This is a list of notable people who left Orthodox Judaism/traditional rabbinic Judaism at some point in their lives. Ancient While Orthodox Judaism is a term applied to traditional Judaism in the modern era, some famous examples exist of those who left rabbinic Judaism in pre-modern times. Although Orthodox Judaism would probably be considered the mainstream expression of Judaism prior to the 19th century, for some Orthodox Judaism is a modern self-identification that distinguishes it from traditional pre-modern Judaism. *Elisha Ben Avuya *Jesus Christ *Paul the Apostle *Josephus Flavius Modern *Sholem Aleichem *Gedaliah Alon *Pessah Bar-Adon *Menachem Begin *Shmuel Ben-Artzi *Eliezer Ben-Yehuda *Micha Josef Berdyczewski *Hayim Nahman Bialik *Yosef Haim Brenner *Ezriel Carlebach *Haim Cohn *Ben-Zion Dinur *Jacob Freud *Abraham Geiger *Chaim Grade *Heinrich Graetz *Ahad Haam *Abraham Harkavy * *Chaim Herzog *Abraham Joshua Heschel *Mordecai Kaplan *Hillel Kook *Saul Lieberman *Yom Tov Lipman Lipkin *Salomon Maimon *Moses Mendelssohn *Shimon Peres *Chaim Potok *Mayer Amschel Rothschild *Solomon Schechter *Mendele Mocher Sforim *Gene Simmons *Isaac Bashevis Singer *Steven Spielberg *Baruch Spinoza *Barbara Streisand *Chaim Weizmann *Harry Austryn Wolfson *Moshe Zilberg