The prize citation for Dr. Kass’s Barry Prize reads:
As a physician, molecular biologist, and lifelong scholar of humanist and religious thought, Leon Kass has brought his love of learning to bioethics policy, and to the fundamental questions of human experience. In scholarly work spanning the humanities, the sciences, and religion as well as in public service, Dr. Kass has relentlessly reminded us to ask what it means to be human, and to be aware of how technological development may be altering that understanding. The Academy honors Dr. Kass’ distinguished contributions to humanity’s quest to understand itself and its world as it shapes its future in an era of unprecedented technological change.
Leon R. Kass is the Addie Clark Harding Professor Emeritus in the Committee on Social Thought and in the College at the University of Chicago. He is also dean of the faculty at Shalem College in Jerusalem. A lifelong enthusiast of liberal education, he earned an M.D. from the University of Chicago and a Ph.D. in biochemistry before shifting from the practice of science to reflection on its human meaning. He has served as vice chairman and research committee chairman of the National Council on the Humanities, on the advisory board of the National Endowment for the Humanities, and as chairman of the President’s Council on Bioethics. He was named the 2009 Jefferson Lecturer of the National Endowment for Humanities.
November 2025
The prize citation for Dr. Kass’s Barry Prize reads:
As a physician, molecular biologist, and lifelong scholar of humanist and religious thought, Leon Kass has brought his love of learning to bioethics policy, and to the fundamental questions of human experience. In scholarly work spanning the humanities, the sciences, and religion as well as in public service, Dr. Kass has relentlessly reminded us to ask what it means to be human, and to be aware of how technological development may be altering that understanding. The Academy honors Dr. Kass’ distinguished contributions to humanity’s quest to understand itself and its world as it shapes its future in an era of unprecedented technological change.
Leon R. Kass is the Addie Clark Harding Professor Emeritus in the Committee on Social Thought and in the College at the University of Chicago. He is also dean of the faculty at Shalem College in Jerusalem. A lifelong enthusiast of liberal education, he earned an M.D. from the University of Chicago and a Ph.D. in biochemistry before shifting from the practice of science to reflection on its human meaning. He has served as vice chairman and research committee chairman of the National Council on the Humanities, on the advisory board of the National Endowment for the Humanities, and as chairman of the President’s Council on Bioethics. He was named the 2009 Jefferson Lecturer of the National Endowment for Humanities.
November 2025