Alan Mittleman

Alan Mittleman is director of the Louis Finkelstein Institute for Religious and Social Studies and professor of Jewish Philosophy at The Jewish Theological Seminary. As director of The Finkelstein Institute, Dr. Mittleman brings programs at the intersection of religion and public affairs to JTS and the general community.

Dr. Mittleman is the author of three books: Between Kant and Kabbalah (SUNY Press, 1990), The Politics of Torah (SUNY Press, 1996), and The Scepter Shall Not Depart From Judah (Rowman & Littlefield, 2000). He is also the editor of Jewish Polity and American Civil Society (Rowman & Littlefield, 2002), Jews and the American Public Square (Rowman & Littlefield, 2002), and Religion as a Public Good (Rowman & Littlefield, 2003). His many articles, essays, and reviews have appeared in such journals as Harvard Theological Review, Modern Judaism, the Jewish Political Studies Review, the Journal of Religion, and First Things. He is a contributor to The Cambridge Companion to American Judaism. Mittleman's current project is a book on the philosophical and theological dimensions of hope in democratic political theory, under contract with Oxford University Press.

Dr. Mittleman served as professor of Religion at Muhlenberg College from 1988 to 2004. He is a member of several learned societies and is a fellow of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs. From 2000 to 2004, Dr. Mittleman served as director of the major research project "Jews and the American Public Square," which was initiated by The Pew Charitable Trusts. Under his direction, the project produced two national surveys of Jewish attitudes on public affairs, three volumes comprising forty scholarly essays, and fifteen conferences around the United States. He is the recipient of an Alexander von Humboldt Foundation Research Fellowship and served as guest research professor at the University of Cologne (1994 and 1996). He has lectured widely in Germany in the course of more than fifty trips to that country. Dr. Mittleman also received a Harry Starr Fellowship in Modern Jewish History from Harvard University's Center for Jewish Studies (1997).

Dr. Mittleman has been an active participant in interfaith dialogue throughout his career and has been interviewed by Time, Newsweek, the New York Times, and USA Today, among other periodicals, and has appeared on Fox News. He was also part of a leadership delegation that met with Pope John Paul II. During the bicentennial of the US Constitution, Dr. Mittleman spoke on the meaning of religious liberty for American Jews in the chambers of the US Senate. He has served on the Advisory Board of the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life. He served as visiting professor of Religion at Princeton University in 2007.

Dr. Mittleman holds a BA (magna cum laude) from Brandeis University and an MA and PhD (with distinction) from Temple University. He lives in Allentown, Pennsylvania, with his wife, Patti, and their sons, Ari and Joel.

July 2007

Books

§   Between Kant and Kabbalah   Available for Purchase

§   The Politics of Torah   Available for Purchase

§   The Scepter Shall Not Depart from Judah   Available for Purchase

§   Jewish Polity and American Civil Society   Available for Purchase

§   Jews and the American Public Square  Available for Purchase

§   Religion as a Public Good   Available for Purchase