Isaac Klein (1905-1979).Rabbi Isaac Klein was born in Hungary in 1905, and emigrated with his family to the United States in 1921. After earning a BA from City College in New York in 1931, As he was nearing ordination at the Yeshiva's REITS he transferred to the Jewish Theological Seminary of America where he was ordained in 1934. Rabbi Klein subsequently earned a PhD from Harvard. Previously, in 1932, he had married Henriette Levin and was blessed by three children: Hannah (Mrs. Paul Katz), Miriam (Mrs. Saul Shapiro), and Rivkah (Mrs. Gerald Berkowitz). During World War II Rabbi Klein served as a chaplain in the U.S. Army, and later served as a Conservative rabbi in Buffalo, New York. Klein was a leader of the right-wing of the Conservative movement. He was president of the Rabbinical Assembly, 1958-1960, and a member of its Committee on Jewish Law and Standards, 1948-1979. He was also the author of several books, notably, A Guide to Jewish Religious Practice. He was one of the outstanding halakhists of the movement, was president of the Rabbinical Assembly from 1958-1960, a leading member of the Committee on Jewish Law and Standards from 1948 until his death in 1979. 1905 (MCMV) was a common year starting on Sunday (link will display the full calendar). ... Also: 1979 by Smashing Pumpkins. ... Combatants Allied powers: China France Great Britain Soviet Union United States and others Axis powers: Germany Italy Japan and others Commanders Chiang Kai-shek Charles de Gaulle Winston Churchill Joseph Stalin Franklin Roosevelt Adolf Hitler Benito Mussolini Hideki Tōjō Casualties Military dead: 17,000,000 Civilian dead: 33,000... Rabbi, in Judaism, means ‘teacher’, or more literally ‘great one’. The word Rabbi is derived from the Hebrew root word , rav, which in biblical Hebrew means ‘great’ or ‘distinguished (in knowledge)’. Sephardic and Yemenite Jews pronounce this word ribbÄ«; the modern Israeli pronunciation rabbÄ« is derived from a recent (18th... Conservative Judaism, (also known as Masorti Judaism in Israel predominantly), is a modern stream of Judaism that arose out of intellectual currents in Germany in the mid-19th century and took institutional form in the United States in the early 1900s. ... Nickname: Location of Buffalo in New York State County Erie County Government  - Mayor Byron Brown Area  - City 52. ... Originally set up as the alumni association of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America (JTS), the Rabbinical Assembly (RA) is the official, international body of Conservative rabbis, with some 1400 members. ...

As a leading authority on halakha he authored many important teshuvot (responsa), many of which were published in his influential "Responsa and Halakhic Studies". From the 1950s to 1970s, he wrote a comprehensive guide to Jewish law which was used to teach halakha at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. In 1979 he assembled this into "A Guide to Jewish Religious Practice", which is used by laypeople within Conservative Judaism. Halakha (Hebrew: הלכה; also transliterated as Halakhah, Halacha, Halakhot and Halachah with pronunciation emphasis on the third syllable, kha), is the collective corpus of Jewish religious law, including biblical law (the 613 mitzvot) and later talmudic and rabbinic law as well as customs and traditions. ... Note: This is based on an entry from the 1906 public domain Jewish Encyclopedia The responsa literature, known in Hebrew as Sheelot U-teshuvot (questions and answers), is the body of written decisions and rulings given by rabbis to questions addressed to them. ... Note: This is based on an entry from the 1906 public domain Jewish Encyclopedia The responsa literature, known in Hebrew as Sheelot U-teshuvot (questions and answers), is the body of written decisions and rulings given by rabbis to questions addressed to them. ... Halakha (Hebrew: הלכה; also transliterated as Halakhah, Halacha, Halakhot and Halachah with pronunciation emphasis on the third syllable, kha), is the collective corpus of Jewish religious law, including biblical law (the 613 mitzvot) and later talmudic and rabbinic law as well as customs and traditions. ... The Jewish Theological Seminary of America The Jewish Theological Seminary of America, known in the Jewish community simply as JTS, is the academic and spiritual center of Conservative Judaism, and is the movements main rabbinical seminary. ... Also: 1979 by Smashing Pumpkins. ... For other uses, see Jew (disambiguation). ... Conservative Judaism, (also known as Masorti Judaism in Israel predominantly), is a modern stream of Judaism that arose out of intellectual currents in Germany in the mid-19th century and took institutional form in the United States in the early 1900s. ...

The scholarship is prodigious, but the message is not esoteric. Anyone, with any amount of training, can obtain the satisfaction of seeking a traditional answer about our religion by consulting Rabbi Klein's tome. The philosophy upon which the book is written is stated in the Foreword: "The premise on which Torah is based is that all aspects of life - leisure no less than business, worship or rites of passage (birth, bar mitzvah, marriage, divorce, death) - are part of the covenant and mandate under which every Jew is to serve God in everything he does. In the eyes of Torah there is, strictly speaking, no such thing as the purely private domain, for even in solitude - be it the privacy of the bath or the unconsciousness of sleep - one has the capacity and the duty to serve God."

This message, of life seen in total consonance with the dictates of Judaism, permeates the many pages of the book. Rabbi Louis Finkelstein, distinguished scholar of the Jewish Theological Seminary wrote: "There are those who would think that we have but two alternatives, to reject or to accept the law, but in either case to treat it as a dead letter. Both of these alternatives are repugnant to the whole tradition of Judaism. Jewish law must be preserved but it is subject to interpretation by those who have mastered it, and the interpretation placed upon it by duly authorized masters in every generation must be accepted with as much reverence as those which were given in previous generations." Although a member of the Conservative Movement, Rabbi Finkelstein's statement does not essentially differ from those offered by modern Reform exegetes of Judaism.

This understanding, of traditional preservation of the law through its continuous interpretation, lies at the heart of Rabbi Klein's extensive study. It belongs in every Jewish home.

Rabbi Isaac Klein's papers are located at the Archives/Special Collections, Butler Library, State University College at Buffalo, New York. What is present here are fifteen reels of microfilm of those papers. A complete listing of the contents of the microfilm is available in the Ratner Center.

The collection consists of extensive writings by Klein on traditional Jewish practice and law. This includes manuscript material for his books Guide to Jewish Religious Practice (1979), The Ten Commandments in a Changing World (1963), The Anguish and the Ecstasy of a Jewish Chaplain (1974), and his translation of The Code of Maimonides (Mishneh Torah): Book 7, The Book of Agriculture (1979). Also represented are speeches, sermons, articles, and remarks from the conservative Jewish viewpoint on subjects such as medical ethics, dietary laws, adoption, and marriage and divorce. Meeting minutes, annual reports, bulletins, and sermons relating to Klein's rabbinical vocations in Springfield, Massachusetts and Buffalo, New York are also included. The papers contain photographs, wartime letters, and military records of Klein documenting his service in World War II as a director of Jewish religious affairs in Germany.

External links

• About Klein's "A Guide to Jewish Religious Practice"
• Excerpts from "A Guide to Jewish Religious Practice"
• Isaac Klein