Rabbi Steven Greenberg

Rabbi Steven Greenberg received his B.A. in philosophy from Yeshiva University and his rabbinical ordination from Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary. He is a Senior Teaching Fellow at CLAL (National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership), a think tank, leadership training institute and resource center in New York City, and the Director of Orthodox Programs for Nehirim: GLBT Jewish Culture and Spirituality.

Steve is an openly gay Orthodox rabbi and a founder of the Jerusalem Open House, the Holy City’s LGBT community center and home to World Pride 2006. After coming out publicly, Rabbi Greenberg appeared in the film Trembling Before G-d, a documentary about gay and lesbian Orthodox Jews. Following the film’s release in October 2001, Steve joined the filmmaker, Sandi Simcha DuBowski, in an outreach project carrying the film across the globe as a tool for spiritual renewal, social change and community dialogue.

Rabbi Greenberg is the author of Wrestling with God and Men: Homosexuality in the Jewish Tradition (University of Wisconsin Press, February 2004).

News and Politics

An Orthodox Jewish Case for Marriage Equality

By Rabbi Steven Greenberg

Now that there are churches and synagogues that perform and hold sacred same-sex vows, the state cannot choose to reject these marriages any more than it can reject marriages that I, as an Orthodox rabbi, would not perform because one partner is a Jew and another a Christian.