Article · Wikipedia archive · Last revised Jul 19, 2026

Yitzchak Breitowitz

Yitzchak (Irving) Breitowitz is an American-born Orthodox rabbi and lawyer. He is the Rabbi Emeritus of Woodside Synagogue Ahavas Torah in Silver Spring, Maryland, and the Rav of Kehillas Ohr Somayach, and lecturer at Ohr Somayach in Jerusalem.

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Rabbi
Yitzchak Breitowitz
Breitowitz speaks at Ohr Somayach, 2023
Personal life
BornIrving Breitowitz
1954 (age 71–72)
New York
EducationHarvard Law School
Religious life
ReligionJudaism
Jewish leader
YeshivaNer Yisrael, Ohr Somayach

Yitzchak (Irving) Breitowitz is an American-born Orthodox rabbi and lawyer. He is the Rabbi Emeritus of Woodside Synagogue Ahavas Torah in Silver Spring, Maryland, and the Rav of Kehillas Ohr Somayach, and lecturer at Ohr Somayach in Jerusalem.

Early life and education

Breitowitz was born in April 1954 in New York, to Holocaust survivors David and Helen Breitowitz.123

Breitowitz grew up in the Greater Hartford, Connecticut area. He attended Ner Israel Yeshiva in Baltimore. He received his bachelor of Arts from Johns Hopkins University and his Juris Doctor at Harvard Law School in 1979. In 1979 he obtained rabbinic ordination from Ner Israel Rabbinical College.45

Career

After graduating Breitowitz worked in private practice in Chicago where he also was law clerk for Susan Getzendanner of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois and taught at the Chicago-Kent College of Law and at the University of Illinois.67

Breitowitz returned to Baltimore in 1983 he joined the faculty of the University of Maryland School of Law as an associate professor of law, specializing in bankruptcy, commercial law and bioethics.6789 In 2001 Breitowitz was named "Outstanding Teacher of the Year" by the University.10

He was the rabbi of Woodside Synagogue Ahavas Torah in Silver Spring, Maryland for 22 years starting in 1988.6

In April 2010 Breitowitz moved to Israel where he became a senior lecturer in Ohr Somayach Yeshiva in Jerusalem and the rabbi of Kehillas Ohr Somayach.111213

Personal life

Breitowitz is married to Sally Naiman. They have one son.14

Select bibliography

See also

See also

References

References

  1. "Breitowitz, David".
  2. "Breitowitz". 12 March 2014.
  3. "Helen Breitowitz Obituary (2014) Hartford Courant". Legacy.com.
  4. "University of Maryland School of Law : Catalog, 1988-1989".
  5. "Rabbi Yitzchak Breitowitz".
  6. "Rav Yitzchak Breitowitz – Rabbi Emeritus – Woodside Synagogue".
  7. "Professor Rabbi Irving Breitowitz, JD". Archived from the original on 2022-08-18. Retrieved 2022-08-31.
  8. Irving Breitowitz All People
  9. "Jacobs drops suit against Mercantile". Baltimore Sun. 13 November 1992.
  10. "Law Notes". Maryland Daily Record. 28 March 2001.
  11. "The Program".
  12. "Jinternship".
  13. https://tikvahfund.org/faculty/rabbi-yitzchak-breitowitz/
  14. https://judaism.stackexchange.com/questions/13291/are-children-adopted-by-jews-jewish
  15. Cobin, David M. (February 9, 2002). "Between Civil and Religious Law: The Plight of the Agunah in American Society. By Irving A. Breitowitz. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press1993. Pp 279. $72.50. ISBN: 0-313-28471-7". Journal of Law and Religion. 17: 203–206. doi:10.2307/1051419. JSTOR 1051419 – via Cambridge University Press.
  16. Breitowitz, Irving (April 1, 1992). "The Plight of the "Agunah:" A Study in "Halacha," Contract, and the First Amendment". Faculty Scholarship.
External links