Honorary Degree Recipients and Honorees

Rabbi Fabian Schonfeld  |  Sylvia Axelrod Herskowitz  
 Rabbi Jacob Haberman  |  Lin-Manuel Miranda |  David Shatz  

Rabbi Fabian Schonfeld 

Rabbi Fabian Schonfeld, recipient of the OU’s National Rabbinic Centennial Medallion Award, serves as rabbi of the Young Israel of Kew Gardens Hills, New York, a position he has held with distinction for fifty-four years. Currently president of Poalei Agudath Israel of America, as well as past president of the RCA and past chairman of the Council of Young Israel Rabbis, Rabbi Schonfeld is also the founder of the Vaad Harabonim of Queens.

Sylvia Axelrod Herskowitz 

Sylvia Axelrod Herskowitz retired on February 1, 2009 as director of the Yeshiva University Museum, a position she held since 1976. Mrs. Herskowitz saw the nascent museum as the partner of the University, and – working closely with philanthropist and founder Erica Jesselson – she gave it a special identity, shaping it as a teaching museum that would collect, interpret and exhibit the art, artifacts and material culture of Jews the world over, through creative and evocative interdisciplinary exhibitions, catalogues and programs for people of all ages, Jews and non-Jews.

Ms. Herskowitz recognized the importance of offering contemporary artists grappling with Jewish themes a venue where they can show their work and communicate their ideas to the visiting public. Over the years the YU Museum has become a magnet for Jewish artists from America, Israel and around the world

Ms. Herskowitz built a museum education department that forged strong and ongoing links with the entire network of Jewish schools of every denomination in the metropolitan New York area and beyond. She also recognized the need for the YU Museum to be a cultural resource for the entire community. In Washington Heights, the Museum’s art program, Seeing in Living Color, offered art to area public school children and their teachers, while in the downtown location, special programming enabled talented public high school students to assemble a portfolio that could gain them entry to the many design careers available in New York City.

Ms. Herskowitzs has had a lifelong interest in the creative and fine arts. She graduated from the High School of Music and Art and Hunter College, where she earned a BFA. She received her Hebrew education at the Marshalliah Hebrew High School and the Herzliah Hebrew Institutes, and did graduate work in education and art at the Bank Street College and the New School. She also studied painting with watercolor master Dong Kingman in NY. During the years prior to her appointment, she travelled extensively through the U.S. as national field director of the Women’s Branch, Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America. In 1968 she became the editor of the weekly Sedra Series, published by the National Association of Hebrew day Schools.

Under Ms. Herkowitz’s auspices, the Museum initiated a strong and abiding relationship with the various government agencies, including the National Endowment for the Humanities, the New York State Council on the Arts, and the New York City Dept. of Cultural Affairs. In many ways, the YU Museum has significantly enhanced the University’s cultural profile, and – under Ms. Herskowitz’s direction – has drawn individuals and audiences who might otherwise have had little contact or knowledge of the University.

Ms. Herskowitz has many family ties to YU. Her husband, Rabbi William Herskowitz, is an alumnus of Yeshiva College, Wurzweiler School of Social Work and Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary, whose rabbinic alumni organization he headed. They have three children: Amy, Neil and Elliot. Amy, the associate director of Partnership for Excellence in Jewish Education, is a graduate of Stern College for Women and Wurzweiler. She and her husband, Nathan Katz, also a YU alumnus, have a son, Ari, who is an alumnus and another, Noam, who is graduating this year. Neil graduated from Marsha Stern Talmudic Academy/Yeshiva University High School for Boys, where his son, Jonathan, is currently enrolled. Elliot graduated from YU and made aliyah with his family in 1994. Sylvia’s late father, Dr. Herman C. Axelrod, was a professor at Ferkauf Graduate School of Psychology, and her brother, Dr. Morton Axelrod, an early graduate of Albert Einstein College of Medicine, was an adjunct professor there. All of his five children are also YU alumni.

Jacob Haberman 

Rabbi Jacob Haberman, a 1950 graduate of Yeshiva College, is an attorney who specializes in real estate. After receiving his ordination from RIETS in 1954, Rabbi Haberman went on to obtain a PhD from Columbia University and his JD degree from New York Law School.  In 1966, he formed Haberman & Haberman, a real estate ownership and management company. (The firm is also known as The Haberman Group.) He has been joined in the business by his sons, Sinclair and Brook YUHS ’79.

His faith looms large in his life. After receiving his semikha, Rabbi Haberman served as the Rabbi of Congregation Ramath Orah, New York, NY. Since 1964, he has been a rabbi with Congregation Torei Zohov. His publications include The Microcosm (1954) and  Maimonides and Aquinas: a Contemporary Appraisal (Ktav, 1979). He is a member of the Rabbinical Council of America.

Rabbi Haberman was born in Zurich, Switzerland, and immigrated to the United States at age 11, in 1941. He married the former Henryka Korngold, and the couple lives in New York City. Their older son, Sinclair, is married to Sharon Brickman, who graduated from Manhattan Girls High School, Stern College for Women, and Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law; their younger son, Brook, is married to Regina Foont, an alumna of Cardozo. Mrs. Haberman is director of Reuth Women’s Social Service for Israel and active with Hadassah. Rabbi Haberman has contributed more than $1 million to Yeshiva University.

Lin-Manuel Miranda 

Gifted young playwright Lin-Manuel Miranda created and wrote the phenomenally successful musical play In the Heights, as well as composing its score and starring in it both on and off-Broadway. Born and raised in a close-knit Puerto Rican family in Washington Heights, Mr. Miranda captured and celebrated the vibrancy and diversity of the neighborhood that is also home to Yeshiva University’s Wilf campus.

Mr. Miranda conceived of In the Heights in 1999, during his sophomore year at Wesleyan University. Upon graduating and returning home to New York, he taught middle school English at his alma mater, Hunter College High School, and composed commercial music for political candidates like Fernando Ferrer and Carl McCall. But In the Heights remained the focus of his creative spirit. He collaborated with director Thomas Kail to rework and restage the campus hit for a larger audience. His work captured the interest of producers Jill Furman, Kevin McCollum and Jeffrey Seller, whose previous work on Broadway included Rent, Avenue Q and The Drowsy Chaperone. After more workshops, more collaborators, and a stint at the Eugene O'Neill Theatre in Connecticut, the musical found a home at Off-Broadway's 37 Arts Theatre.

During its run at 37 Arts, In the Heights quickly became an audience favorite and a critical success. The response was unprecedented: the musical was luring both traditional and non-traditional theatergoers and garnering a huge cache of accolades, including the Outer Critics' Circle Award and Lucille Lortel Award for Best Musical. After more than 200 performances, In the Heights played its final Off-Broadway show on July 15th, 2007, and subsequently moved to Broadway, with Mr. Miranda enhancing the script and score; its opening night was March 9, 2008. Later that year, In the Heights was honored with four Tony Awards, including Best Musical and Best Original Score. At the February 2009 Grammy Awards, it won the award for Best Musical Show album.

Mr. Miranda – who is planning to move home to Washington Heights – has never strayed far. Last year, he spoke to a playwriting class at Yeshiva College and he was part of a neighborhood arts festival for which Yeshiva University donated space at the uptown Schottenstein auditorium. Many YU students, both men and women, have seen the play, appreciate the music and identify with the immigrant experience, the closeness of family, the challenges of assimilation, and the identity with another homeland.

Awarding an honorary degree to Mr. Miranda gives the University the opportunity both to recognize a prodigiously talented young man at a peak moment of accomplishment, and to connect with the neighborhood we call home.

David Shatz  

David Shatz is Professor of Philosophy at Stern College for Women, Yeshiva University and editor of The Torah u-Madda Journal. 

After graduating as valedictorian of his class at Yeshiva College in 1969, Prof. Shatz was ordained at the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary and earned his Ph. D. with distinction in general philosophy from Columbia University. He has edited or authored twelve books and has published over sixty articles and reviews, dealing with both general and Jewish philosophy. His work in general philosophy focuses on the theory of knowledge, free will, ethics, and the philosophy of religion, while his work in Jewish philosophy focuses on Jewish ethics, Maimonides, Torah and science, and twentieth century rabbinic figures. He also is editor of the MeOtzar HoRav series, which is devoted to publishing manuscripts by Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik zt”l, and co-editor of three of the series's  ten volumes.