Barry W. Holtz

Barry W. Holtz is the Theodore and Florence Baumritter Professor of Jewish Education at The Jewish Theological Seminary (JTS). Born in Boston, he grew up in Brookline, MA. He received his undergraduate education at Tufts University and his doctorate from Brandeis University in English and American Literature where his dissertation advisor was the distinguished poet and literary theorist Allen Grossman. He was a member of the founding group of Havurat Shalom, the first of the independent havurot (intensive Jewish communities) that have had a profound influence on American Jewish life. Upon completing his doctorate he taught both English and Jewish studies at a Jewish private high school outside of Philadelphia. During that time he decided to move his central focus away from English literature to Jewish education. He came to JTS in 1978 and for 12 years was co-director of the Seminary's Melton Research Center for Jewish Education. From 2008 to 2013 he served as dean of JTS's Davidson Graduate School of Jewish Education. His early training in literature--both with two outstanding English teachers at Brookline High School and with professors at Tufts and Brandeis-- has deeply influenced both his educational scholarship and the books he has edited and written for general audiences. His books include: most recently Rabbi Akiva: Sage of the Talmud; Back to the Sources: Reading the Classic Jewish Texts; Finding Our Way: Jewish Texts and the Lives We Lead Today; Textual Knowledge: Teaching the Bible in Theory and in Practice; and (with Arthur Green) Your Word is Fire: The Hasidic Masters on Contemplative Prayer.