Graduate-Level Courses Open to the Public

Interested in deepening your Jewish learning and studying alongside our rabbinical students? Every semester, we invite members of the general public to take selected courses. We hope to see you in our virtual classrooms.

Upcoming Semester Courses 

Eicha Rabbah
Instructor:  Rabbi Mira Wasserman, Ph.D.
Meeting Details:  Hybrid Course that meets Tuesday from 11:15 a.m. – 12:35 p.m. EDT and 1:40-3 p.m. EDT
Credit: 3 RRC credits. 
Course Notes:  Required normally taken in year 3, fulfills Midrash.  This class can be repeated so long as the selected texts are different and it can fulfill Advanced Text or Elective. The course is open to non-matrics.
Prerequisite: Introduction to Rabbinic Literature
Course Description:  Midrash Eicha Rabbah is a work that explores human and divine responses to destruction and loss. It opens with a series of petihtas that imagine God in wildly diverse ways. In this course, we will study a selection of petihtas and other key passages, examining the ways midrash conveys theological ideas. In what ways can Eicha Rabbah serve as a resource for as we confront the losses and traumas of our own age? 

Models of Leadership
Instructor:  Rabbi Sarra Lev, Ph.D.
Meeting Details:  On-line course that meets Monday from 12-1:40 p.m. EDT and Tuesday from 9:30-10:50 a.m. EDT.
Credit: 3 RRC credits
Course Notes:  Normally taken in year 4-5.  This course is a distribution requirement that can fulfill Talmud 3, Advanced Text, or Elective credit.  Course capped to ten.  The course is open to non-matrics.
Prerequisite: Talmud 1 and Talmud 2 and Hebrew 1 and 2
Course Description:  This class will examine issues of leadership through rabbinic literature, primarily the Babylonian Talmud. Through an investigation of various rabbinic texts, we’ll look at different models of leadership in the rabbinic period (including the dayan, the sage, and the parnas) and think about some of the issues involved in being a leader through these texts. The course will examine both halakhic and aggadic passages.

Multi-Faith Literature
Instructor: Amanda Mbuvi, Ph.D.
Meeting Details: Hybrid course that meets Tuesday from 3:30-4:50 p.m. EDT
Credit: 1.5 RRC credits
Course Notes: This course can fulfill Multi-Faith or Elective credit.  Course open to non-matrics. 
Course Description: People often study other religions by examining their sacred texts and/or by reading scholarly analysis. In this course, we’ll take a different approach, engaging other religions through contemporary fiction—novels, short stories, and maybe a children’s book or two. Fiction gives us the opportunity to approach religion from the perspective of lived experience in ways less constrained by our cultural bias and that of academic religious studies.
 

Reconstructionism 1
Instructor:  Rabbi Alex Weissman
Meeting Details:  Hybrid course that meets on Wednesday from 3:30-4:50 p.m. EDT
Credit:  1.5 RRC credits 
Course Notes:  Required, normally taken in Year 2.  Part 1 is in the fall and part 2 is in the spring (1.5 RRC credits for spring).
Course Description:  This course surveys the history of the Reconstructionist movement and places particular emphasis on the basic categories of Mordecai M. Kaplan’s thought. Students become acquainted with the categories that differentiate the Reconstructionist approach to Judaism and reflect upon their continuing relevance.

Festival Liturgy – Shalosh Regalim
Instructor: Hazzan Jessi Roemer
Meeting Details: Online course that meets on Thursday from 1:40-3 p.m. EDT
Credit: 1.5 RRC credits
Course Notes:   This course can fulfill Multi-Faith or Elective credit.  Course open to non-matrics. 

Please refer to the course fees on our website.

If interested, please contact Mary Buhring at MBuhring@rrc.edu to make sure there is still room in the course.

First day of class is Tuesday, August 26, 2025.

Current Tuition Schedule

* For more info on the Biblical Hebrew Online Course, contact Rabbi Melissa Heller.