Ari Goldman

Ari L. Goldman taught at Columbia as a professor of journalism for more than 30 years until his retirement in 2024. Although he spent most of his time in the classroom, he also spent a year as Dean of Students and another year as acting Academic Dean.

When he first came to Columbia in 1993, Professor Goldman created the school’s Covering Religion seminar, which later gained the financial support of the Scripps Howard Fund. The fund enabled Professor Goldman to take students in the Covering Religion seminar on study-tours abroad during spring break. In the past, his class has visited India, Russia, Ukraine, Ireland, Italy, Israel, Jordan and the Palestinian Territories. To learn more about his most recent trips, visit his class blog. 

Although he retired from full-time teaching in 2024, Professor Goldman continues to direct the school’s Scripps Howard Program in Religion, Journalism and the Spiritual Life. He will teach Covering Religion as a Professor Emeritus in 2025.

Ari Goldman was educated at Yeshiva University, Harvard and Columbia. Before returning to Columbia in 1993 to teach, he spent 20 years at The New York Times, most of it as a religion writer. Professor Goldman has been a Visiting Fulbright Professor at Hebrew University in Jerusalem; a Skirball Fellow at the Oxford Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies in England, and a scholar-in-residence at Yeshiva’s Stern College for Women.

He is the author of four books including the best-selling memoir, The Search for God at Harvard. He has been honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Religion News Association and with an Alumni Award from Columbia Journalism.

In addition to his teaching at the university level, Goldman is on the faculty of the School of The New York Times where his course, “Writing the Big City: Covering New York,” is one of the most popular offerings. It is open to high school students of all ages.

He occasionally contributes articles, obituaries and reviews to The New York Times, The Washington Post, Salon, The New York Jewish Week, the Forward, Tradition and the Jesuit magazine America.

See Professor Goldman being interviewed on the CNN program “Amanpour” with his Covering Religion colleague Professor Gregory Khalil.

Web feature: A Day in the Life: Four Hours With Ari Goldman