Joseph Rudavsky

Rabbi Rudavsky (1922-2016), a Brooklyn native, was spiritual leader of Temple Sholom, a Reform congregation, from 1962 to 1988. The synagogue became Temple Avodat Shalom after a 2009 merger with a Fair Lawn congregation. The Holocaust was Rabbi Rudavsky's academic specialty. He earned a doctorate in Holocaust studies from New York University and wrote a book titled "To Live With Hope, to Die With Dignity: Spiritual Resistance in the Ghettos and Camps." In 1980, on the heels of the acclaimed television miniseries "Holocaust," he founded what is now The Gross Center for Holocaust & Genocide Studies at Ramapo College. Rabbi Rudavsky taught classes on the Holocaust at Ramapo and created workshops for high school teachers who wanted to incorporate the Holocaust into their curriculums. He was the center's director until 1996. Prior to coming to Temple Sholom, Rabbi Rudavsky directed Hillel organizations at the University of Texas and the University of Georgia, and occupied the pulpit of a congregation in Lawrence, Massachusetts.