The New Rabbi

by Stephen Fried

"From award-winning journalist Stephen Fried comes a vividly intimate portrait of American Judaism today in which faith, family, and community are explored through the dramatic life of a landmark congregation as it seeks to replace its legendary retiring rabbi - and reinvent itself for the next generation.". "The center of this compelling chronicle is Har Zion Temple on Philadelphia's Main Line, which for the last seventy-five years has been one of the largest and most influential congregations in America. For thirty years Rabbi Gerald Wolpe has been its spiritual leader, a brilliant sermonizer of wide renown - but now he has announced his retirement. It is the start of a remarkable nationwide search process largely unknown to the lay world - and of much more. For at this dramatic moment Wolpe agrees to give extraordinary access to Fried, inviting him - and the reader - into the intense personal and professional life of the clergy and the complex behind-the-scenes life of a major Conse