 2009 Newsweek named him # 5 on its list of "50 Influential Rabbis."

Death Ellenson died on December 7, 2023, at the age of 76.

Books Jewish Meaning in a World of Choice: Studies in Tradition and Modernity. The Jewish Publication Society, 2014 Pledges of Jewish Allegiance, co-authored with Daniel Gordis. Stanford University Press, 2012. Nominated for National Jewish Book Award. After Emancipation: Jewish Religious Responses to Modernity. HUC-Press, 2004. Winner of National Jewish Book Award 2006. Between Tradition and Culture: The Dialectics of Jewish Religion and Identity in the Modern World. Scholar's Press, 1994. Bits of Honey: Essays for Samson H. Levey, co-edited with Stanley Chyet. Scholar's Press, 1993. Rabbi Esriel Hildesheimer and the Creation of a Modern Jewish Orthodoxy. University of Alabama Press, 1990. Nominated for National Jewish Book Award. Tradition in Transition: Orthodoxy. Halakhah and the Boundaries of Modern Jewish Identity. University Press of America. 1989.