Home

Walk-ins welcome! Join us Sunday at 5 p.m.

Daughter of legendary “refusenik” Natan Sharansky will be scholar-in-residence in West Hartford

By Stacey Dresner

WEST HARTFORD – Every year on the anniversary of the day her father was released from a Soviet prison in 1986, Rachel Sharansky Danziger’s family celebrated with a “seder.”

“My dad would tell us stories and then me and my sister would ask questions and my parents would give us answers. And the questions changed and evolved as we grew up. They started with, ‘Were there animals in prison?’ and made it all the way to ‘How did you maintain your ability to relate to each other as husband and wife so that 12 years after you were separated you were able to go on with your marriage?’”  

This scholar-in-residence weekend is the handiwork of Beth David member Ben Abrams. He and Rabbi Yitzchok Adler were in the audience when Danziger interviewed her father about Israel at the AIPAC Policy Conference in Washington D.C. last March.  Read the entire Connecticut Jewish Ledger article here:  

Register Now!  

It is Beth David tradition to take one hakafah outside on Simchat Torah. Unbeknownst to us, this year our neighbors across the street at the Catholic church caught our celebration on video! Looking forward to a year of simchas with our wonderful community.

Beth David Synagogue becomes CT’s first synagogue to welcome Orthodox scholar from controversial women’s yeshiva 

By Stacey Dresner

WEST HARTFORD – Jenna Englender is a Jewish scholar.

Currently enrolled in an in-depth course of study that includes Jewish law, Talmud, Torah, Jewish thought, leadership training, and pastoral counseling, Englender will use all that she is learning as the new director of outreach at Beth David Synagogue, a Modern Orthodox congregation in West Hartford. Englender took up her new post on August 1.
     Next year, when she graduates, she has a choice of using the title of either “Maharat” or “Rabba.” Maharat is an acronym for “Torah, spiritual and halachic leader;” Rabba is the feminine for “Rabbi.”
     Beth David’s spiritual leader, Rabbi Yitzchok Adler, says the title is really up to Englender, who this fall will begin her fourth and last year of study at Yeshivat Maharat, the Orthodox women’s yeshiva founded in 2009 by Rabbi Avi Weiss and Rabba Sara Hurwitz.

     “For me it hasn’t really been about the title. It is more about the skills,” she explains. “I think it is important to have had someone say, ‘You have been taught, you have knowledge, you are capable of teaching the community in a serious way.’ But I think the conferral of a degree is very important in that way. It gives a sense of authority to what you are doing that I think is very important.”

Check out the Jewish West Hartford Video! 

We’re glad you found us.

Beth David is the largest orthodox synagogue in the greater Hartford area. For more than 70 years we have been a center of Jewish cultural and spiritual activity for hundreds of families, thousands of people and untold numbers of visitors and friends.

Members come from all over the world and from diverse Jewish traditions to form a friendly, committed and engaged congregation.  We are proud to be part of a thriving and energetic Jewish community in a remarkable town astride the Red Sox/Yankees divide (our Rabbi, a Braves fan, is above that fray), convenient to Boston and New York, home to renowned research, education and medical facilities, with urban amenities and rural tranquility all within easy reach.

If you're planning a visit, please be in touch so that we may welcome you and show you what our community and synagogue have to offer.  Click here to let us know when you'll be in town.  If you're already local, please fill out our Contact Us located in the box to the right.  We look forward to meeting you! 

In the meantime, we welcome you to take a look at this film clip to get another glimpse into what we are all about here at Beth David.  The Making of BDS Welcome Video.

Our ritual committee members stand ready to connect you with whatever Jewish learning interests you have. Strengthen your synagogue skills, learn Torah or Talmud, find a study partner or a mentor. Contact Galya Greenberg to get started.

West Hartford Community Television:  View "Journeys with Jeff"  interview with Rabbi Adler at Beth David Synagogue.