Breaking Down Patriarchy on Chanukah - with Rabbi Hara Person

While many of our listeners are no doubt getting ready for Christmas festivities this week, for others the winter celebrations have already begun. Candles are being lit, loved ones are gathered close, and latkes are already sizzling in oil as our Jewish friends, family, and neighbors are celebrating Chanukah, the festival of lights.

From Gerda Lerner and Gloria Steinem to Betty Freidan and Naomi Wolf, I have always admired to contributions of Jewish women to feminist thought and yet we haven’t yet had the opportunity to highlight voices from the Jewish community this season. With that in mind, I was so grateful to be put in contact with a fabulous writer, thinker, and rabbi — Hara Person —who generously volunteered to join us this season and share some stories of powerful women in the Jewish holiday tradition.

Rabbi Hara Person (she/her) is the Chief Executive of Central Conference of American Rabbis. Previously, she was the CCAR’s Chief Strategy Officer. In that capacity, she oversaw the Communications Department and served as Publisher of CCAR Press, and worked with leadership on overall organizational strategy.

Rabbi Person was ordained in 1998 from HUC-JIR, after graduating summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Amherst College (1986) and receiving an MA in Fine Arts from New York University/International Center of Photography (1992).

She served as Educator at the Brooklyn Heights Synagogue from 1990-1996, and was the Adjunct Rabbi there from 1998-2019. Since 1998, Rabbi Person has been the High Holy Day Rabbi of Congregation B’nai Olam, Fire Island Pines, NY.

Before coming to the CCAR, Rabbi Person was the Editor-in-Chief of URJ Books and Music, where she was responsible for the revision of The Torah: A Modern Commentary (2005) and the publication of many significant projects, including the Aleph Isn’t Tough adult Hebrew series and Mitkadem: Hebrew for Youth as well as several award-winning children’s books. While at URJ, she was also the Managing Editor of The Torah: A Women’s Commentary, named the National Jewish Book Award Book of the Year in 2008.

Rabbi Person is also the co-author of Stories of Heaven and Earth: Bible Heroes in Contemporary Children’s Literature and as well as co-editor of That You May Live Long: Caring for Your Aging Parents, Caring for Yourself, and Editor of The Mitzvah of Healing. Her essays and poems have been published in various anthologies and journals, including Bridges: A Jewish Feminist Journal, upstreet, Encyclopedia of Jewish American Popular Culture, Women and Judaism, The Continuum Encyclopedia of Children’s Literature, and The Women’s Haftarah Commentary.

Rabbi Person lives in Brooklyn, NY, and is the mother of two adults.