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Rabbi Barry Starr

Rabbi Barry Starr, a Conservative Rabbi and Past-President of the Massachusetts Board of Rabbis, was ordained in 1976 from the Jewish Theological Seminary and served three years as assistant Rabbi at Beth El Synagogue in Minneapolis, MN. He then spent three years as the first Recruitment Director for the Jewish Theological Seminary, where he successfully established recruitment as a tool for not only increasing the student population, but for outreaching to communities and bringing the message of the Seminary to its constituents.

Following four years at Temple Israel in Binghamton, NY, he came to Temple Israel in Sharon, MA where he currently serves in his twenty-second year. He has engineered steady growth at Temple Israel not only in numbers, but also in quality of programs and community feelings. The Synagogue has grown during his tenure, and a renovated facility now makes Temple Israel one of the leading Synagogues in the New England region.

Rabbi Starr been a member of the Joint Placement Commission of Conservative Judaism in which capacity he prepared a special report on the situation of Assistant Rabbis and has spoken to the Rabbinical School on the same issue. He also has been the New England Regional President of the Rabbinical Assembly, the umbrella organization for conservative Rabbis, and serves as a Rabbinical Assembly Representative to a Joint Committee with United Synagogue on the commitment to Halakhah in the Conservative Movement. Rabbi Starr has recently stepped down from the Board of Directors of the Joint Retirement Board for Conservative Judaism and has begun serving a term on the Rabbinical Assembly's Committee on Jewish Law & Standards.

In Sharon he has served on numerous committees and organizations including the Sharon Youth Coalition and the Sharon Clergy Association, which he helped found. Always interested in youth, Rabbi Starr served for many years as a member of the United Synagogue Youth National Board of Directors and while at the Seminary, founded OMETZ, a Movement-wide college outreach program that has since grown and changed its name to KOACH.

Rabbi Starr truly believes in the capacity of each Jew to reach the full spiritual potential of which he or she is capable and hopes in his Rabbinate to foster that goal. He lives in Sharon with his wife, Rebecca, and his children Elianna and Uri.

 
A Tribute Book for Rabbi Starr

From the Desk of Rabbi Starr

It may be an apocryphal story. But so it goes that a young aspiring Rabbinical student was facing his acceptance interview to the Jewish Theological Seminary...

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