The Community Manual: Pooling Together Best Practices for Community Building

The purpose of the Community Manual is to develop theoretical and applicable knowledge in the field of community building and weave a multi-disciplinary project that will yield significant contributions for organizations worldwide, as well as academic value for researchers in the field. It will also include Jewish and spiritual traditional wisdom that can inform and enhance community building efforts. This project will be a joint venture between Hakhel, the Jewish Intentional Communities Network (a project of Adamah, the largest Jewish environmental organization in the world), Mosaic United, the Ministry of Diaspora Affairs, the Institute for Jewish Spirituality and Society, and the Varda Center. This project's research and academic parts will be conducted under the auspices of the Harvard Divinity School as part of the lead researcher and Hakhel’s founder and general director post-doc fellowship there. This session invites leading scholars in the fields of Jewish studies, sociology, anthropology, and other related fields to think together about community-building best practices, the theory behind community building, and assess the needs in the field. The purpose of this session is to make the Community Manual a collaborative project, with various contributors who can benefit the field.