Jewish Life in Pasadena

 

There is a Chabad House just a mile's walk from campus, at the corner of Wilson Ave. and Walnut St. About 30 people, including several Caltech students, attend Chabad each shabbos, and Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur welcome a congregation of about 100. Chabad also holds early-morning minyanim on Mondays and Thursdays, offers beginning Talmud classes on Tuesday evenings, and sponsors numerous other educational and community events. For more information see the Chabad website or contact Rabbi Chaim Hanoka or Rabbi Yisroel Pinson at 626-564-8820 and/or ChabadPas@aol.com.

The Pasadena Jewish Temple and Center (PJTC) is a large conservative synagogue located about 4 miles from campus at 1434 North Altadena Drive. Besides services on shabbos and yom tovim, PJTC offers Hebrew language classes, Israeli folk dancing, bible study classes, and other Jewish activities. You can call the temple office at 626-798-1161. Another nearby conservative synagogue is Congregation Sha'arei Torah in Arcadia, but getting to Sha'arei Torah does require access to someone with a car.

Several reform synagogues are located within convenient driving distance of Caltech, including Temple Sinai in Glendale (818-246-8101) and Temple Beth Torah in Grenada Hills (818-831-0835).

Los Angeles, the second largest Jewish community in the US (the first is New York), is just a half hour away by car. There you'll find 20 shuls within two miles' radius, lots of kosher restaurants and grocery stores, Jewish bookstores, etc. It takes about an hour to get there by bus.