Tribute to Dr. Louis Finkelstein Jewish Theological Seminary Receives $1m from United Synagogue Wome

The National Women’s League of the United Synagogue of America, whose Torah Fund annually raises about $1 million for the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, labored for only nine months this time around in order to pay tribute to the Seminary’s retiring Chancellor Dr. Louis Finkelstein and as a birthday salute to the educator who will be 77 years old June 14.

At a well-attended lunch yesterday afternoon, Women’s League president Mrs. Henry N. Rapaport presented Dr. Finkelstein with a $1 million check for the Seminary and a set of the 16-volume Encyclopaedia Judaica. The 76-year-old scholar, will leave his post June 30 after more than three decades’ leadership of the Seminary, the last 21 as Chancellor. Dr. Finkelstein called the record-setting Torah Fund drive a “remarkable” and “monumental” achievement.

Seminary Chancellor-elect Dr. Bernard Mandelbaum said Conservative Judaism “must keep pace with the needs of the hour” while remaining true to its past, and must be sensitive to the demands of Jewish youth. President-elect Dr. Gerson D. Cohen also noted that although there are “challenges to be faced,” American Jewry can cite a “record of tremendous achievement” and that “despite the inroads of alienation and assimilation we have achieved so much.”

Dr. Cohen said Dr. Finkelstein had “perceived the need and the possibility of raising a native generation who will contribute to the chain of Jewish tradition in quality and in quantity.” Mrs. Rapaport commented that the women of the 200,000-member League were dedicated to both Jewish tradition and social concern. She also took issue with what she called the denigration of the Jewish mother, who “has given the world such an inordinate number of outstanding Jewish sons and daughters who have taken their places of leadership in every field of human endeavor for the betterment of mankind.”