Legacy of Rabbi Sacks is spreading worldwide

Three years after his passing, the teachings of Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, an educator and member of the British House of Lords, continue to impact people worldwide.

Now, the Rabbi Sacks Legacy, set up after his untimely passing at 72, has launched the Rabbi Sacks Scholars Programme to afford those who had a personal connection with Rabbi Sacks the chance to delve into his teachings through a series of seminars and a Jerusalem retreat. It has selected 27 scholars for a high-level Jewish educational and leadership initiative.

Meanwhile, Bar-Ilan University in Ramat Gan is establishing the Jonathan Sacks Institute to “ensure that Rabbi Sacks’ ideas receive the attention and recognition that they deserve within academia, through programs and research, especially as they relate to contemporary moral, social and political challenges.”

“Rabbi Sacks was a master communicator, distilling complex Jewish concepts into understandable insights for people of all ages and backgrounds,” said Joanna Benarroch, chief executive of the Rabbi Sacks Legacy. “His timeless messages continue to inspire and guide communities of faith and society as a whole.”

The program will empower the late rabbi’s students to “share his philosophy with future generations,” added Benarroch.

“It is a humbling and exciting opportunity to help perpetuate Rabbi Sacks’ memory and messages, which have become essential in our fractured world today,” said Rabbi Seth Grauer, head of school of the Bnei Akiva Schools in Toronto, is among the program’s first participants — from America, Canada, Great Britain, South Africa, Australian and Israel.

Grauer met Rabbi Sacks at a 2010 fundraising dinner for Yeshivat Har Etzion, a religious seminary in Alon Shvut, an Israeli settlement in Gush Etzion, and the two had a close relationship thereafter.

The program starts with a retreat in Jerusalem to provide scholars with access to high-level Israeli leaders who are guided by Sacks’ philosophy that “leadership at its highest transforms those who exercise and those who are influenced by it.”

Mijal Bitton, rosh kehilla and co-founder of Manhattan’s Downtown Minyan and a Shalom Hartman Institute scholar-in-residence, is one of four scholars in the program who hails from New York. She met Rabbi Sacks when he served as a visiting professor at New York University.

“Being included among his students in [this] program is a humbling honor and a precious responsibility,” Bitton told JNS.

“I look forward to delving deep into his ideas and having the unique opportunity to better understand his mastery of Torah; his exceptional leadership; and the ways in which he delivered his transformative message to the Jewish community and the world.”

Bar-Ilan hopes to do something similar with its new institute, which will aim to develop a “diverse network of alumni with leadership potential who can make a practical impact on the future of Israeli, Jewish and world society, inspired and guided by Rabbi Sacks’ vision,” it stated.

Rabbi Sacks’ influence extended beyond Judaism specifically and religion more broadly, said JonathanRynhold, head of Bar-Ilan’s department of political studies, who will be the institute’s academic director. It was “both timely and timeless,” Rynhold said.

Even among the many great rabbinical minds, Rabbi Sacks stood out for his development of “a body of thought deeply grounded in the Jewish religious tradition that speaks to the most important contemporary issues for Jews and non-Jews alike,” Rynhold continued.

“Rabbi Sacks was deeply concerned with the threat to a free democratic society posed by rampant individualism on the one hand and religious extremism on the other,” he explained. “He argued that our ability to overcome these challenges depends on a civic culture that engages in debates with mutual respect — a moral ecology that provides hope and builds connections and trust between different communities.”

Fundraising is currently underway for the institute, which hopes to open in fall 2024, Rynhold said. It will have bachelor’s level programming for outstanding students, as well as scholarships for master’s degree and doctoral level theses, plus seminars, visiting lectureships and an annual prize for a leading public intellectual.