Two Orthodox rabbinical students have been ordained by the Rabbinical Seminary Berlin in the eastern German city of Leipzig. Both men were trained at the seminary, located in the German capital and supported by the foundation of World Jewish Congress (WJC) President Ronald S. Lauder (pictured). The seminary is the successor to the institution founded by Rabbi Azriel Hildesheimer in 1873 in Berlin and shut down by the Nazis in 1938. "Judaism is alive and well in Germany," Lauder said during the ceremony. The head of the German Jewish community and vice-president of the WJC, Charlotte Knobloch, praised the contribution of eastern European Jewish immigrants to Jewish life in Germany, which was now there to stay.
Shlomo Afanasev was born in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, where he studied financial management and accounting. He will be working for the Jewish communities in the state of Brandenburg. Moshe Baumel’s family immigrated to Germany from Lithuania in 1991. He will be rabbi and director of Jewish studies at the Zwi-Peres-Chajes School of the Jewish Community of Vienna, Austria. In addition to pursuing ordination, Baumel has studied art history and antiquities.
“The ordination is the apotheosis of all the concerns about whether the Russian immigration to Germany would produce Jewish life,” Rabbi Joshua Spinner, the Rabbinical Seminary's director, told JTA.
