A fairly recent post on JSpot has begged the question, "Who's on your Rabbi list?" This of course is a reference to the list of America's Top 50 Rabbis, as published by Newsweek. It seems that this list has flared the angers and piqued the interests of people all over the internet, specifically, the blogosphere. So, in an attempt to answer the question raised by Jeremy Burton of JSpot, I compiled my own list of the top 50 Rabbis in America (in no particular order):
- Rabbi Yitzchak Adlerstein
- Rabbi Lipa Lipshutz
- Rabbi Marvin Heir
- Rabbi Nosson Scherman
- Rabbi Shmuel Kaminetsky
- Rabbi Aharon Feldman
- Rabbi Malkiel Kotler
- Rabbi Uren Reich
- Rabbi Dovid Leibowitz
- Rabbi Herschel Schachter
- Rabbi Dovid Feinstein
- Rabbi Reuven Feinstein
- Rabbi Matisyahu Solomon
- Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski
- Rabbbi Mordechai Willig
- Rabbi Menashe Klein
- Rabbi Yonason Sacks
- Rabbi Yitzchak Yaakov Rabinowitz
- Rabbi Moshe Heinemann
- Rabbi Yisroel Belsky
- Rabbi Yisroel Reisman
- Rabbi Gershon Bess
- Rabbi Moshe Leib Rabinovitch
- Rabbi Feivel Cohen
- Rabbi Yosef Blau
- Rabbi Akiva Tatz
- Rabbi Shmuel Bloom
- Rabbi Yechiel Epstein
- Rabbi Meir Stern
- Rabbi Chaim Dov Keller
- Rabbi Yudel Krinsky
- Rabbi Elyah Svei
- Rabbi Aharon Shechter
- Rabbi Yissocher Frand
- Rabbi Shmuel Birnbaum
- Rabbi Zelig Epstein
- Rabbi Yerucham Olshin
- Rabbi Don Ungarischer
- Rabbi Elya Ber Wachtfogel
- Rabbi Eli Chaim Swerdloff
- Rabbi Zalman Leib Teitelbaum
- Rabbi Aharon Teitelbaum
- Rabbi Michel Twerski
- Rabbi Dovid Twesky
- Rabbi Yaakov Perlow
- Rabbi Shmuley Boteach
- Rabbi Shlomo Cunin
- Rabbi Dovid Gottlieb
- Rabbi Daniel Lapin
- Rabbi Dovid Goldwasser
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4 comments:
When I saw your post's introduction on Kinja, I was hoping that you would make such a list, but didn't think that you (or anyone else) would have the guts to. It seems like you have a nice cross-section of rabbanim on the list. I would ask for your criteria, but I don't think it really makes much of a difference. Y"K.
R’ Chaim - Not suprisingly, your list displays a narrowly Orthodox view of the world (dare I say, Haredi?). That’s cool, for where you are coming at this from. I’m curious what your criteria might be, other than source of semicha, as those may be aplicable to a broader audience (e.g. scholarship, influence as a teacher or posek, size of congregation, etc…)
I could easily say that I chose these Rabbis based on their scholarship, influences, position, leadership, magnitude of constituency, and piety, but in truth I did not. I simply wrote a list of the first fifty Rabbis which popped into my head (except for Dr. Norman Lamm). The mere fact that a Rabbi's name is popular enough to have "popped into my head" while I was brainstorming for this posts testifies that that Rabbi is worthy of being on the list. Of course looking back at the list, there are probably some names that I would replace with other more-known Torah personalities like Rabbi Paysach Krohn or Rabbi Ephraim Greenblatt or Rabbi Chaim Stein or Rabbi Yitzchok Ausband, etc... But it was a first-come-first-serve basis, so to speak, so since I didn't think of them right away, I am not going to replace others with them now.
By the way, Mr. Burton, was my own Los Angeles bias apparent in this listing?
Chaim,
The list would be helpful and informative if you were to identify the names as the Newsweek list did.
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