JTA — Rabbi Deborah Waxman, who leads the seminary and congregational union of Judaism’s Reconstructionist movement, said this week that she will retire in the summer of 2026, opening the top job at a movement that has been rocked by tension over a growing strain of anti-Zionism among its recent rabbinical school students and graduates.

Since taking over as CEO of Reconstructing Judaism in 2014, Waxman has steered the main bodies of American Judaism’s smallest denomination to a firm financial footing following the post-2008 financial upheavals, and spearheaded curriculum changes at the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College that beefed up field training and pastoral education for its graduates. During her tenure, the seminary also became the first rabbinical school to admit rabbis with non-Jewish partners.

In 2018, she led the renaming of the organization that combines, since 2012, the seminary and the former Jewish Reconstructionist Communities. She hosts a popular podcast, “Hashivenu: Jewish Teachings on Resilience,” and expanded Ritualwell, an online collection of new rituals and prayers.

But the movement’s reputation as organized Judaism’s progressive vanguard — pioneering the inclusion of women, LGBT people and Jews of color and embracing rituals later adopted by other liberal denominations — has been overshadowed in recent years by internal discord over Israel. Reconstructionist rabbis have taken leading roles in anti-Zionist activism, leading to public complaints by students and alumni and to the formation of Beit Kaplan, a new group of rabbis asserting their support for Israel.

Waxman addressed those tensions last year in remarks at the seminary’s ordination ceremonies, and last July the movement issued a statement reiterating its support for progressive Zionism, the existence of Israel and the two-state solution.

In an interview Tuesday, Waxman emphasized her own personal commitment to Israel and the movement’s stance that it will not submit current or prospective rabbis to “litmus” tests over Zionism.

And she said her decision to step down was not related to the tensions over Israel, but rather a personal decision after 13 years to hand leadership over to a new generation. (The movement has not announced a successor.)

“I deeply believe that institutions need to renew themselves, and that a change in leadership helps toward that renewal,” said Waxman, 58. “When my contract concludes in August of 2026, I will have served 13 years, almost a generation, and I really believe in raising up the next generation of leaders, and so [I’m] stepping aside for the vitality of the Reconstructionist movement.”

Talk of generational change came up frequently in a conversation held shortly before the movement was to announce her decision. Ordained as a rabbi by the RRC in 1999, Waxman said........

© The Times of Israel