The American rabbinate has met and is continuing to meet in full and on time its military chaplaincy quota, it was reported here today by Charles Aaron, president of the National Jewish Welfare Board. He paid tribute to the country’s Jewish religious leadership on the completion of five years of a voluntary draft system through which all rabbis upon ordination become subject to chaplaincy duty.
In the five years since the plan was adopted in the fall of 1950 soon after the fighting in Korea, the three major rabbinical associations constituting JWB’s Commission on Jewish Chaplaincy have brought into the chaplaincy 203 rabbis, Mr. Aaron declared. Of these, 131 have already completed their chaplaincy service and 72 others are still on active service, in addition to 21 Jewish career chaplains. Another 44 are now processing in preparation for chaplaincy service, Mr. Aaron said.
Set up by the Central Conference of American Rabbis (Reform), Rabbinical Assembly of America (Conservative) and Rabbinical Council of America (Orthodox), and administered by JWB’s Commission on Jewish Chaplaincy, the chaplaincy availability program consists of a voluntarily imposed draft under which the rabbinical groups and their associated rabbinical seminaries require that every rabbinical student upon his ordination make himself available for at least two years of chaplaincy service.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
