Contact Rabbi Adler rabbiadler@adathisraelnj.org
Rabbi Benjamin Adler has been the spiritual leader of Adath Israel Congregation since 2014. He is passionate about being present and guiding individuals and families through the sweetness, sorrows, challenges, and opportunities of Jewish life. Drawing on the ancient wisdom of the tradition and the progressive values of modern Judaism, he has spent years building and sustaining warm, committed, and caring communities that support each member as they find their own unique spiritual path.
A graduate of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America in New York City where he earned a master’s degree in Jewish Philosophy, Rabbi Adler also studied at the Schechter Institute of Jewish Studies in Jerusalem. Born and raised in San Antonio, Texas, he graduated cum laude from Columbia University with a BA in History.
Before entering rabbinical school, he worked for Congregation B’nai Jeshurun in New York City and spent time working in the digital media world. Rabbi Adler has served congregations in Rockaway, New Jersey, Pittsfield, Massachusetts and Greenport, New York.
He has served as president of the Board of Rabbis of Princeton Mercer Bucks, vice president of the New Jersey Rabbinical Assembly, on the board of trustees of the Gottesman RTW Academy, and on the Religious Pluralism committee of the Jewish Federation of Greater MetroWest New Jersey. Rabbi Adler co-founded the Rockaway Interfaith Community, worked with the New Jersey Muslim-Jewish Solidarity Committee and Clergy of Lawrence Township, and helped plan a conference that trained Conservative rabbis in the skills of community organizing.
When he is not teaching, preaching, and leading his congregation, Rabbi Adler can probably be found following the San Antonio Spurs, reading, watching a good movie or TV show, fixing things around the house, or on the slopes in the winter. He is married to Lisa Adler and they have three children: Ronen, Jonah, and Miya.
Photo credit: Mike Schwartz
Click on the title of the articles below to read on Rabbi Adler’s website
- Feast of Freedom April 18, 2024Each year at Passover, we celebrate our redemption from slavery to freedom. It is a moment of triumph for our people, but how do you observe a holiday like that when you don’t feel a sense of victory? How can you say “we were slaves, but now we are free” when hostages sit in captivity? […]
- Leverage April 5, 2024A few weeks ago, Senator Charles Schumer, the majority leader, made a speech on the Senator floor accusing Israel’s prime minister of being an obstacle to peace and calling for new elections. Many were outraged that Schumer would call for a change in government of an American ally. Others felt that he spoke hard truths […]
- My Shabbat with Joe Lieberman March 28, 2024The news that Joseph Lieberman died this week reminded me of the time twenty years ago that my family and I spent a Shabbat with the senator and his wife in Safed. We were living in Israel during my rabbinical studies and liked to travel around the country as much as possible. One weekend we […]
- From Both Sides Now March 21, 2024The charge that Jews in America have a dual loyalty to both Israel and the United States has been problem since the rise of political Zionism in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. American Jews have struggled to prove that while they can support first the Zionist cause and then the State of Israel, […]
- A Mixed Triumph March 15, 2024Stories from the Holocaust often fall into two categories: tragic tales of murder and destruction, or redemption and triumph in the face of impossible odds. The reality is that many survivors experienced messy, complicated lives during and after the Shoah. These stories may not hit us with a depth of rage or a purely hopeful […]
- Golden Ages March 7, 2024We Jews have a fascination with the idea of the golden age. Because our history has taken us from country to country as we have been welcomed and expelled over the ages, we are sensitive, as a people, to the conditions that surround us. We seek out places that are welcoming to Jews and flee […]
- Make Some Noise February 29, 2024Last Shabbat I spoke about my recent trip to Barcelona and Girona and the dearth of a Jewish presence there. While there are Jewish museums, some archeological sites, and gravestones, the living Jewish community of Spain had to be reconstructed beginning in the 19th century when Jews were allowed to return after their expulsion. There […]
- What’s in a Name? February 16, 2024During the Super Bowl last week, I, like millions of others, was attuned to the most exciting part … the commercials. OK, I enjoyed the game too, but one of my favorite pastimes is to try to guess the product being advertised before it is revealed at the end of the advertisement. In a society […]
- Trade Routes February 9, 2024Almost from the beginning, Israel’s war against Hamas has spread to other parts of the Middle East. At the start of the war the Houthi rebels in Yemen fired missiles and drones that reached Israel’s most southern city, Eilat. The Houthis have no direct point of conflict with Israel since Yemen is over a thousand […]
- Native Sons and Daughters February 2, 2024Several years ago, I gave a sermon in which I argued against the comparison of the conflict between Jews and Palestinians to that of European settlers and Native Americans. Even if one were to say that the Jews who came to the Land of Israel in the late 19th and early 20th centuries were like […]