Tamara Cohn Eskenazi is The Effie Wise Ochs Professor of Biblical Literature and History at the Reform Jewish seminary
Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion
Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...
in Los Angeles.
She was the first woman hired by the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion as a full-time tenure track faculty member for their rabbinical school in 1990, and became the first female tenured full professor in their rabbinical school in 1995.
She was also the chief editor of ''The Torah: A Women’s Commentary'' ( Andrea Weiss was associate editor), which won the 2008 Jewish Book of the Year Award from the Jewish Book Council.
On May 19, 2013, Eskenazi was ordained as a
rabbi
A rabbi () is a spiritual leader or religious teacher in Judaism. One becomes a rabbi by being ordained by another rabbi – known as ''semikha'' – following a course of study of Jewish history and texts such as the Talmud. The basic form of ...
by the
Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion
Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...
.
Recognition
In 2011, Eskenazi and the late
Tikva Frymer-Kensky
Tikva Simone Frymer-Kensky (October 21, 1943 – August 31, 2006) was a professor at the University of Chicago Divinity School. She received her MA and PhD from Yale University. She had previously served on the faculties of Wayne State Universit ...
won the 2011
National Jewish Book Award
The Jewish Book Council (Hebrew: ), founded in 1944, is an organization encouraging and contributing to Jewish literature. Carol Hamoy created the artwork about Eskenazi.
Selected works
* ''In an age of prose : a literary approach to Ezra-Nehemiah'', 1986
* ''Second Temple studies. Temple and community in the Persian period '', 1991
* ''The Torah : a women's commentary '', 2008
* ''Ruth : the traditional Hebrew text with the new JPS translation '', 2011