“…in the postwar era, the dominant face of American Orthodoxy was that of Yeshiva University-trained rabbis…”

…in the postwar era, the dominant face of American Orthodoxy was that of Yeshiva University-trained rabbis (and their counterparts at the Hebrew Theological College in Skokie, IL) who were joined together in the Rabbinical Council of America (RCA). The Modern Orthodox ideal was conveyed by the motto of YU, Torah u’madda, usually translated as Torah and secular knowledge or, more broadly, Western culture and learning. For second- and third-generation American Jews attracted to this synthetic ideal, the figure they looked to was Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik, who embodied the ideal through his mastery of rabbinic texts and his broad knowledge of and continuing engagement with Western philosophy.

Jack Wertheimer, “Can Modern Orthodoxy Survive?”, Mosaic (August 2014) [http://mosaicmagazine.com/essay/2014/08/can-modern-orthodoxy-survive/]