Aryeh Bernstein
Aryeh Bernstein is the Assistant Director of the Halakhah Think Tank. He teaches on the Talmud faculty of the Hartman High School for boys, in Jerusalem. He is a co-founder and faculty member of the Northwoods Kollel and Beit Midrash Program at Camp Ramah in Wisconsin, where he has also served as Staff Educator. Holding B.A.'s in Psychology from Columbia and Talmud from the Jewish Theological Seminary, he also studied for seven years at Yeshivat Ma'ale Gilboa, in Israel, as well as at Yeshivat Hamivtar, in Israel, and Yeshivat Chovevei Torah, in New York, and has partially completed the rabbinic examinations of the Israeli Chief Rabbinate. He is an M.A. candidate in Talmud at Yeshiva University, and was a MeORoT Fellow. He was a founding Co-Editor-in-Chief of Columbia's student journal of Jewish scholarship, Iggrot Ha-Ari, has been published in The Jerusalem Report, and has taught at numerous communities and Hillels around the U.S.
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Rabbi Miles Cohen
Rabbi Miles Cohen is senior lecturer of Professional and Pastoral Skills at The Jewish Theological Seminary. Rabbi Cohen teaches synagogue skills, such as chanting the Torah, Megillot, and prayers of the weekday, Shabbat, holiday services, and special life-cycle occasions. He has been teaching these skills to JTS rabbinical students and education students for over ten years. He also specializes in Hebrew grammar, which he teaches in both the Hebrew Language and Bible Departments, and in Masoretic studies. Rabbi Cohen will teach Basic Torah Reading at Yeshivat Hadar.Email Rabbi Cohen
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Rabbi Dianne Cohler-Esses
Rabbi Dianne Cohler-Esses is a teacher and writer. She most recently served as a scholar-in-residence at UJA-Federation. She also writes about Torah and Jewish ethnicity for several anthologies and scholarly journals and for the New York Jewish Week. Before coming to UJA-Federation, Rabbi Cohler-Esses taught and consulted widely in the Jewish world in such organizations as Ma'ayan, Jewish Life Network, and The Curriculum Initiative, and served on the faculties of the Skirball Center for Adult Jewish Learning, the Hebrew Union College Kollel, and the Edgar M. Bronfman Youth Fellowships in Israel (BYFI). She became co-director of BFYI in 1998, and served in a variety of capacities until 2005. Rabbi Cohler-Esses previously received a fellowship from CLAL—The National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership to study with Yitz Greenberg and to teach for CLAL. She subsequently joined their faculty, teaching in pluralist settings, while pursuing advanced study of Midrash at the Jewish Theological Seminary. She received ordination from the Jewish Theological Seminary in 1995 and is the first woman from the Syrian Jewish community to become a rabbi, as well as the first — and currently the only — person from her community to become a non-Orthodox rabbi.
Email Rabbi Dianne Cohler-Esses
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Alyssa Frank
Alyssa Frank is the Director of Community Engagement of Mechon Hadar. She received her BA from Barnard College, her MPA from NYU’s Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service and is completing an MA in Hebrew and Judaic Studies at NYU as a Taub Scholar. Prior to her role at Mechon Hadar, Alyssa has held development and marketing positions at Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the NYU Child Study Center, and the JCC in Manhattan. A long-time board member of Kol Zimrah, she has also presented her workshop " “Fundraising for Grassroots Jewish organizations” at a number of Jewish communal conferences, including Mechon Hadar’s Independent Minyan Conference.
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Rachel Friedrichs
Rachel Friedrichs teaches Tanakh at Yeshivat Hadar, with a focus on medieval commentaries. She teaches Tanakh and Jewish Thought in Jerusalem for Young Judaea and Siach - both pluralist, co-ed, gap year programs. She recently completed the Pardes Educators Program, simultaneously earning her MA in Jewish Education at Hebrew University, and has a BA from Brandeis University with a concentration in Intellectual History. Rachel also spent time studying at Midreshet Moriah in Jerusalem, and at NYU’s campus in the Czech Republic. Upon her graduation from Brandeis, Rachel participated in the Jewish Teacher Corps, a program that placed her in Phoenix, AZ to teach and mentor at the Jess Schwartz Community High School; before moving to Israel she also taught at a Solomon Schechter school in New York. She has also led beit midrash programs at Brandeis, worked as a teacher at Camp Ramah, and taught occasionally for Kehilat Hadar.
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David Goshen
David Goshen is a graduate of the Har Etzion and Mir Yeshivot and has studied Philosophy and Religion at the Hebrew University. He taught at the ‘Havruta’ Beit Midrash program at Hebrew University and Tel Aviv University.Back to Top
Rabbi Shai Held
Rabbi Shai Held is co-founder of Mechon Hadar. Previously, he served for six years as Scholar-in-Residence at Kehilat Hadar, and as Director of Education at Harvard Hillel. He has also taught both Jewish theology and Jewish Law at the Jewish Theological Seminary. A graduate of the Wexner Graduate Fellowship, Shai has has taught for institutions such as the Wexner Heritage Program, Drisha Institute, Hebrew College, Meah, UJA-CJP, and the Rabbinic Training Institute. He is currently completing a PhD in religious studies at Harvard. Shai leads the Mahshavah curriculum at Yeshivat Hadar.
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Avital Hochstein
Avital Hochstein is a faculty member at Yeshivat Hadar and the former
Rosh Kollel at Pardes Institute. A research fellow at Mechon Shalom
Hartman, she has taught Talmud for several years at both institutions and is Rosh Beit Midrash at the new Hartman High School for Girls. Avital completed her BA degree in Talmud at Hebrew University, and is working on her MA in Talmud currently at Hebrew University, where she was awarded the Prize for Outstanding Students in Hebrew Literature in 2005. She is the co-author of The Place of Women in Midrash (Yedioth Ahronoth 2008). Avital is a founder of Kehilat Shirah Hadashah in Jerusalem.
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Rabbi James Jacobson-Maisels
Rabbi James Jacobson-Maisels will teach Mahshavah and an elective on spritual practices at Yeshivat Hadar. He teaches Jewish thought and mysticism at the Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies in Jerusalem. James holds a BA in Philosophy and Judaic Studies from Brown University and an M.St. in Modern Jewish Studies from Balliol College the University of Oxford. He studied at the Conservative Yeshivah, the Hartman Institute of Jewish Studies, and in the Advanced Learning Seminar at Pardes and received rabbinic ordination from Rabbi Daniel Landes in Jerusalem. He is currently pursuing a PhD at the University of Chicago in Jewish Studies specializing in Jewish mysticism. He has taught in a variety of settings in America and Israel on Judaism and Jewish Mysticism. He hopes to integrate his study and practice and to help teach and live Judaism as a spiritual discipline.
Email Rabbi James Jacobson-Maisels
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Rabbi Amy Kalmanofsky
Rabbi Amy Kalmanofsky graduated from the Reconstructionist Rabbinical
College and received her PhD in Bible and Ancient Semitic Languages at the
Jewish Theological Seminary where she is currently an assistant professor. Her research interests include feminist and literary criticism of the Bible
and biblical theology. She is a contributor to the forthcoming Women's
Torah Commentary. Her articles "Their Heart Cried Out to God:
Gender and Prayer in the Book of Lamentations" and "Horror and Childbirth in
the Biblical Prophets" will appear, respectively, in the volume A Question
of Sex: Gender and Difference in the Hebrew Bible and the Journal of Biblical
Interpretation. She is finishing her book Terror All Around: The Rhetoric of Horror in the Book of Jeremiah to be published by T&T Clark/Continuum. Last year, she received the List College Teacher of the Year award. Amy will teach an elective on Parashat Hashavua at Yeshivat Hadar.
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Rabbi Elie Kaunfer
Rabbi Elie Kaunfer is the co-founder and executive director of Mechon Hadar, and teaches Talmud at Yeshivat Hadar. He was ordained at the Jewish Theological Seminary, where he also completed an MA in liturgy. A Wexner Graduate Fellow, Elie is a co-founder of Kehilat Hadar, a flagship independent minyan committed to spirited traditional prayer, study and social action. Elie is pursuing a doctorate in liturgy at the Jewish Theological Seminary, where he received ordination. He was selected as an inaugural AVI CHAI Fellow, known as the “Jewish Genius Award.” He is the author of Empowered Judaism: Independent Minyanim and the Future of Jewish Life (Jewish Lights, forthcoming). In 2008 the Forward named him one of 50 Top Jewish leaders, and in 2009, Newsweek named him one of 50 Top Rabbis in America.
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Elizabeth Kessler Sacks
Elizabeth Kessler Sacks, a professional prayer educator, will be the lead teacher and facilitator for the Minyan Project's prayer-leader training program. A Wexner Graduate Fellow, Elizabeth was invested as a cantor at the Hebrew Union College School of Sacred Music; she is currently the assistant cantor at Central Synagogue. Elizabeth trained with Hazzan Jacob Mendelson, from whom she learned the art of traditional hazzanut as well as service leading and congregational singing. She has since studied with Cantor Benjie-Ellen Schiller and Merri Lovinger Arian, who are at the forefront of training women to be prayer leaders. Elizabeth received her B.A. in Music and Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations from Harvard, where she studied ethnomusicology, the transmission of oral traditions, and contemporary trends in Jewish pedagogy.
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Yehuda Kurtzer
Yehuda Kurtzer is Visiting Assistant Professor and the inaugural Chair of Jewish Communal Innovation at Brandeis University, having won an international competition with his book proposal entitled "The Sacred Task of Rebuilding Jewish Memory." He is completed his doctoral dissertation in Jewish Studies at Harvard University on the Jews of the Mediterranean Diaspora and their relationship to the rise of rabbinic piety. He has lectured and taught widely in adult education settings, including The Curriculum Initiative, the Brandeis Initiative on Bridging Scholarship and Pedagogy, NYU's Center for Online Judaic Studies, and the American Jewish Committee's Commission on Contemporary Jewish Life. Yehuda also helped co-found and remains active in Brookline's Washington Square Minyan. He lives in Brookline, MA with his wife Stephanie Ives and their sons Noah and Jesse.
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Amanda Pogany
Amanda Pogany teaches 8th grade Judaic Studies and Hebrew language at the Solomon Schechter School of Manhattan. She is also the middle school Student Life Coordinator. In addition to her teaching, she serves, as a mentor to new teachers is several capacities, as well as a consultant on pedagogy and curriculum. She mentors for the Davidson School at JTS, the Pardes Educators program, and Schechter Manhattan. She is trained as a mentor through the Jewish New Teacher Project. She is a graduate of the Pardes Educators Program, has a Masters in Jewish Education from Hebrew University and a BA from Barnard College. She is co-founder of Altshul, an independent egalitarian minyan. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband Aaron Bisman and their son Asher.
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Rabbi Micha'el Rosenberg
Rabbi Micha'el Rosenberg teaches Tanakh at Yeshivat Hadar. He is the rabbi of the Fort Tryon Jewish Center, an independent egalitarian synagogue in the Washington Heights section of New York City. An alumnus of the Wexner Graduate Fellowship program, he received his rabbinical ordination from the Chief Rabbinate of Israel following his studies in the kollel halakhah at Yeshivat Ma’aleh Gilboa and is currently a doctoral candidate in Talmud and Rabbinic Literature at the Jewish Theological Seminary. He has taught Bible, Talmud, and halakhah in a wide variety of settings, including the Drisha Institute for Jewish Education, JTS, the National Havurah Institute, and the Northwoods Kollel and Beit Midrash of Ramah Wisconsin.
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Jason Rubenstein
Jason Rubenstein is the Sho'el Umeshiv (a resource during Talmud seder) at Yeshivat Hadar and coordinates the yeshiva's group process programming. He is a fourth-year rabbinical student at the Jewish Theological Seminary and holds an MA in Talmud from JTS and an AB in Social Studies from Harvard College. An alumnus of Yeshivat Ma'ale Gilbo'a, Jason has led three trips for the Nesiya Institute, and is a recipient of a Wexner Graduate Fellowship, a Legacy Heritage Rabbinic Fellows Fellowship, and a Graduate Fellowship from The Center For Jewish Law and Contemporary Civilization at Cardozo Law School.
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Jaclyn Rubin
Jaclyn Rubin is the Coordinator of Special Projects. She completed a year at the Drisha Scholar’s Circle. She recently graduated from Barnard and the Jewish Theological Seminary with B.A.’s in English and Talmud, respectively. She holds an M.A. in Talmud from the Jewish Theological Seminary. Jaclyn has been on the beit midrash team of Kehilat Hadar for four years. She was a fellow in Yeshivat Hadar in 2007.
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Rabbi Ben Skydell
Rabbi Ben Skydell teaches Talmud and Chumash and is the Director of Religious Guidance at North Shore Hebrew Academy. He has ordination from the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary. Ben will teach Hasidut at Yeshivat Hadar.
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Dr. Devora Steinmetz
Dr. Devora Steinmetz is the author of From Father to Son: Kinship, Conflict, and Continuity in Genesis and Punishment and Freedom: The Rabbinic Construction of Criminal Law. She has taught rabbinic literature at Drisha and the Jewish Theological Seminary. She was a visiting scholar at the Hebrew University’s Hevruta program and the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Steinmetz is the founder of Beit Rabban, an innovative day school that is profiled in Daniel Pekarsky's Vision at Work: The Theory and Practice of Beit Rabban. She serves as an educational leadership consultant to the Mandel Foundation.
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Rabbi Ethan Tucker
Rabbi Ethan Tucker is a co-founder of Mechon Hadar: An Institute for Prayer, Personal Growth and Jewish Study. He teaches Talmud and Halakhah in the Machon's summer Yeshiva, Yeshivat Hadar, and is also a faculty member at the Drisha Institute for Jewish Education, where he teaches Talmud and Halakhah in the Scholars Circle. Rabbi Tucker was ordained by the Chief Rabbinate of Israel after years of study at Yeshivat Ma'ale Gilboa and earned a PhD in Talmud and Rabbinics from the Jewish Theological Seminary. He is currently a Fellow with the Harold Grinspoon Foundation and is a co-founder of New York's Kehilat Hadar.
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Joey Weisenberg
Joey Weisenberg, a mandolinist/guitarist, will lead musical programming at Yeshivat Hadar. At age twelve, Joey began performing as a harmonica player and guitarist in blues bars in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Joey currently performs with bands including Romashka, Zagnut Circus Orchestra, The Marija Krupoves Trio, AnsambleMastika, The Amazing Frosen String Quartet, Michael Winograd's Klezmer Outfit, and as a leader of his own ensembles. Joey also works as the Musical Director at Brooklyn’s oldest synagogue, the Kane Street Shul. As a teacher, Joey leads his “Spontaneous Jewish Choir” workshops, teaches for institutions including Klez Kanada and the Jewish Theological Seminary, and teaches private instrumental lessons to a variety of students. Joey currently studies traditional Jewish nusach with Cantor Noah Schall.
Email Joey Weisenberg
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Mishael Zion
Mishael Zion is a Faculty Fellow at the Skirball Center for Adult Jewish Learning in New York and a student at Yeshivat Chovevei Torah Rabbinical School. Mishael was born and raised in Jerusalem, where he served on the faculty of the Shalom Hartman Institute and the Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies. He is co-author of A Night to Remember: The Haggadah of Contemporary Voices (2007).
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Yeshiva Location: 190 Amsterdam Ave, New York, NY 10023
(212) 284-6913 info@mechonhadar.org