It was ironic, to say the least, that it took coming to an oil-rich Arab emirate to get me to lead my first Rosh Hashanah service.
Forty-five years ago I had earned Conservative rabbinic ordination from New Yorkâ??s Jewish Theological Seminary. But this was the first time I had ever used it. I had turned, instead, to a career in scholarship as a professor of Near Eastern studies for several decades at Princeton University. But my role at this Rosh Hashanah service last September was a byproduct of my work this past semester as a visiting professor at New York Universityâ??s new campus, in Abu Dhabi.
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