LBI Presents
LBI Presents is a new podcast from the Leo Baeck Institute, New York. It’s hosted by author and journalist Mark Oppenheimer. Mark chats with key experts as we dive into LBI’s vast archive and explore the remarkable lives and histories of German-speaking Jews…beyond the stories you already know. Join us as we bring history to life—and better understand ourselves through the lens of the past.
Produced By: Debbie Pacheco, Emily Morantz
Client: Leo Baeck Institute | New York
About the Host
MARK OPPENHEIMER, the director of open learning at American Jewish University, in Los Angeles, holds a Ph.D. in religious studies from Yale, and has taught at Stanford, Wesleyan, Wellesley, NYU, Boston College, and Yale, where he was the founding director of the Yale Journalism Initiative. From 2010 to 2016, he wrote the “Beliefs” column, about religion, for The New York Times. From 2015-2023 he hosted Unorthodox, the world’s most popular podcast about Jewish life and culture, with over 7 million downloads. He also hosted Gatecrashers, an eight-part podcast about the history of Jews and antisemitism at Ivy League schools. He is the author of five books, most recently Squirrel Hill: The Tree of Life Synagogue Shooting and the Soul of a Neighborhood. His next book will be a biography of Judy Blume. He lives in Connecticut with his wife, four daughters, one son, and two dogs.