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Our Bet Din - About Us

The Sandra Caplan Community Bet Din of Southern California is proud to welcome new Jews from diverse racial, cultural, ethnic, and class backgrounds. We welcome new Jews from diverse gender histories and expressions, and we are proud to work sensitively and individually with all candidates to bring them, body and soul, into the Jewish people.

Rabbis from the Conservative, Reconstructionist, and Reform movements, as well as transdenominational rabbis, have agreed on standards and procedures; this assures that converts will be welcomed by the great majority of the Jewish community. Our pluralistic, permanent sitting court is virtually unprecedented.  

Our Name

Sandra Caplan (1952–2001) was a convert to Judaism who led an exemplary Jewish life. Her premature death was widely mourned. This Bet Din was named after her, and our work honors her memory. (To read more about her, click here.)

Our Dayanim (Rabbis acting as Judges)

Our Bet Din consists of 130 rabbis. Our members take turns serving on the panel that meets with each candidate for conversion (or with their parents, in the case of children). Our members have been specially trained for this purpose. When they serve on a panel, they are known as dayanim.

Our dayanim are volunteers. They serve on our panel because they know that meeting with conversion candidates is almost always one of the most gratifying and inspiring aspects of being a rabbi.

Some of the members also serve as sponsoring rabbis. That is, they work closely with individual candidates to ensure that each one is ready, and then they sponsor those candidates to come before our panel. And they welcome them into a Jewish community once the conversion ritual is complete.

View our Dayanim 

Cooperating Organizations

The Sandra Caplan Bet Din (SCCBD) operates in cooperation with:

Rabbinical Associations

Congregational Federations

Mikveh

Board of Governors

Rabbi Elliot Dorff
Rabbi Richard Levy (z"l)
Founders 

Rabbi Stephen Einstein
Chair

Rabbi Jonathan Bernhard
Vice Chair

Rabbi Len Muroff
Secretary

Rabbi Lisa Bock
Treasurer

Rabbi Mark Borovitz
Rabbi Lynn Brody Slome
Rabbi Elliot Dorff
Rabbi Lisa Edwards
Rabbi Joshua Hoffman
Rabbi Jonathan Klein
Rabbi Jonathan Kupetz
Rabbi Warren Levy
Rabbi Michelle Missaghieh
Rabbi Laura Owens
Rabbi Robin Podolsky
Rabbi Eva Robbins
Rabbi Eric Rosenstein
Rabbi Jason Rosner
Rabbi Daniel Sher
Rabbi Dan Shevitz
Rabbi Neal Weinberg
Rabbi Dvora Weisberg


Board of Trustees

George Caplan
Chair

Lynn Beliak
Barbara Benedek
Rabbi Lisa Bock
Hon. Eli & Arlene Chernow
Muriel Dance
Rabbi Elliot Dorff
Suzanne Gallant (z"l)
Rabbi Jerrold Goldstein
Elana Jassy
Norman Levine & Barbara Mack
Rabbi Janet Madden
Rabbi Laura Owens
Dr. Joel & Rabbi Lori Shapiro
Eric Stockel & Ruth Waddell



Our Administrators

Rabbi Dan Shevitz
Rosh Bet Din
(Head Rabbi of the Court)

Rabbi Michelle Missaghieh
S’gan Rosh Bet Din
(Associate Head Rabbi of the Court)

Chaplain Deborah Schmidt, Esq
Executive Director


Contact Us

GENERAL INFORMATION
exec@scbetdin.us

Voice: 323-863-5486    

Mailing Address

8306 Wilshire Blvd #830

Beverly Hills, CA 90211


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