THE Narrow Bridge Project Mission

The project draws its name from a famous quote by Rabbi Nachman of Bretslav.

"The whole world is a very narrow bridge. The essential thing is to have no fear at all”

OUR PURPOSE:

It is our mission to address

  • a diminishing sense of Jewish peoplehood

  • a lack of consensus in defining and confronting antisemitism

  • the confusing ways that conversations around antisemitism and Israel/Palestine intersect

OUR OUTCOMEs:

  1. Increased Jewish consensus on what antisemitism looks like and how to address it. 

  2. More relational, strategic, and effective Jewish activism around Israel/Palestine and antisemitism across the political spectrum. 

  3. Greater capacity for educating Jews and non-Jews alike about how and why Israel/Zionism show up in conversations around antisemitism.

OUR PROCESS:

  1. NBP brings Jews together across generational and political divides to discuss the past, present, and future of Jewish peoplehood, Zionism, and antisemitism. The cohort context enables conversation about our differences in understanding these topics and interrogates why they exist. We explore how these differences impact our Judaism, activism, and life experiences as Jews today.

    • We run nine-week cohorts online and in person. The cohorts are by application and can be local or (inter)national. They take participants through a curriculum exploring Jewish positionality and experiences from before the foundation of Jewish state up until today.

    • We support campuses and communities that seek to run their own cohorts.

  2. NBP offers resources for communities of all sorts to understand antisemitism, in ways that bridge the political chasm.

    • We offer written materials and custom presentations and trainings for a variety of contexts and lengths.

The Project encourages Jews to stand together on the narrow bridge that represents our often differing fears in order to more effectively confront them.

NBP has been supported jointly by Brown RISD Hillel and by the Brown University Office of the Chaplains and Religious Life since its inception in Spring 2018. Until 2022, it was funded exclusively by the Avi Schaefer Fund and the Dorot Foundation. We’re now expanding the scope of our work and our supporters. Can we count you in?