Welcome to the Richard S. Dinner Center for Jewish Studies

The Richard S. Dinner Center for Jewish Studies (CJS) offers courses in Jewish Studies for students at the CJS and throughout the GTU, the University of California, Berkeley, and to the wider community. Community auditors are generally welcome as well, with a minor tuition fee. The CJS faculty is committed to combining rigorous text-study of primary sources with sophisticated interdisciplinary approaches – all within a non-sexist, non-homophobic, non-ethnocentric learning environment. Among our areas of focus are the study of Jewish-Christian relations from late antiquity to modernity, the classical Jewish library, Jewish secular culture, and Jewish literary studies. The Center also hosts conferences and lectures, celebrations of Jewish holidays, and other programs that are open to the public.

Contact

Mailing Address: Center for Jewish Studies, 2400 Ridge Road, Berkeley, CA 94709.
Offices are located at 2465 Le Conte Avenue, Berkeley.
510/649-2482, cjs@gtu.edu

The Berkeley-Jerusalem Fellowship at the Graduate Theological Union and the Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies

The Richard S. Dinner Center for Jewish Studies at the Graduate Theological Union and the Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies are pleased to announce the establishment of a new fellowship for students pursuing an M.A. in Jewish Studies at the GTU, with supplementary studies at the Pardes Institute in Jerusalem. This fellowship allows students to take full advantage of the resources at both institutions and inaugurate a collaboration for the mutual benefit of the students, faculty and community at the GTU and at Pardes.  

The Berkeley-Jerusalem fellowship will provide the full tuition for the M.A. in Jewish Studies at the GTU, as well as tuition at Pardes for one semester, funding for summer Hebrew language study at an Ulpan, travel to Jerusalem and a stipend for additional expenses.

Berkeley-Jerusalem fellows would be expected to study at CJS for the first year of their program, and to attend a summer Hebrew Ulpan in Israel (where necessary), and spend the fall semester of their second year at Pardes. Students may also choose to attend the Pardes summer program. Fellows are expected to return to Berkeley in the spring to complete their M.A. at GTU. While in Israel, students will work in close consultation with faculty from both institutions, regarding their course of study and evaluation. Students can receive up to twelve units of academic credit, through GTU, for their studies in Jerusalem.

Timeline

Students will apply for the Berkeley-Jerusalem Fellowship as part of their M.A. applications to CJS for studies beginning in the fall of 2013 (due February 15, 2013). The first fellowships will be awarded in March 2013; the fellow or fellows will begin in the fall of 2013, with travel to Pardes in the summer of 2014 and graduation in spring 2015. Fellows may complete the M.A. program in three years, if needed.

For more information, please contact Daniella Bensimon at cjs@gtu.edu.

The Richard S. Dinner Center for Jewish Studies is grateful for the generous support of the Koret Foundation, the Taube Foundation for Jewish Life and Culture, the Osher Foundation, the Bernard Osher Jewish Philanthropies Foundation, and the Posen Foundation.

Make a donation to support CJS or give a monthly gift by contacting the Gifts Coordinator, 510/649-2531.

Monthly gifts will continue until the GTU is notified by the donor to terminate the gift.