| This study is an examination of the life and work of Tehilla Lichtenstein (1893-1973), cofounder and leader of the Society of Jewish Science movement in New York City. An immigrant with her family in 1904 from Palestine and Constantinople, Lichtenstein was a graduate student at Columbia University in 1919 when she met her husband, Rabbi Morris Lichtenstein. Together they founded the Jewish Science movement (1922), whose purpose was to bring Judaism back to Jews, including apathetic and lapsed Jews, many of whom were leaving Judaism for Christian Science. When her husband died in 1938, Lichtenstein succeeded him as leader of the Society until her death in 1973; thus, she is the first American Jewish woman to lead an ongoing Jewish congregation. She wrote and preached more than 500 sermons, gave lectures, and presented a series of radio broadcasts. |
