Sharon Kleinbaum


Sharon Kleinbaum is an American Rabbi who serves as spiritual leader of New York City's Congregation Beit Simchat Torah. She was installed as CBST's first rabbi in 1992, arriving at the height of the AIDS crisis when the synagogue was in desperate need of pastoral care and spiritual leadership. She is a prominent advocate for human rights. She graduated from Barnard College and the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, where she was ordained. While at Barnard College, she led protests against Barnard's investments in South Africa and against the proliferation of nuclear weapons. She is openly lesbian and has two daughters. She married Rabbi Margaret Wenig in 2008, but they divorced.
In 1995 Rabbi Kleinbaum, along with Rabbi Margaret Wenig and Russell Pearce, sent a resolution asking for support for civil marriage for gay couples to the Reform movement's Commission on Social Action; when it was approved by them, Wenig submitted it to the Central Conference of American Rabbis, which approved it in 1996.
Rabbi Kleinbaum served on Mayor Bloomberg's Commission on Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Questioning Runaway and Homeless Youth and New York Police Department's LGBT Advisory Committee. Rabbi Kleinbaum has also served on Mayor de Blasio's Transition Committee, and President Obama's the U.S Department of State's Religion and Foreign Policy Working Group Sub-working Group on Social Justice. Appointed by Senator Charles Schumer, she served as a Commissioner for the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom 2019-20. She also serves on New York City's Commission on Human Rights, she serves on Mayor de Blasio's Faith Based Advisory Council, and is on the Board of the New Israel Fund.

Awards

Sharon Kleinbaum was named one of the 50 most influential rabbis in America by Newsweek for several years, as well as one of Newsweek's 150 Women Who Shake the World. She was also named one of the Top 10 Women Religious Leaders and one of the 15 Inspiring LGBT Religious Leaders by the Huffington Post. She has also been named one of the country's top 50 Jewish leaders by the Forward and the New York Jewish Week, as well as being named one of Forward's Sisterhood 50 American Influential Rabbis and AM New York named her one of New York City's Most Influential Women for Women's Day. Rabbi Kleinbaum is a recipient of the Jewish Fund for Justice Woman of Valor Award. Other awards she has received include:

Rabbi Kleinbaum is a 1977 graduate of The Frisch Yeshiva High School of Northern New Jersey, and graduated cum laude from Barnard College with a degree in political science in 1981. She received her ordination from the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College in 1990. Rabbi Kleinbaum has also studied at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and at the Oxford University Centre for Post-Graduate Hebrew and Yiddish Studies. She is a member of the Central Conference of American Rabbis and the Reconstructionist Rabbinical Association.

Articles and Books