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[[Yeshiva University]], a United States private university in [[New York City]], with six campuses in New York and one in Israel, was founded in 1886. It is a research university ranked as 45th105th in the US among national universities by ''[[U.S. News & World Report]]'' in 20122023.
 
==Foundation and early growth==
The [[Etz Chaim Yeshiva (Manhattan)|Etz Chaim Yeshiva]], a [[cheder]]-style elementary school, was founded on the [[Lower East Side]] of [[Manhattan]] in 1886. Prior to its founding, Jewish education in the United States had been limited to supplemental and synagogue affiliated schools. Etz Chaim ("The Tree of Life," a reference to the [[Torah]] from the Biblical [[Book of Proverbs]], and a common name for yeshivas and synagogues) was the first [[yeshiva]] in America; that is, the first full-time, independent Jewish school focusing on the study of the [[Talmud]]. The primary impetus for its establishment was the influx of Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe that began in the 1880s; the school was established along the lines of the Eastern European yeshivas, which themselves had begun to be established in the early 19th Century. However, the New York school, unlike its European counterparts, also offered some secular education, including classes in English. These were very limited at first, but eventually (partially due to New York State law) became a full co-curriculum, something almost unprecedented in the history of Jewish education.
 
The graduates of Etz Chaim had no place in the United States to continue their formal Jewish education after they completed elementary school, and some began studying Talmud with Rabbi Moses Matlin in his Lower East Side apartment. Soon, in 1896, this group formally became an advanced yeshiva, covering high school years and beyond. Rabbi [[Yitzchak Elchanan Spektor]], the chief rabbi of [[Kovno]] (later the capital of [[Lithuania]]), and widely considered the leading rabbi of Eastern Europe at the time, died in that year, and the yeshiva was named in his honor, as Yeshivat Rabbeinu Yitzchak Elchanan ("The Yeshiva of our Rabbi, Isaac Elchanan"). A year after it was founded, the yeshiva was formally chartered by New York State in 1897 as the [[Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary]], which is known to this day by its acronym, '''RIETS'''. The first class of three rabbis was ordained in 1903.
 
Despite its name, RIETS began as a traditional Lithuanian yeshiva, not a rabbinical seminary, with classes focusing only on the traditional subjects of Talmud and Jewish law. However, many of the students desired careers as rabbis, and found themselves in competition with the graduates of the [[Jewish Theological Seminary of America|Jewish Theological Seminary]], at that time still seen as an Orthodox school (it would later become the flagship institution of the [[Conservative Judaism|Conservative]] movement), which, while not stressing the traditional subjects, taught its students practical rabbinics, homiletics, and related subjects, making them more attractive to synagogues seeking rabbis. The students of RIETS struck several times in the mid-1900s, demanding these subjects be taught. The board of directors eventually acceded to their requests, and RIETS continues, to this day, to have the somewhat unusual position of being both a traditional yeshiva, preparing its students for the traditional Orthodox semikha (ordination) by teaching a full curriculum of Talmud and Codes of Law, as well as a rabbinical seminary, teaching various practical rabbinics courses. Rabbinical students may also take courses, depending on their intended field of practice, leading to degrees in Jewish studies, Jewish education, or pastoral social work at other schools of Yeshiva University, while others, including those who intend to teach, focus more intensely on the traditional subjects such as Talmud. In the period following these changes, from 1906–1915, such prominent rabbis as Dr. Phillip Hillel Klein, Moses Zebulon Margolies, and Bernard Levinthal served as RIETS president.
 
Etz Chaim and RIETS, while separate schools, had a close relationship. There were a number of efforts to unite them, which finally succeeded in 1915, when they merged as the Rabbinical College of America. Both schools had each occupied a few locations on the Lower East Side, and now moved into a new building in the neighborhood. Shortly after the merger, the name reverted, for legal reasons, to RIETS, although the most common name used was simply "The Yeshiva." As a number of new Jewish elementary schools were opening at this time, Etz Chaim, the elementary division of the yeshiva, was phased out of existence over the course of the 1920s.
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The women's school was eventually folded into [[Stern College for Women]]. In 1922, Rabbi Shlomo Polachek began to teach at RIETS, being recognized as the top Rosh Yeshiva (teacher of Talmud). When he died in 1928, he was succeeded by Rabbi Moshe Soloveichik.
 
TA provided a college-preparatory education, but there was no college for its graduates to continue their Jewish educations as well. In 1928, the Yeshiva established [[Yeshiva College (Yeshiva University)|Yeshiva College]], which provides both an upper-level yeshiva education as well as a secular university curriculum, awarding a [[Bachelorbachelor's degree]]. It was starting at this time that Revel- and, later, other leaders of Yeshiva- began to develop their philosophy of the integration of religious and secular knowledge. Rabbinic education in RIETS, for those who choose it (most of the undergraduate men do not), now continues for a few years past graduation from college, leading to ordination, and continues further for a select few students. The school now became known as "Yeshiva College and RIETS."
 
Also in the late 1920s, Yeshiva left the Lower East Side and moved to its current location in [[Washington Heights, Manhattan|Washington Heights]], in upper Manhattan. The area centered on 185th Street and Amsterdam Avenue continues to be Yeshiva's main campus, containing the central administration offices, the main library, the undergraduate schools for men, the boys' high school, the rabbinical seminary, and other divisions. The 1928 building, by Charles B. Meyers Associates, is an extravagant [[Moorish Revival]] architectural romance of domes, turrets, and towers done in orange stone, copper, brass and ceramic tiles. It may be the only university campus to have been built in the Moorish revival style, a style widely in use in synagogues from the mid-nineteenth to mid-twentieth century. The [[Great Depression]] began at this time, and Yeshiva was faced with numerous financial difficulties, having to shelve its more extensive building plans in order to stay open. (The campus would not really expand until the 1960s.) Yeshiva established its first graduate school, in Jewish studies, in 1936. At this time, Revel began working to bring over from Europe numerous faculty, in both Jewish and secular subjects, in order to save them from the impending Holocaust.
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The graduate school was named in honor of Revel after his death, at the age of 55, in 1940. Shortly after, Moshe Soloveichik died as well; his place was taken by his son, Rabbi [[Joseph B. Soloveitchik]], who would remain the Rosh Yeshiva for over forty years, teaching and ordaining thousands of rabbis.
 
Revel was succeeded in 1943 by Rabbi Dr. [[Samuel Belkin]], also a European-born scholar, a graduate of [[Brown University]], and a professor of [[greek language|Greek]] at Yeshiva College. Under Belkin, the institution began to expand greatly. University status was obtained in 1945, and over the following decades, many new schools and divisions were opened. [[Stern College for Women]], providing both an advanced Jewish education and full undergraduate curriculum, was established in the 1950s (its campus is in [[Midtown Manhattan]]), as was the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, in the [[Bronx]]. Also established, among others, were a graduate school of education and the humanities (now the graduate school of psychology) and a graduate school of the sciences (now focusing on biomedical studies), a school of Jewish music for the training of cantors, and a division providing various services to the Jewish community at large. Belkin set in process the foundation of [[Cardozo Law School]], which opened, in [[Greenwich Village]], shortly after his death.
 
===Diversification===
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Belkin retired as president in 1975 and was appointed Chancellor. After Belkin died in 1976, Rabbi [[Norman Lamm]] was elected third president of Yeshiva University and, at the same time, president and [[Rosh Yeshiva]] of RIETS. Lamm was the first American-born president and was a graduate of Yeshiva himself: He received his undergraduate degree in chemistry from Yeshiva College, was ordained by RIETS, and received his doctorate (in Jewish philosophy) from the Revel graduate school. He was, at the time, rabbi in a Manhattan synagogue as well as a professor of philosophy at Yeshiva.
 
When Lamm took office Yeshiva was facing a serious financial crisis. As a result, some of the schools and programs had to be consolidated or closed. MoreThe renowned Belfer Graduate School of Science was closed in 1978.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Maeroff |first=Gene |date=November 15, 1981 |title=Yeshiva U., Once Almost Bankrupt, Eagerly Awaits Final Debt Payment |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1981/11/15/nyregion/yeshiva-u-once-almost-bankrupt-eagerly-awaits-final-debt-payment.html?searchResultPosition=1 |access-date= |work=The New York Times |pages=58}}</ref> Once this was stabilized, additional divisions were added: For example, the [[Sy Syms School of Business]], with divisions for both the undergraduate men and women,wome was opened in 1988. At this time, many of the undergraduate students began to spend their first year (or more) studying in yeshivot and other schools in [[Israel]], which has become an almost universal practice, and a Joint Israel Program regulating these studies was established to allow them to receive credit for this year at Yeshiva. RIETS also maintains a campus in [[Jerusalem]], and many of the rabbinic students spend a year studying there as well. Over the course of Lamm's tenure, enrollment grew considerably to over 2000 undergraduate students. In addition to its undergraduate schools and affiliates, Yeshiva maintains graduate schools in Jewish studies, Jewish education and administration, social work, psychology, law, and medicine. There are over fifteen schools in total. In addition, numerous joint undergraduate-graduate programs with other schools in the New York area and beyond are maintained. The Yeshiva University Museum, an affiliate of the school, is now one of the components of the Center for Jewish History, located in downtown Manhattan.
 
===Fourth leader===
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In December 2012, Joel apologized over allegations that two rabbis at the college's high school campus abused boys there in the late 1970s and early 1980s.<ref>{{cite web |title=Yeshiva University president apologizes for '70s and '80s molest allegations |author1=Blau, Reuven |author2=Rachel Monahan |url=http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/yeshiva-university-president-apologizes-1970s-80s-molestations-article-1.1219938 |publisher=New York [[Daily News (New York)|Daily News]] |date=13 December 2012 |accessdate=26 August 2013}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/14/nyregion/report-of-sexual-abuse-rattles-manhattan-yeshiva-campus.html|title=Report of '80s Sexual Abuse Rattles Yeshiva Campus|date=14 December 2012|work=[[New York Times]]}}</ref> Investigations into these allegations by ''[[The Jewish Daily Forward]]''<ref>Berger, Paul, (Jane Eisner, ed.), [http://forward.com/articles/168012/yeshiva-officials-rabbis-knew-of-alleged-abuse/?p=all "Yeshiva Officials, Rabbis Knew of Alleged Abuse"], ''The Forward'', 20 December 2012 (issue of 28 December 2012). Via [http://frumfollies.wordpress.com/2012/12/20/yu-handling-of-molesting-principal-george-finkelstein-is-looking-worse-and-worse/ Yerachmiel Lopin]'s ''Frum Follies'' blog. Retrieved 25 December 2012.</ref> and a law firm hired by the university<ref>{{cite news |url=http://chronicle.com/blogs/ticker/yeshiva-u-mishandled-sex-abuse-allegations-until-2001-report-says/65223 |title=Yeshiva U. Mishandled Sex-Abuse Allegations Until 2001, Report Says |newspaper=[[The Chronicle of Higher Education]] |author=Nick DeSantis |date=28 August 2013 |accessdate=28 August 2013}}</ref> found "multiple instances in which the university either failed to appropriately act to protect the safety of its students or did not respond to the allegations at all." These allegations led to a 380 million dollar lawsuit by former students.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://forward.com/articles/180007/former-yu-high-school-students-file-m-suit-cla/ |title=Former Y.U. High School Students File $380M Suit Claiming Sex Abuse Cover-Up |author=Paul Berger |publisher=[[The Jewish Daily Forward]] |date=8 July 2013 |accessdate=26 August 2013}}</ref> The case has since been dismissed.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://nypost.com/2014/01/30/judge-tosses-380m-sex-abuse-lawsuit-against-yeshiva/ |title=Judge tosses $680M sex abuse lawsuit against Yeshiva U. |work=[[New York Post]] |date=30 January 2014 |accessdate=15 August 2014}}</ref>
===Fifth leader===
Rabbi Dr. Ari Berman began his tenure as Yeshiva University’s fifth president in June 2017.
Dr. Berman has articulated a new business model with investments in key areas such as science and technology, entrepreneurship and innovation, values and leadership and market ready graduates. During his tenure, the university has introduced over 20 new graduate degrees in emerging fields including artificial intelligence, cyber security, physician assistant, biotech management, real estate management, special education, marriage and family therapy, MBA and Masters in Holocaust and Genocide Education. He established new academic centers such as the Emil A. and Jenny Fish Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies. These efforts have produced growth in enrollment as well as in philanthropic gifts including funding for the Shevet Glaubach Center for Career Strategy and Professional Development, the Innovation Lab, new physician assistant and occupational therapy labs as well as state of the art computer science labs. Under his leadership, Yeshiva University has risen 29 places in the U.S. News & World Report.
Dr. Berman is widely published in outlets such as Forbes, Newsweek, and the Wall Street Journal. Dr. Berman graduated with distinction from four of Yeshiva University’s schools. He earned his B.A. from Yeshiva College, his M.A. in Medieval Jewish Philosophy from the Bernard Revel Graduate School of Jewish Studies, and his rabbinical ordination from the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary (RIETS). His studies also included two years of learning at Yeshivat Har Etzion in Israel, under the tutelage of the seminal Jewish thinker and leader Rabbi Dr. Aharon Lichtenstein. After making aliyah to Israel in 2008, Dr. Berman completed his higher education with a Ph.D. in Jewish Thought at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, supervised by philosopher Professor Moshe Halbertal.
 
== References ==
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Yeshiva_University"