Leo Baeck College

On behalf of everyone at Leo Baeck College, may this Shavuot be fruitful and bring you abundance.

Study Day & Viva Presentation at Leo Baeck College

Join us at Leo Baeck College for a special Study Day & Viva Presentation celebrating 100 years of the World Union for Progressive Judaism.

As part of the EUPJ and MPJ Darkeinu conference, the day will bring together scholarship, reflection, and the opportunity to connect with the spiritual foundations of Progressive Judaism.

We are also delighted to host fifth-year rabbinical student Yael Tischler’s Viva Presentation, where she will defend her dissertation: ‘Our Monstrous Mother: Encountering Lilith’s Multiplicities’.

📍 Leo Baeck College, The Sternberg Centre
📅 Thursday 25th June 2026

Celebrate a century of WUPJ with us. Find out more and register here: https://lbc.ac.uk/study-day-viva-presentation-lbc/

On Saturday 9th May, The Ark Synagogue inducted its latest rabbi, Rabbi Andrea Kulikovsky, who was ordained by Leo Baeck College last July.

LBC's Principal, Rabbi Professor Deborah Kahn-Harris, attended the induction. She reflected on this momentous occasion: “I was greatly honoured to attend the induction of Rabbi Andrea Kulikovsky at the Ark Synagogue earlier this month. Having been privileged to ordain Rabbi Kulikovsky myself last July, I am thrilled to see her thriving as a congregational rabbi.

Rabbi Kulikovsky is the first Brazilian woman to be ordained by Leo Baeck College as well as the first to serve a UK congregation. It was, therefore, very special to hear from His Excellency Antonio de Aguiar Patriota, the Brazilian ambassador to the UK, during the service.”

A very hearty mazal tov to Rabbi Kulikovsky from everyone at LBC.

Pictures by Kathryn Harker.

✨💡 Want to inspire your students through confident, engaging teaching? 📚

Are you a teacher or teaching assistant in a cheder or Jewish supplementary school?

Looking to grow your confidence, strengthen your skills, and bring fresh energy into your classroom? 🌟

Join our dynamic and engaging 6‑week live online Teacher Training course, designed to give you practical, classroom‑ready tools you can apply immediately — while learning alongside others who share your commitment to Jewish education.

📘 Course Details:
🖥️ 6‑week live online course
📅 3 June – 8 July
🕗 Wednesdays | 7.30–9.00pm (UK time)
💷 £90* for the full course
👉 To find out more and book your place:
https://lbc.ac.uk/lehrhaus-jewish-education/ -21273

Whether you're new to teaching or looking to build on your experience, this course offers the support, skills, and inspiration to help you thrive as an educator. 🌱

✨ Train. Grow. Inspire — take the next step in your teaching journey and unlock your full potential. ✨

* MPJ members are eligible for a 50% discounted fee (£45). To pay the discounted fee, please tick the discount box on the Register and Pay page.

“Bamidbar describes the census taken of the tribes of Israel and their spatial assignments around the Mishkan.”

Read this week's d'var Torah on Parashat Bamidbar by Dr Stacy Hackner, LBC rabbinical student, on our website: https://lbc.ac.uk/parashat-bmidbar/

Earlier today, the Archbishop of Canterbury, The Most Reverend and Right Honourable Sarah Mullally, visited The Sternberg Centre. As part of her visit, she spoke at the Lily Montagu Reading Room.

Reflecting on this extraordinary visit, Rabbi Professor Deborah Kahn-Harris said: “For more than 50 years, Leo Baeck College has been a pioneering partner in the work of interfaith dialogue. Indeed, today we were hosting the organising team of the Jewish-Christian Bible Week conference we co-sponsor every year.

In that context, we were especially honoured to welcome The Rt Revd and Rt Hon Dame Sarah Mullally DBE, the Archbishop of Canterbury, to the Lily Montagu Reading Room. During her visit today to the Sternberg Centre, organised under the auspices of the Movement for Progressive Judaism, the Archbishop spoke compellingly to us about her commitment to solidarity with the Jewish community – a powerful reminder to us of the verse from our shared biblical tradition:

הִנֵּ֣ה מַה־טּ֭וֹב וּמַה־נָּעִ֑ים שֶׁ֖בֶת אַחִ֣ים גַּם־יָֽחַד׃

How good and pleasant it is when kindred dwell together

[Psalm 133:1].”

Picture by Zoe Norfolk.
For more information and pictures, visit our website: https://lbc.ac.uk/archbishop-of-canterbury-visits-the-lily-montagu-reading-room/

On Sunday 15th March 2026 LBC Principal, Rabbi Professor Deborah Kahn-Harris and LBC Alum, Rabbi Dr Jonathan Romain MBE, sat down to discuss Jewish beliefs, values and evolving practices in the modern world at this year’s edition of The Voices of Faith Festival.

Visit our website to watch the recording from this event: https://lbc.ac.uk/lbc-principal-at-the-voices-of-faith-festival-at-barbican-centre/

This week, we were joined in the Lily Montagu Reading Room for a wonderful, interactive session by the Alyth Synagogue Pardes Group.

LBC's Senior Librarian, Cassy Sachar reflected: “It was a joy to welcome our first congregational group to visit the Leo Baeck College Library’s wonderful new space and explore our collections together.”

Join us on Thursday 14th May for another special event in the Lily Montagu Reading Room as we explore international artist Maty Grünberg’s The Book of Ruth. At this interactive event, we will delve into the moving story of faith and friendship through art and poetry.

For more information and to book today, please visit: https://lbc.ac.uk/library-resources/visit/events/speaking-of-ruth-event/

“At a time when we are fearful of many things, almost all of them completely beyond our power to control, it is excellent advice to stay as cool as we can, to keep our heads while all about us are losing theirs, and to carry on, as normally as possible, with our lives.”

Read this week's d'var Torah on Parashat B’har B’chukkotai from the LBC archives by Rabbi Dr Charles Middleburgh, Dean and Director of Jewish Studies at LBC, on our website: https://lbc.ac.uk/parashat-bhar-bchukkotai-from-the-lbc-archive/

LBC is pleased to announce its latest intake of progressive Judaism student rabbis.

Four students will start on LBC’s acclaimed five-year Rabbinic Programme in September 2026. The four encompass an eclectic range of backgrounds and nationalities, but all share a passion for progressive Judaism and a thirst to be part of communal life in the UK and beyond.

Additionally, we will also be joined by a 5th student rabbi, finishing his studies with us. We will introduce you to our transfer student in the coming weeks.

For more information about our class of first-year student rabbis, please head over to our website: https://lbc.ac.uk/leo-baeck-college-introduces-the-2026-2027-cohort/

Speaking of Ruth event at the Lily Montagu Reading Room on Thursday 14th May.

International artist Maty Grünberg’s beautiful artist’s book The Book of Ruth, explores the moving story of faith and friendship through art and poetry. Join us ahead of Shavuot to explore the images and soundscape Grünberg and poet Linda Zisquit created, as we accompany Ruth and Naomi on their journey.

On Thursday 14th May the library will become an art gallery with all 18 woodcuts and texts illustrating the book of Ruth will be on display in the Lily Montagu Reading Room.

Booking required. For more information and to book today visit our website: https://lbc.ac.uk/library-resources/visit/events/speaking-of-ruth-event/

⏳ YOUR LAST CHANCE TO BOOK ⏳

🎨🖼️ Curious How Jewish Thought Reframes Art and Beauty? – A Distinctly Jewish Perspective

Join us for a four‑week online course exploring Jewish art and aesthetics. Together, we move through a Jewish gallery of texts, images, gardens, and ideas — from Genesis and the Garden of Eden to modern art and contemporary questions about beauty and appearance.

Across the course, we’ll consider creation as a work of design, Jewish approaches to images, and what Jewish philosophy can teach us about how we see the world today.

📘 Course Details:
🖥️ 4‑week live online course
🗓️ 5–26 May 2026
🕗 Tuesdays | 7.30–9.00pm UK time
💷 £60 for the full course

🔗To book your place, click here:
👉https://lbc.ac.uk/lehrhaus-jewish-studies/ -21352

✨ Join a thoughtful Jewish conversation about art, beauty, and seeing.

“Shelomit’s son wants one thing: belonging. He is both Egyptian and Israelite; he is neither fully Egyptian nor fully Israelite. His identity is multiple, mixed and fluid, he defies fixed categories. And yet, Shelomit’s son has made his choice. He has followed his mother’s people into the wilderness.”

Read this week's d'var Torah on Parashat Emor by Yael Tischler, LBC rabbinical student, on our website: https://lbc.ac.uk/parashat-emor/

🎨🖼️ Curious How Jewish Thought Reframes Art and Beauty? – A Distinctly Jewish Perspective

Join us for a four‑week online course exploring Jewish art and aesthetics. Together, we move through a Jewish gallery of texts, images, gardens, and ideas — from Genesis and the Garden of Eden to modern art and contemporary questions about beauty and appearance.

Across the course, we’ll consider creation as a work of design, Jewish approaches to images, and what Jewish philosophy can teach us about how we see the world today.

📘 Course Details:
🖥️ 4‑week live online course
🗓️ 5–26 May 2026
🕗 Tuesdays | 7.30–9.00pm UK time
💷 £60 for the full course

🔗 Book here: https://lbc.ac.uk/lehrhaus-jewish-studies/ -21352

✨ Join a thoughtful Jewish conversation about art, beauty, and seeing.

“"Love your fellow [Israelite] as yourself" (Lev. 19:18), and "The strangers who reside with you shall be to you as your citizens; you shall love each one as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt. I the Eternal am your God." (Lev. 19: 34) Taken as a pair, these two instructions command us to love – to love – everyone we might reasonably come into direct contact with most of the time, our fellow Israelites, or Jews in today's parlance; and the stranger among us, or non-Jews.”

Read this week's d'var Torah on Parashat Acharei Mot-Kedoshim by Richard Allen Greene, LBC rabbinical student, on our website: https://lbc.ac.uk/parashat-archarei-mot-kedoshim/

🌍 Is the Planet Asking Us for Love?

As the climate crisis deepens, many Jews feel called to act—not only to protect the planet, but to respond to its suffering with care and responsibility.

This thought provoking talk explores whether one of Judaism’s most enduring commandments, to love the stranger, can help us rethink our relationship with the natural world. Might this call to love now extend beyond humanity itself?

Join us for a thoughtful exploration of Jewish ethics, environmental activism, and how Torah might speak from within a wounded planet.

📘 Talk Details:
🖥️ One off online talk
🗓️ Thursday 30 April 2026
🕗 7:30–9:00pm (UK time)
💷 £5
🔗 Book your place: https://lbc.ac.uk/lehrhaus-jewish-education/ -21343

✨Join us and engage the deep questions at the intersection of Torah, ethics, and the environment.

On Sunday 19th April, the Lily Montagu Reading Room hosted a Gentle Craftivism Workshop, bringing together crafters and activists from six Progressive Jewish communities to explore principles and practices to do things differently.

It was a wonderful example of how the LBC library is a source of inspiration and information not just for text study but for art and activism, and every aspect of Jewish life. It brought together rabbis, congregants, crafters and changemakers, enriching the library’s community of readers.

This was workshop was supported by Women of Reform Judaism, and we are grateful to our sisters across the pond for sharing our vision of invigorating and transformative learning at the LBC Library.

For more pictures and to find out more, please visit our website: https://lbc.ac.uk/craftivism-workshop-lmrr/

🗡️🛡️ Courage Wore a Kippah: When Torah Met the Sword

What if a rabbi was also a battlefield commander?
What if Jewish leadership once wore armour as well as learning?

Step into a remarkable — and little‑known — chapter of Jewish history.

This fascinating one‑off Jewish Studies talk reveals the astonishing life of Rabbi Shmuel HaNagid of Granada: rabbi, Talmudist, courtier, war poet and field marshal. A towering figure of the Jewish “Golden Age” of Muslim Spain, his story overturns everything we assume about Jewish power, leadership and creativity.

✨ Faith and politics.
✨ Poetry and war.
✨ Torah and the sword.

Join us to explore a world where all of these collided — and to rethink what Jewish leadership once looked like, and what it might still be.

📘 Talk Details:
🗓️ Wednesday 29 April
🕢 7:30 – 9:00pm (UK time)
💷 £5 · one‑off live online talk
🔗 Book your place here: https://lbc.ac.uk/lehrhaus-jewish-studies/ -21353

Come for the history. Leave inspired.

Yom Ha'atzmaut Sameach from Leo Baeck College.

“It is interesting that this double Parashat Tazria-Metzora, and the halacha which grew from it, is the one which causes such difficulty in the Progressive Jewish world.”

Read this week's d'var Torah on Parashat Tazria-Metzora by Shamaya Mirviss-Carvajal, LBC rabbinical student, on our website: https://lbc.ac.uk/parashat-tazria-mtzora/

Leo Baeck College’s secrets unlocked

It is well known that we in Britain (and many synagogues abroad) are lucky to have a constant supply of rabbis that have been trained at the Leo Baeck College.

What is not generally known is that part of their course involves writing a lengthy thesis on a Jewish topic. However, these fascinating original works have largely been read only by the examiners and a few others. What a waste! However, in order to celebrate the College’s 70th anniversary since its establishment in 1956, a book has just been published which contains a shortened version of 27 of them by the original writers, covering a variety of subjects including:

How do you deal with bad rabbis?
What does Judaism say about eating disorders?
How do Jewish ethics interact with social media?
What is so unique about the Jewish approach to death and dying?
Did you know there is a Jewish theology of sleep?
What should we do about the sale of defective goods?
How did the Bible get divided into chapters and verses?
To what extent should we redistribute money to the poor?
What happened when anti-alienism coincided with antisemitism?

These and many more intriguing topics are in Judaism Uncovered, edited by Rabbi Dr Jonathan Romain. The book is 255 pages, costs £9.99, makes fascinating reading for you and is the ideal present for others. It is available from the College and can be obtained by emailing: [email protected].

On Sunday 19th April, 10.30am-12.30pm, award winning activist, author and founder of the global Craftivist Collective [], Sarah P. Corbett will lead a session at LBC’s Lily Montagu Reading Room on her ‘Gentle Protest’ methodology with a hands-on activity to put your learning into practice and see where gentle craftivism might be a useful tool for you and your communities on issues you care about.

Sarah says "I love making workshop spaces multisensory to help people engage deeply and compassionately on how they can use creativity and campaign actions to help our world flourish."

If we want our world to be more beautiful, kind and fair, can we make our activism to be more beautiful, kind and fair? It sometimes feels like the only way to create change is to stand up and fight for the world we want to see. To march under giant banners and shout to have our voices heard. There’s time for the loud, there’s also time for the quiet. There’s time for the fast, there’s also a need for the slow. Learn the theory and practice of Corbett’s ‘gentle protest’ approach to using handicrafts as a tool for craftivism (craft + activism) mitigates risk of polarisation and can create real and positive change. No craft skills needed. Just an open heart and open mind. Suitable for adults only.

Last few places left, sign up today: https://lbc.ac.uk/library-resources/visit/events/craftivist-workshop-lbc/

📖✡️ Discover Hebrew and Build Your Confidence — From Aleph to Amen!
א ב ג ד ה ו ז ח ט י כ ל מ נ ס ע פ צ ק ר ש ת

Beginning your Hebrew journey and wanting to build the skills to read prayers and blessings in Hebrew with ease?
Exploring Judaism, beginning conversion, or simply ready to start?

Join Hagit Tal for this warm and accessible beginner‑friendly, two‑term live online course, designed to help you learn the Hebrew alphabet from your very first letter to reading Hebrew prayers and reciting blessings with confidence.

Over these two inspiring terms*, you will:
🔹 Build clear, confident pronunciation
🔹 Practise reading from prayer books, Biblical texts & Hebrew literature
🔹 Enrich your experience of Shabbat and festival services
🔹 Develop a meaningful connection to Hebrew

📘 Course Details:
🖥️ 12 weeks live online course* (Each term is 12 weeks)
🗓️ 15 April – 8 July 2026
🕗 Wednesdays · 7:00–8:30pm UK time
💷 £180 for Term 1
📘 Textbook (Aleph to Amen): £40 + postage
🔗 Click here to book your place:
https://lbc.ac.uk/lehrhaus-languages/ -21533

✨ Learn. Read. Connect — Start your Hebrew journey here! ✨

From everyone at Leo Baeck College – we are wishing you a peaceful Passover.

Watch Leo Baeck College Principal’s, Rabbi Professor Deborah Kahn Harris’ Pesach video message here: https://lbc.ac.uk/chag-pesach-sameach-5786/