Steven Schwarzschild

In 1950 he returned to the United States serving in Temples in Lynn, Massachusetts, where he came into contact with Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik of Boston whom he came to view as an important teacher, and in Fargo, North Dakota.

Both in person and by correspondence he entered into dialogue with the American Mennonite theologian and pacifist John Howard Yoder,[1][2][3] with the American Catholic monk and writer Thomas Merton, and with many leading figures in philosophy and in Jewish thought.

The topic of his dissertation was the thought of Nachman Krochmal and Hermann Cohen as philosophers of history.

He also showed an interest in the thought of rabbis such as Isaac Hutner, Joseph B. Soloveitchik and Joel Teitelbaum.

Following Hermann Cohen, Schwarzschild espoused a form of neo-Kantianism and emphasized the role of the halakha in Judaism as a rational system of moral ideals.