Morris Lichtenstein

Morris Lichtenstein (1889–1938) was a founder of the Society of Jewish Science. Born in Lithuania, he later moved to Cincinnati, Ohio where he was ordained by the Reform Hebrew Union College in 1916, becoming the first Eastern European student to ever study at the institution.

Lichtenstein served as a Rabbi in Amsterdam, Troy, and New York City, where he received a Master's degree in Psychology from Columbia University in 1919. He briefly served a congregation in Athens, Georgia before moving back to New York to marry Tehilla Hirshenson in 1920. Together they founded the Society of Jewish Science in 1921 or possibly 1922. Morris became its spiritual leader.

After Morris's death in 1938, that year his widow Tehilla Lichtenstein took over his post and thus became the first Jewish American woman to serve as the spiritual leader of an ongoing Jewish congregation, although she was not ordained. She was never ordained, and never held a rabbinic title. She also took over his duties as editor of the Jewish Science Interpreter magazine, serving until her death in 1973.