Rabbi David Rosen is the Special Advisor for Interfaith Affairs of the Abrahamic Family House in Abu Dhabi, and has been active in promoting interreligious understanding globally for some forty years. In the last decade, his work has increasingly focused on the advancement of Jewish-Muslim relations, particularly in the Arabian peninsula.
the third son of the renowned Rabbi Kopul Rosen (founding Principal of Carmel College in England) he was born in 1951 in Newbury, Berkshire, and educated in England and Jerusalem. He served in the IDF and was chaplain to the forces in West Sinai. Subsequently he served as the Senior Rabbi of the largest Jewish congregation in South Africa, in Sea Point, Cape Town, as well as on the Cape Beth Din (Ecclesiastical Court.) and he was the founder/chairman of the Cape Inter-Faith Forum, the Council of Jews, Christians and Muslims.
Thereafter he was appointed Chief Rabbi of Ireland during which time he also served on the Academic Council of the Irish School of Ecumenics. He returned to Israel in 1985 to take up the appointment of Dean at the Sapir Center for Jewish Education and Culture in the Old City of Jerusalem and subsequently became Professor of Jewish Studies at the Jerusalem Center for Near Eastern Studies. At that time, he also served as the Anti-Defamation League’s Director of Interfaith Relations in Israel and as the ADL’s co-liaison to the Vatican. In 1997 he became the Director of the ADL Israel office, and in the Spring of 2001 he was appointed International Director of Interreligious affairs of the American Jewish Committee assuming responsibility for AJC’s global interfaith work from his base in Jerusalem.
Rabbi Rosen is a member of the Chief Rabbinate of Israel’s Commission for Interreligious Dialogue; and is a past chairman of IJCIC, the International Jewish Committee for Interreligious Consultations that represents world Jewry to other world religions .
He is an International President of the Religions for Peace (RfP); Honorary President of the International Council of Christians and Jews (ICCJ); and is a member of the Elijah Interfaith Institute’s Board of World Religious Leaders. He served for ten years on the Board of Directors of the King Abdullah International Center for Interreligious and Intercultural Dialogue (KAICIID), established by the King of Saudi Arabia together with the governments of Austria and Spain and the Holy See. He has served as a member of the Executive Committee of the World Congress of Imams and Rabbis and as a member of the Executive Committee of the World Economic Forum’s Council for promoting relations and cooperation between the Muslim and Western worlds. He is a Founder of Rabbis for Human Rights, and the Rossing Centre for Education and Dialogue.
Rabbi Rosen was a member of the Bilateral Commission of the State of Israel and the Holy See that negotiated the Fundamental Agreement between the two, leading to the establishment of full bilateral relations in 1994.
In November 2005, Pope Benedict XVI made Rabbi Rosen a Knight of the Order of St Gregory the Great for his contribution to promoting Catholic-Jewish reconciliation; in 2010 he was made a CBE (Commander of the British Empire) by H.M. Queen Elizabeth II for his contributions to interfaith relations; and in March 2016 he was awarded the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Hubert Walter Award for Reconciliation and Interfaith Cooperation.
In addition to honorary doctorates, Rabbi Rosen is the recipient of various awards including the Premio Galileo 2000 Award; the Raphael Lemkin Award for Human Rights; the Search for Common Ground Award for Interfaith Dialogue; Waldzell Institute Life Achievement Award (together with the Dalai Lama and Sheikh Ahmed El Tayeb); and the Festival of Faiths’ Lifetime Achievement Award.
Rabbi Rosen is married to Sharon (Global Director of Religious Engagement, Search for Common Ground) and they have three daughters, four granddaughters and three grandsons.