Reform Congregation Keneseth Israel – Founded 1847
Reform Congregation Keneseth Israel has a remarkable history.
From its modest origins in 1847 as Philadelphia’s fourth synagogue to becoming this area’s first Reform synagogue to the dramatic decision to call the country’s leading rabbinic abolitionist to its pulpit in the middle of the Civil War, to the founding of an agricultural college, to its leading role in the history of Reform Judaism and Reform Jewish music, and to its incredible history of rabbinic and intellectual leadership, KI truly has no peer.
Some of America’s most illustrious Jewish families from the Annenbergs to the Guggenheims to the Rosenwalds have also called KI their spiritual home. Indeed, KI has much to be proud of and to preserve for the future. In the 1970s, KI organized a professional archive that now contains 100,000 pages of original documentation.
Reform Congregation Keneseth Israel – Founded 1847