The origins of Yeshivat Chovevei Torah go back to 1996 when rabbis Avi Weiss and
Saul Berman founded a program known as
MeORoT that provided supplemental lectures on issues in liberal Orthodoxy to rabbinical students enrolled in
Yeshiva University. At the time, the fellowship was co-sponsored by Yeshiva University,
Edah, and Weiss's synagogue, the
Hebrew Institute of Riverdale. In September 1999, Weiss and Linzer launched Yeshivat Chovevei Torah as an undergraduate learning program primarily for students at
Columbia University and
Barnard College. The YCT University Program had Linzer as its Rosh HaYeshiva and was housed at
Congregation Ramath Orah, a Modern Orthodox congregation on 110th Street in
Manhattan. In January 2000, the leadership of the YCT university program, which consisted of Weiss, Berman, Linzer, and Dov Weiss, decided to create a rabbinical school that would officially open in September 2000. In September 2000, the rabbinical school welcomed its first class of seven students. YCT
ordained its first rabbi in 2003, its first graduating class of rabbis in June 2004, and 27 rabbis by June 2006. Controversies over YCT came to a head when, in 2006, YCT applied for membership in the
Rabbinical Council of America, the rabbinical body affiliated with the
Orthodox Union, the largest North American
Modern and Centrist Orthodox body. YCT subsequently withdrew its application when it became apparent that the application would be denied. YCT graduates, who are not eligible for
RCA membership, can join the
International Rabbinic Fellowship, an organization co-founded in 2008 by Avi Weiss and
Marc Angel.
Terminology For its first 15 years YCT described itself as an "
Open Orthodoxy" institution and its mission statement made heavy use of the term coined by Avi Weiss. The term and concept provoked harsh criticism and were rejected by other Orthodox institutions.
Sylvia Barack Fishman, a professor of
Judaic studies at
Brandeis University stated that some critics used the term Open Orthodox derogatorily rather than descriptively to delegitimize Modern Orthodox Jews who support women's leadership in Judaism. Since then, YCT has distanced itself from the term. In an interview with
The Jewish Week in August 2017, Rabbi
Asher Lopatin, the school's then-president, said: "When they say, 'Open Orthodox,' I say, 'We are Modern Orthodox. We are a full part of Modern Orthodoxy.'" The affiliated women's rabbinical seminary, Yeshivat Maharat, also uses "Modern Orthodox" to describe itself. == Curriculum and pastoral counseling program ==