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South African Union For Progressive Judaism (SAUPJ)
The South African Union for Progressive Judaism (SAUPJ) is an affiliate of the World Union for Progressive Judaism and supports 11 progressive congregations. The SAUJP estimates that it represents around 6,000 South African Jews and around 10 per cent of the overall Jewish population residing in South Africa.November 2019
SAUPJ. Accessed on 6 December 2019
Johannesburg: Culture & Community
Reform Judaism. Accessed on 6 December 2019
In 2020 a study by the

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Progressive Judaism
Reform Judaism, also known as Liberal Judaism or Progressive Judaism, is a major Jewish denomination that emphasizes the evolving nature of Judaism, the superiority of its ethical aspects to its ceremonial ones, and belief in a continuous search for truth and knowledge, which is closely intertwined with human reason and not limited to the theophany at Mount Sinai. A highly liberal strand of Judaism, it is characterized by lessened stress on ritual and personal observance, regarding ''halakha'' (Jewish law) as non-binding and the individual Jew as autonomous, and great openness to external influences and progressive values. The origins of Reform Judaism lie in 19th-century Germany, where Rabbi Abraham Geiger and his associates formulated its early principles. Since the 1970s, the movement has adopted a policy of inclusiveness and acceptance, inviting as many as possible to partake in its communities rather than adhering to strict theoretical clarity. It is strongly identifie ...
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Zionist
Zionism ( he, צִיּוֹנוּת ''Tsiyyonut'' after '' Zion'') is a nationalist movement that espouses the establishment of, and support for a homeland for the Jewish people centered in the area roughly corresponding to what is known in Jewish tradition as the Land of Israel, which corresponds in other terms to the region of Palestine, Canaan, or the Holy Land, on the basis of a long Jewish connection and attachment to that land. Modern Zionism emerged in the late 19th century in Central and Eastern Europe as a national revival movement, both in reaction to newer waves of antisemitism and as a response to Haskalah, or Jewish Enlightenment. Soon after this, most leaders of the movement associated the main goal with creating the desired homeland in Palestine, then an area controlled by the Ottoman Empire. From 1897 to 1948, the primary goal of the Zionist Movement was to establish the basis for a Jewish homeland in Palestine, and thereafter to consolidate it. In a unique v ...
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Sternberg Centre
The Sternberg Centre for Judaism, in East End Road, Finchley, London, is a campus hosting a number of Jewish institutions, built around the 18th-century Finchley manor house. It was founded to facilitate a number of Reform and Liberal Jewish institutions, attached to the Movement for Reform Judaism (formerly: Reform Synagogues of Great Britain), principally through education and cultural means. The centre was opened in 1981 by the Manor House Trust and is now named after Sigmund Sternberg. The founding organisations are: Leo Baeck College, the Movement for Reform Judaism and the Akiva School, the first Reform Jewish day school in England (also opened in 1981). Later the ( Masorti) New North London Synagogue also located there. The Sternberg Centre also includes the offices of RSY Netzer, The Zionist Youth Movement for Reform Judaism. The centre also hosted the Jewish Museum, Finchley until 2007. Movement for Reform Judaism The Movement for Reform Judaism has had its headqua ...
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United Herzlia Schools
The United Herzlia Schools is an organisation that manages the delivery of separate Jewish education in Cape Town in South Africa. History One of the earliest Jewish schools was the Hope Mill Hebrew Public School which was located at the top of Government Avenue, close to the Cape Town Hebrew Congregation. By 1901 it had about 350 students. The school received state assistance from the Cape school board and the school gradually lost its Jewish character. A Talmud Torah school was established in District Six in 1899 and by 1903 it housed 100 pupils. In 1919, the United Hebrew Schools of Cape Town were established. The school was housed at 101 Hope Street under the principalship of Mr Joseph Homa. With the arrival of Rabbi Abrahams as Chief Rabbi of the Cape Town Hebrew Congregation, the idea of the Jewish Day School was given new impetus. The first class, which was housed at 101 Hope Street, Cape Town, opened in January 1940. The first parent committee was established ...
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King David Schools, Johannesburg
The King David Schools are a network of Jewish day schools in Johannesburg, South Africa, offering nursery through high school education. There are three campuses across Johannesburg: Linksfield, Victory Park, and Sandton; "each school has an atmosphere of its own serving the specific community". The schools are under the auspices of the South African Board of Jewish Education. King David aims to deliver "an excellent general education together with the study of Hebrew, Jewish Studies and the living of the Jewish calendar and year cycle" and to produce "graduates who are '' menschen'', confident and equipped to pursue any opportunity they wish to, who are proud of their Jewish heritage and its traditions, who have a love for learning, and a determination to contribute to their society." The Linksfield campus, in northeastern Johannesburg, was established in 1948 as South Africa's first Jewish day school (the high school was founded in 1955); see further under History of ...
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Yeshiva College Of South Africa
The Yeshiva College of South Africa (''Yeshivat Beit Yitzchak''), commonly known as Yeshiva College - and formerly known as Yeshivat Bnei Akiva - is South Africa’s largest religious Jewish Day School. The school is headed by Mr Rob Lonsince 2018; the Rosh Yeshiva is RabbNechemya Tayloras of 2021. Yeshiva College Yeshiva College was established in 1953; it is located in the Glenhazel, Gauteng, Glenhazel area of Johannesburg, Gauteng, South Africa. The school has around 500 pupils, between the ages of 3 and 18. It consists of a nursery school (up to age 6), a coeducational primary school (grades 0-6), and separate boys' and girls' high schools (grade 7-12). The school adopts a Religious Zionist and Modern Orthodox philosophy. Throughout, pupils study a double curriculum, focusing on Torah study as well as secular studies; students ultimately sitting for the National Senior Certificate (see Matriculation in South Africa), where the school achieves competitively. Various ...
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Union For Progressive Judaism
The Union for Progressive Judaism is an affiliate of the World Union for Progressive Judaism and supports 27 progressive congregations in Australia, New Zealand and Asia. The movement serves about a fifth of the region's affiliated community. The UPJ is represented on the major communal bodies in Australia, such as the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, the Zionist Federation of Australia (ZFA) and Zionism Victoria. Belief and practice The denomination shares the basic tenets of Reform Judaism (alternatively known also as Progressive or Liberal) worldwide: a theistic, personal God; an ongoing revelation, under the influence of which all scripture was written – but not dictated by providence – that enables contemporary Jews to reach new religious insights without necessarily being committed to the conventions of the past; regarding the ethical and moral values of Judaism as its true essence, while ritual and practical observance are means to achieve spiritual e ...
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Dana Evan Kaplan
Dana Evan Kaplan (born October 29, 1960) is a Reform rabbi known for his writings on Reform Judaism and American Judaism. He has also written on other subjects, including American Jewish history and Jews in various diaspora communities. Kaplan has been the rabbi of Temple Beth Shalom of the West Valley in Sun City, Arizona, since June 2019. Since becoming rabbi in this Phoenix suburb, Kaplan has worked closely with Cantor Baruch Koritan and Educator Andre Ivory to build a thriving, multi-generational Reform congregation that would span the entire West Valley. This geographical area has seen tremendous growth in recent years, and Kaplan has endeavored to reach out to the predominantly unaffiliated Jews in this region, as well as non-Jews who might be interested in exploring Jewish religious wisdom for the first time. Early life Kaplan was born and grew up in Manhattan. As a child, his parents sent him to Ramaz School, a Jewish day school on the Upper East Side. Rabbi Edward ...
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Lithuanian Jews
Lithuanian Jews or Litvaks () are Jews with roots in the territory of the former Grand Duchy of Lithuania (covering present-day Lithuania, Belarus, Latvia, the northeastern Suwałki and Białystok regions of Poland, as well as adjacent areas of modern-day Russia and Ukraine). The term is sometimes used to cover all Haredi Jews who follow a " Lithuanian" (Ashkenazi, non- Hasidic) style of life and learning, whatever their ethnic background. The area where Lithuanian Jews lived is referred to in Yiddish as , hence the Hebrew term (). No other famous Jew is more closely linked to a specifically Lithuanian city than Vilna Gaon (in Yiddish, "the genius of Vilna"). Rabbi Elijah ben Solomon Zalman (1720–1797) to give his rarely used full name, helped make Vilna (modern-day Vilnius) a world center for Talmudic learning. Chaim Grade (1910–1982) was born in Vilna, the city about which he would write. The inter-war Republic of Lithuania was home to a large and influential ...
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Gustav Saron
Gustav "Gus" Saron (1905 – 1989) was associated with the South African Jewish Board of Deputies for almost half a century. He was appointed Secretary in 1936 and General Secretary in 1940. He retired at the end of 1974, but continued in the role of Honorary Consultant. In July 1966 Saron completed thirty years of service as the Board's General Secretary, the top post in South African Jewry's "civil service," and was suitably feted by communal leaders. Johannesburg-born, Saron lectured in classics and Hebrew at the Witwatersrand University before practising law and joining the staff of the Board of Deputies. He played a key part in combating Nazi propaganda in South Africa during the Hitler years, and in expanding the Board's scope and activities. In lieu of taking a sabbatical leave, Saron embarked, in October 1966, on a five-months' study tour of Jewish communities in the United States, Europe, and Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَا ...
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German Jewish
The history of the Jews in Germany goes back at least to the year 321, and continued through the Early Middle Ages (5th to 10th centuries CE) and High Middle Ages (''circa'' 1000–1299 CE) when Jewish immigrants founded the Ashkenazi Jewish community. The community survived under Charlemagne, but suffered during the Crusades. Accusations of well poisoning during the Black Death (1346–53) led to mass slaughter of German Jews and they fled in large numbers to Poland. The Jewish communities of the cities of Mainz, Speyer and Worms became the center of Jewish life during medieval times. "This was a golden age as area bishops protected the Jews resulting in increased trade and prosperity." The First Crusade began an era of persecution of Jews in Germany. Entire communities, like those of Trier, Worms, Mainz and Cologne, were slaughtered. The Hussite Wars became the signal for renewed persecution of Jews. The end of the 15th century was a period of religious hatred that ...
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Haskalah
The ''Haskalah'', often termed Jewish Enlightenment ( he, השכלה; literally, "wisdom", "erudition" or "education"), was an intellectual movement among the Jews of Central and Eastern Europe, with a certain influence on those in Western Europe and the Muslim world. It arose as a defined ideological worldview during the 1770s, and its last stage ended around 1881, with the rise of Jewish nationalism. The ''Haskalah'' pursued two complementary aims. It sought to preserve the Jews as a separate, unique collective, and it pursued a set of projects of cultural and moral renewal, including a revival of Hebrew for use in secular life, which resulted in an increase in Hebrew found in print. Concurrently, it strove for an optimal integration in surrounding societies. Practitioners promoted the study of exogenous culture, style, and vernacular, and the adoption of modern values. At the same time, economic production, and the taking up of new occupations was pursued. The ''Haskalah'' p ...
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