Tamid Adult Learning Faculty

Rav Rachel Adelman

Rav Rachel Adelman
Associate Professor of Bible
Hebrew College
Tamid of Hebrew College

Rav Rachel Adelman, who joined the full-time faculty in 2012, provides a dynamic, open approach to text study, drawing on a wide range of sources, from Tanakh and classical midrash to modern Israeli poetry. She holds a M.A. in Jewish Studies from Matan/Baltimore Hebrew University and a Ph.D. in Hebrew literature, with a specialty in midrash, from The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and rabbinical ordination from Hebrew College.

Her first book, The Return of the Repressed: Pirqe de-Rabbi Eliezer and the Pseudepigrapha, is based on her doctoral dissertation, and she began her second, The Female Ruse: Women’s Deception and Divine Sanction in the Hebrew Bible, under the auspices of the Women’s Studies in Religion Program (WSRP) at Harvard. She is currently working on a new book, Daughters in Danger from the Hebrew Bible to Modern Midrash (forthcoming, Sheffield Phoenix Press). When she is not writing books, papers, or divrei Torah, it is poetry that flows from her pen.

Ariella Amshalem

Ariella Amshalem
Tamid of Hebrew College

Ariella is an American Israeli Chef and Chef Instructor whose grandparents came from Istanbul and Izmir, Turkey to New York City in the 1920s. Sephardic Jewish cuisine dominated and blessed her grandmother’s kitchen where as a young girl Ariella watched biscochos, bourekas, fiveyos, fritadas, and roscas form like magic in her grandmother’s hands. After many years living in Israel and working as a cafe cook, culinary tour guide and private chef, Ariella now resides in New England with her husband and children, and teaches about Sephardic culture and history through the lens of food and cooking. She is also a certified mashgicha by KVH. You can learn more about her educational initiative, La Famiya Sefaradi, on her website, ariellaamshalem.com.

Rabbi Jeff Amshalem, PhD

Rabbi Jeff Amshalem, PhD
Tamid of Hebrew College

Rabbi Jeff Amshalem has been in Jewish education for over twenty years in a variety of roles, and has done much of his learning and teaching in pluralistic environments such as Pardes and Beit Midrash Elul in Jerusalem and Hebrew College. For the past several years he was a Senior Educator at Ayeka Soulful Education, mentoring teachers in making their classrooms spaces for personal reflection and spiritual transformation, and now teaches in the Religion Department at Tufts University.

He earned his PhD in Jewish Thought from Ben-Gurion University and has orthodox rabbinic ordination from Rabbi Daniel Landes and Rabbi Zalman Nechemia Goldberg of Jerusalem. He currently lives in Sharon, MA, with his wife Ariella, four children, a dog, a cat, and ten chickens.

President Sharon Cohen Anisfeld

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Deborah Anstandig

Deborah Anstandig
Tamid of Hebrew College

Deborah Anstandig is in Shana Bet Rabbinical Student at Hebrew College. Deborah earned an undergraduate degree in English Literature at Yeshiva University, a Masters of Jewish Education from Hebrew College, and a Masters in Education from Harvard Graduate School of Education. Deborah spent eleven years teaching middle and high school Judaic Studies at SAR High School and The Heschel School in New York City. Most recently, Deborah also served as the Dean of Instruction at Heschel, supporting the professional development of the faculty. Deborah loves being in Jewish community and engaging ideas where the questions are greater than any possible answer. Deborah is a Hebrew College/IYUN Fellow.

Alan Avery-Peck

Alan Avery-Peck
Tamid of Hebrew College

Alan Avery-Peck is Kraft-Hiatt Professor in Judaic Studies at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, where he teaches a wide range of courses in Jewish history, religion, and culture. He specializes in Judaism in the first six centuries C.E., with particular attention to the literature of Rabbinic Judaism. Alongside involvement in accessible works such as The Encyclopaedia of Judaism (Brill, 2005) and The Blackwell Companion to Judaism (2000), he is a co-author of A Comparative Handbook to the Gospels of Matthew and Luke: Comparisons with Pseudepigraph, the Qumran Scrolls, and Rabbinic Literature (Brill, 2021) and is co-editor-in-chief of The Encyclopedia of Religious and Philosophical Writings in Late Antiquity (Brill, 2007). His commentary on 2 Corinthians appears in The Jewish Annotated New Testament (Oxford, 2011), and he is a member of the translation team of Readings from the Roots: A New Historically Sensitive Translation of the Revised Common Lectionary (https://readingsfromtheroots.bard.edu). Alan taught some of the first Meah classes in MetroWest, some twenty-five years ago, and he very much looks forward the excitement of learning with adults this year.

Avi Bernstein-Nahar

Avi Bernstein-Nahar
Tamid of Hebrew College

Avi Bernstein-Nahar received his doctorate in religious studies from Stanford University and a BA in philosophy from Brown. He is the author of papers on Hermann Cohen, Franz Rosenzweig, and Charles Taylor, and is currently working on Die Schrift, Buber and Rosenzweig’s translation of the Tanakh into German. He has been lauded as a “gifted and passionate teacher,” and praised for bringing “deep learning and empathy” into the classroom. Avi has served as Executive Director of Brandeis’ Osher Lifelong Learning Institute, and Dean and Director for Adult Learning programs at Hebrew College.

Rabbi Allison Berry

Rabbi Allison Berry
Tamid of Hebrew College

Rabbi Allison Berry is honored to serve as the Director of the Betty Ann Greenbaum Miller Center for Jewish Healing at Jewish Family & Children’s Services. She is passionate about her work supporting members of the Jewish community and beyond who are on a journey through the many stages of grief and healing.

Prior to joining JF&CS Rabbi Berry served for many years as a congregational rabbi – most recently as the Co-Senior Rabbi of Temple Shalom in Newton, MA. Rabbi Berry is a graduate of Hebrew Union College – Jewish Institute of Religion and Brandeis University. She is proud to be the past chair of the Newton Interfaith Clergy Association and volunteers as a trained court mediator for Metrowest Mediation Services.

Aliza Brosh

Aliza Brosh
Ulpan

Aliza has vast experience teaching Hebrew to adults and high school and college students in both Israel and the United States. For nearly 20 years, Aliza taught Hebrew literature at a leading high school in Rishon Le-Zion, Israel. In addition, she led a special Hebrew language program for young high-school age immigrants. Following her move to the Boston area 20 years ago, Aliza founded the Israeli School in Lexington and taught there for a year. Since 2002, she has been teaching Hebrew at Brandeis University and at Prozdor and Ulpan at the Hebrew College. Additionally, since 2012, Aliza has been teaching Hebrew immersion courses at Middlebury College Summer School in Middlebury, Vt., for the Life-Long Learners program. Aliza holds a B.A. in literature and sociology from Haifa University, a Teaching Certificate from Haifa University, and a M.A. in Liberal Arts from the Hebrew College.

Adva Cohen Alpert

Adva Cohen Alpert
Hebrew Language Ulpan

Born in Jerusalem and a native Hebrew speaker, Adva started her career as an instructor in the IDF. She then received her degree and earned a teaching certificate from the Hebrew University and David Yallin, Jerusalem.

Over the past 20 years, Adva continued her education taking post-graduate classes including psychology and Hebrew as a second language, at Boston University, Lesley College, and Hebrew College, along with teaching both children and adults in different schools in the Boston area as well as in Israel (ex. Boston University, Maimonides, Keren Karev, etc.)

Adva has been with the Hebrew College since 2003, teaching Hebrew as a second language at all proficiency levels and in different programs such as Prozdor, Ulpan and Rabbinic (Mekorot).

Adva enjoys integrating Israeli and Jewish culture into the curriculum to stimulate classroom learning and to help students achieve a higher level of proficiency.

Maya Dalzell

Maya Dalzell
Ulpan

Maya Dalzell has been a Hebrew and Jewish Studies teacher for more than 25 years. Born and raised in Israel, Maya began her studies at the University of Tel Aviv, where she received her undergraduate degree in literature and language arts. After receiving her master’s degree in translation and linguistics, Maya started her teaching career in the University of Tel Aviv School of Languages, where she taught for several years. For the last 16 years, Maya has taught Hebrew, Jewish Studies, and Israeli history at the Rashi School. This past summer, Maya taught at the Brookline Public Schools, working with high school students on subjects such as math, English and science. In recent years, Maya completed several workshops and courses at “Facing History and Ourselves” and earned a diploma after completing the course, “From an Idea to a State” with Professor Eyal Naveh of the University of Tel Aviv. She is thrilled to be joining the Hebrew College team.

Jan Darsa

Jan Darsa
Tamid of Hebrew College

Jan Darsa was Director of Jewish Education at Facing History and Ourselves for over 20 years, and has developed curricula in the field of Holocaust History, Jewish life before WW II and Israeli History. Her recent publications are Sacred Texts, Modern Questions: Connecting Ethics and History Through A Jewish Lens, and Colliding Dreams Study Guide. Jan has taught in public and private high schools and Tufts University. She is a Jerusalem Fellow, studying for 2 years (1988-90) in Jerusalem, and in 1991 was a scholar-in- residence in South Africa. In 2010 she received the Covenant Award for excellence in Jewish Education. She taught in the Open Circle program last fall.

Marc Dollinger

Marc Dollinger
Tamid of Hebrew College

Marc Dollinger is the Goldman Research Chair in Jewish Studies and Social Responsibility at San Francisco State University, gifting him the platform to talk about his passion for Jewish social justice. He is a past board president of both Brandeis-Hillel Day School and the Jewish Community High School of the Bay, and has served on the board of Jewish LearningWorks, URJ Camp Newman, Brandeis Marin Jewish Day School, the Bay Area Jewish Healing Center, and Ha-maqom. Currently, he serves on the board of the Osher Marin Jewish Community Center and the Jewish Community Federation in the San Francisco Bay Area. 

Dollinger was named the volunteer of the year in 2008 by the Jewish Community Federation of San Francisco. In 2015, the Jewish Community Relations Council awarded him the year’s Courageous Leader for his work at SF State, a sometimes-hostile campus for Jews. He has appeared in a PBS television show, American Jerusalem, offering insights into the history of San Francisco Jews, and then enjoyed 8 minutes of fame on NBC’s prime-time “Who Do You Think You Are?” teaching academy-award winning actress Helen Hunt about her San Francisco Jewish roots.  

Dollinger is the author of “Black Power, Jewish Politics: Reinventing the Alliance in the 1960’s,” “American Jewish History,” “Quest for Inclusion” and “California Jews.” 

Michael Fraade

Michael Fraade is a fifth-year rabbinical student at Hebrew College. In the past he has worked as a farmer and Jewish outdoor educator in the south; learned Torah at a variety of progressive yeshivas including Hadar, Yashrut, and Pardes; and volunteered with nonprofits focused on food justice, reproductive rights, and Jewish communal life. He has also completed a unit of Clinical Pastoral Education at Massachusetts General Hospital, where he currently serves as a part-time chaplain. Michael lives in Cambridge, MA with his wife, Rabbi Jenn Queen, and their dog Priya.

Elisha Gechter

Elisha Gechter
Tamid of Hebrew College

Elisha Gechter is the Senior Program Manager for Fellowships Curriculum at Harvard Kennedy School’s Center for Public Leadership. She designs leadership learning experiences for over 100 fellows, oversees the Wexner Israel Fellowship and the Wexner Senior Leadership Program as well as the Black Family Fellowship for active duty and veteran military students. Elisha has been working in the Boston Jewish Community for 14 years – previously connecting people searching for community and for Jewish wisdom as the Associate Director of Adult Learning and Community Engagement at Hebrew College (where she founded the Eser program in 2011and has been teaching in the young adult and young family community ever since) and fundraising with local young leaders at CJP. She has a BA in psychology from Yeshiva University’s Stern College in New York and an MA/MBA from Brandeis’ Heller Hornstein Program in Jewish Leadership and Non-Profit Management. She serves as president of the board of Mayyim Hayyim Mikvah and Education Center, a co-chair of Encounter’s Boston Regional Circle, and lives in Somerville, MA with her husband and two kids. She attends minyan at Minyan Tehillah, Cambridge Minyan and the Tremont Street Shul. 

Rabbi Neal Gold

Rabbi Neal Gold
Tamid of Hebrew College & Me’ah Classic

RABBI NEAL GOLD teaches and writes about Jewish texts, Israel, and the intersections between Jewish spiritual life and the contemporary world. In 2020, he created a rapidly expanding online platform for adult Jewish learning called “A Tree with Roots.” He is adjunct faculty Hebrew College in Newton, MA, and in 2023 became the spiritual leader of Am HaYam—Cape Cod Havurah.

Neal is the Immediate Past President of the Massachusetts Board of Rabbis. In 2021, he became an inaugural JJGI [J.J. Greenberg Institute for Advancement of Jewish Life] Fellow at Hadar Institute in New York.

Neal received smicha (rabbinic ordination) from Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, where he also received a Doctor of Divinity honoris causa degree in 2022. In 2018 he earned a second Master’s Degree in Near Eastern and Judaic Studies from Brandeis University. He is the author of many academic and popular writings about Judaism and Israel, and he is the editor of Radiance: The Collected Prose and Poetry of Danny Siegel, published by the Jewish Publication Society in 2020.

For over 18 years, Neal served congregations in New Jersey and Massachusetts. He was the Jewish Chaplain and Hillel Director for the Office of Spiritual and Religious Life at Babson College. He also served as the Director of Content & Programming for ARZA, the Association of Reform Zionists of America, and was a delegate at the 37th World Zionist Congress in Jerusalem. He serves on the boards of a variety of Jewish, interfaith, and social justice organizations. His writing and blogging on issues of Jewish interest, and his teaching schedule both online and in person, can be found at www.ATreeWithRoots.org.

Neal lives in Massachusetts with his wife Heidi Gold and their children Avi and Jeremy. He enjoys fishing, writing, Talmud, playing bass guitar, yoga, and highly amplified music.

Jonathan Golden

Dr. Jonathan Golden
Tamid of Hebrew College

Dr. Jonathan Golden is Director of Wellspring Initiatives at Shalom Hartman Institute of North America. Previously he served as the Israel Curriculum Coordinator and a history teacher at Gann Academy, a pluralistic Jewish high school in Waltham, MA. During his career at Gann, he taught AP American History, chaired the History Department, served as Assistant Head of School and Director of Academic Operations, and mentored numerous teachers and department chair. He teaches adult education courses on contemporary Israel at synagogues and homes in the Greater Boston area and is a member of CJP’s Boston-Haifa Shared Society Task Force and a Community Representative of JCRC Boston.

A graduate of Princeton University, Jonathan received his M.J.Ed. from Hebrew College and Ph.D. from Brandeis University. At Brandeis, he studied American Jewish history under the tutelage of Professor Jonathan Sarna and wrote a dissertation entitled From Cooperation to Confrontation: The Rise and Fall of the Synagogue Council of America.

Jonathan has participated in the Schusterman Center Summer Institute for Israel Studies which in 2022 included participants from Abraham Accords countries (Morocco, Bahrain, UAE), and has taught the Myra Kraft Seminar on Israel to first year students of the Hornstein program at Brandeis University.

As a member of a Conservative synagogue in his childhood, a Reform community in college, modern Orthodox synagogues in his 20s and the independent Temple Beth Zion today, Jonathan is interested in historical and contemporary questions of Jewish pluralism. His professional career in the world of Jewish pluralism is a natural extension of his educational path.

In 2007, Jonathan was the recipient of Hebrew College’s Sydney Hillson Memorial Award for Distinguished Leadership in and Commitment to Jewish Education. In 2014, he received the AJC Boston Young Leadership Award. In 2018, he was given CJP’s Chai in the Hub award honoring the contributions of young professionals and lay leaders in the greater Boston Jewish community.

Jonathan lives in Brookline, MA with his wife and son, and serves as a Brookline Town Meeting member.

Laila Goodman

Laila Goodman
Tamid of Hebrew College

Laila Goodman has been a high school teacher since 1985. Since 2005, she has worked at Gann Academy, a pluralistic Jewish High School in Waltham. She is a biology teacher and the Madrichat Ruchanit (Spiritual Advisor), a role in which she designs and implements experiential Jewish programming, including running a Mussar class for adults and students. Laila graduated from FSU with a degree in Marine Ecology and has a M.Ed from Harvard University.

Rabbi Leonard Gordon, D. Min.

Rabbi Leonard Gordon,
Tamid of Hebrew College

Dr. Rabbi Leonard Gordon is the chair of the National Synagogue Council (NCS) and a frequent teacher in the Tamid of Hebrew College Me’ah program since 2017. The NCS organizes interfaith dialogues between the American Jewish community and the Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox and Muslim communities. He served as rabbi at congregation B’nai Tikvah in Canton, MA through June, 2023. Fascinated by the unique Jewish experience in Sepharad, he currently leads trips to Spain and Morocco for interfaith and Jewish heritage groups, including a planned MEAH trip to Spain in May, 2024.

Gordon received rabbinic ordination and an MA from the Jewish Theological Seminary. He also holds a BA and M Phil from Columbia University, and an MA in Religious Studies from Brown University. In 2018, he earned a Doctor of Ministry degree in Interfaith Studies at the Andover Newton Theological School.

D'vorah J. Grenn, Ph.D. and Kohenet

D’vorah J. Grenn, Ph.D. and Kohenet
Tamid of Hebrew College

D’vorah J. Grenn is Founding Director of The Lilith Institute (1997). She co-directed the former Women’s Spirituality MA Program at Institute of Transpersonal Psychology/Sofia University, founded Mishkan Shekhinah, a movable sanctuary honoring the Sacred Feminine in all traditions, and served on the Founding Advisory Board of the Kohenet Hebrew Priestess Institute. D’vorah directs The Lilith Institute’s new Women’s Leadership Program and Mishkan Shekhinah program; recently taught “Amulets, Incantations & The Evil Eye: Jewish Magic and Folklore” for Hebrew College, and co-hosts the “Tending Lilith’s Fire” broadcast/podcast with Kohenet Annie Matan, and serves as a mashpi’ah/spiritual mentor.

Her “Talking To Goddess” anthology includes sacred writings of 72 women from 25 spiritual traditions. D’vorah’s dissertation, “For She Is A Tree of Life: Shared Roots Connecting Women to Deity” studied beliefs and rituals among South African Lemba and U.S. European-American Jewish women. Other publications include her book “Lilith’s Fire: Reclaiming our Sacred Lifeforce”; “The Kohanot: Keepers of the Flame”, in Stepping into Ourselves: An Anthology of Writing on Priestesses (Key & Cant); the Jewish priestess and Lilith entries in the Encyclopedia of Women in World Religions (de-Gaia), and “The First Resister: Evoking Lilith For Transformation And Freedom” in Original Resistance: Reclaiming Lilith, Reclaiming Ourselves (Girl God Books).

Osnat Hazan

Osnat Hazan
Ulpan

Osnat Hazan was born and raised in Israel. She started her teaching career as an instructor in the IDF, and studied Hebrew linguistics and Hebrew literature at Ben -Gurion University. Before Ulpan, she taught in Hebrew College’s Prozdor program.
She has also at Boston University.

Rabbi Dan Judson, Ph.D.

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Jordan Katz

Jordan Katz
Me’ah

Jordan Katz is a historian of early modern Jewry, with a focus on Jewish cultural history, history of medicine, and women and gender in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Her current book project examines the role of Jewish midwives within communal, intellectual, and medical frameworks in the early modern Ashkenazic world. Through an exploration of Jewish midwives’ medical influences, their engagement with administrative knowledge systems, and their intellectual status in the eyes of prominent male leaders, Katz’s study offers a new understanding of the structures of knowledge and authority that undergirded early modern European society. More broadly, she is interested in the ways in which expertise and special skills created pathways for interaction between Christians and Jews, and between Jews of different socioeconomic classes, that have not yet been studied.

Professor Katz has received fellowships from the Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture; the Consortium for History of Science, Technology and Medicine; the Center for Jewish History; and the Leo Baeck Fellowship Programme. Her work has been published in Jewish Quarterly Review and Jewish Social Studies.

Publications

“Jewish Midwives, Wise Women, and the Construction of Medical-Halakhic Expertise in the Eighteenth Century.” Jewish Social Studies Vol. 26, No. 2 (Winter 2021): 1-36.

“Midwife | Judaism” and “Midwife | Medical Treatises and Other Scholarly Reception.” Encyclopedia of the Bible and its Reception (EBR) Online. Berlin: De Gruyter (2020).

“‘To judge and to be judged’: Jewish Communal Autonomy in Metz and the Struggle for Sovereignty in Eighteenth-Century France.” Jewish Quarterly Review 104.3 (Summer 2014): 438-470.

Layah Lipsker

Layah Lipsker
Tamid of Hebrew College

Layah Kranz Lipsker is a Boston based Jewish educator and spiritual coach. For three decades, Layah has been sharing Jewish wisdom through engaging text study in Biblical literature and Midrash, through the lens of Kabbalah. A research associate at the Hadassah Brandeis Institute, Layah is passionate about issues related to religion and gender and is the director of the Boston Agunah Taskforce, an organization focused on eliminating gender disparities in Jewish divorce practices. Layah serves as scholar in residence for spiritual retreats, trips to Israel, and lectures widely. She lives in Swampscott, MA, and is the mother of six amazing human beings.

Shari Lowin, Ph.D.

Shari Lowin, PhD
Tamid of Hebrew College & Me’ah Classic

Shari Lowin is professor of religious studies at Stonehill College. She previously taught at the University of Chicago, Yeshiva University, Brooklyn College and in Ma’ayan. Lowin is fluent in Arabic and has researched and published on a number of topics comparing Judaism and Islam. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago.

David Mahfouda

David Mahfouda
Tamid of Hebrew College

David (he/him) received an A.B. in Visual and Environmental Studies from Harvard University, and an M.E. in Product Architecture and Engineering from Stevens Institute. Prior to matriculating at Hebrew College, David was a practicing artist and curator at the Proteus Gowanus Gallery in Brooklyn, where he cofounded the Fixers Collective, an anarchist repair community that gathered weekly to fix broken things. David was also the cofounder and CEO of Bandwagon, a technology company that facilitated shared taxi rides from NYC airports.

David really loves gathering (people), and practice (all kinds, spiritual, Jewish, artistic, etc.), and believes that both his artistic and technical inclinations stem from deep rooted Jewish values toward collective interdependence and return, and a Jewish sensibility about what might redeem the lives we’ve been given to live out on our one earth. He loves cooking and singing and sparkly things, and he’s very excited to be teaching at the intersection of Judaism and practice.

Rabbi Natan Margalit, Ph.D.

Rabbi Natan Margalit, PhD
Tamid of Hebrew College

Natan Margalit is the author of The Pearl and the Flame: A Journey into Jewish Wisdom and Ecological Thinking. He was ordained in Jerusalem in 1990 and earned a Ph.D. from U.C. Berkeley, 2001. He has taught at Bard College, RRC, and Hebrew College Rabbinical School.

Natan is currently Interim Dean of Faculty and chair of the Rabbinic texts Department at the Aleph Ordination Program. He is also Director of AOP’s Earth-Based Judaism program and founder of the non-profit Organic Torah. He lives in Newton, MA with his wife, two sons and dog.

Jacob Meskin, Ph.D.

Jacob Meskin, PhD
Tamid of Hebrew College & Me’ah Classic

Dr. Jacob Meskin is currently Academic Advisor and Senior Lecturer in the Me’ah Program at Hebrew College. He teaches in, and has taught for the Me’ah and Me’ah Select programs, the Tzion program, and for various synagogue and professional groups in the Boston area. In addition to having served for many years as teacher trainer for the Me’ah Program, he is co-author of the curriculum for Parenting Through A Jewish Lens, and works as a consultant on adult Jewish education and teacher training in the Boston area. Meskin was the inaugural holder of the Ruderman Chair in Jewish Studies at Northeastern University, and has taught at Princeton University, Rutgers University, the Bernard Revel Graduate School of Yeshiva University, Williams College, and Lehigh University. His articles have appeared in Modern Judaism, The Journal of Religion, Soundings, Levinas Studies, Judaism, Cross Currents, Educational Philosophy and Theory, and in several edited volumes. Despite being a transplant from New York City, Meskin has become an avid Boston sports fan. His hobbies include chess (which he thinks he’s good at), Go (which he wishes he were good at), nineteenth century English novels, old movies, and Indian vegetarian food. He lives with his wife and daughter in Brookline.

Rabbi Marcia Plumb

Rabbi Marcia Plumb
Tamid of Hebrew College

Marcia Plumb is the senior rabbi of Congregation Mishkan Tefila in Brookline.  She has studied and taught Mussar for many years.  She teaches Mussar at Mishkan Tefila in Newton and in Winchester.  She lived and worked in London for many years and now lives in Needham with her husband and two children.

Rabbi Nehemia Polen, Ph.D.

Rabbi Nehemia Polen, PhD
Hebrew College Professor of Jewish Thought

Nehemia Polen is a leading expert in Hasidism and Jewish thought. A widely published author, his books include The Holy Fire: The Teachings of Rabbi Kalonymus Kalman Shapira, the Rebbe of the Warsaw Ghetto; a translation of Malkah Shapiro’s The Rebbe’s Daughter: Memoir of a Hasidic Childhood, a project that originated in Polen’s research as a National Endowment for the Humanities fellow and recipient of a National Jewish Book Award; Filling Words With Light: Hasidic and Mystical Reflections on Jewish Prayer; and From Tiberias, With Love: A Collection of Tiberian Hasidism, Volume I: Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Vitebsk. His most recent book, Stop, Look, Listen: Celebrating Shabbos Through a Spiritual Lens (Maggid 2022), was named a finalist for the 72nd Jewish Book Council’s Myra H. Kraft memorial Award for Contemporary Jewish Life & Practice. In 2024, he received Hadar’s Ateret Tzvi essay award second prize.

Polen holds a doctorate from Boston University, where he studied with and served as a teaching fellow for Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel. Prior to his career in Jewish academia, Polen served for 23 years as a congregational rabbi.

Meredith Reiches

Meredith Reiches
Tamid of Hebrew College

Meredith Reiches is Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of Massachusetts Boston, a Senior Researcher in the GenderSci Lab at Harvard University, and a Shanah Bet student in the rabbinic ordination program at Hebrew College. Meredith earned a B.A. in Comparative Literature in French and Italian at Brown University and a Ph.D. in Human Evolutionary Biology at Harvard University. Her research focuses on how ideas about the biology of sex show up in the stories we tell about adolescence and reproduction. She is a proud member of the Community Hevra Kadisha of Greater Boston.

Carolyn Ringel

Carolyn Baker Ringel
Tamid of Hebrew College

Carolyn Baker Ringel has a law degree from the University of Chicago and a master’s degree in bioethics from Harvard Medical School. She has taught, written, and presented at workshops about navigating ethical issues in the healthcare setting.

Rabbi Or Rose

Rabbi Or Rose
Director, Miller Center for Interreligious Learning & Leadership
Tamid of Hebrew College

Rabbi Or Rose is the founding director of the Betty Ann Greenbaum Miller Center for Interreligious Learning & Leadership of Hebrew College. Before assuming this position in 2016, he worked in various administrative and teaching capacities at Hebrew College for over a decade, including serving as a founding faculty member and associate dean for Informal Education of the Rabbinical School. Rabbi Rose was also one of the creators of CIRCLE, The Center for Interreligious & Community Leadership Education, cosponsored by Hebrew College and Andover Newton Theological School (2007-2017) and has taught for Hebrew College’s Me’ah Classic program.

In addition to his work at Hebrew College, Rose has taught for the Bronfman Youth Fellowships, The Wexner Graduate Fellowship, and in a variety of other academic, religious, and civic contexts throughout North America, and in Asia, Europe, and Israel. A prolific author and editor, his writings have appeared in Beliefnet;  The Forward;  The Huffington Post;  Interfaith America; The Jewish Telegraphic Agency;   Patheos;  MyJewishLearning;  Religion News Service;  The Times of Israel;  Tikkun;  Sh’ma;  The Washington Post; as well as various scholarly publications. Rose is the Senior Publisher of  The Journal of Interreligious Studies, as well as co-editor of  Speaking Torah: Spiritual Teachings from Around the Maggid’s Table, and the award-winning anthology,  My Neighbor’s Faith: Stories of Interreligious Encounter, Growth, and Transformation. His most recent publication is the co-edited volume, Rabbi Zalman Schachter: Essential Teachings. Rose is currently working on two new anthologies: a contemporary multifaith commentary on the Psalms, tentatively entitled The Book of Psalms: Here & Now (Paraclete Press, 2023) and With the Best of Intentions: Interreligious Missteps & Unexpected Learnings (Orbis 2023).

Rabbi Benjamin Samuels, PhD

Rabbi Benjamin Samuels
Tamid of Hebrew College & Me’ah Classic

Benjamin J. Samuels has served since 1995 as rabbi of Congregation Shaarei Tefillah in Newton, Mass., and has been a member of the Me’ah faculty since 1996. He received his bachelor’s degree, master’s degree and rabbinic ordination from Yeshiva University and is an alumnus of the Wexner Graduate Fellowship program. Rabbi Samuels earned his PhD in Science, Philosophy and Religion at Boston University.

Rev. Rob Schenck

Rev. Rob Schenck
Visiting Scholar of Christianity & Religious Leadership
Miller Center for Interreligious Learning & Leadership of Hebrew College

Rev. Rob Schenck, D.Min. is an ordained evangelical minister and a progressive voice of dissent in his religious community.

Over a 40-year career, he has served as an addictions counselor, youth director, pastor, global humanitarian outreach worker, and a minister to top elected and appointed officials in Washington, DC. In the aftermath of 9/11, Schenck helped lead an unprecedented international dialogue between North American evangelical leaders and North African Islamic scholars. Shortly afterward, he was the subject of Abigail Disney’s Emmy Award-winning documentary, The Armor of Light, a critique of the American evangelical embrace of popular gun culture, eventually leading to his break from evangelical orthodoxy on guns, abortion, and the public display of religious symbols.

Schenck holds degrees in Bible and Theology, Religion, and Christian Ministry and a Doctor of Ministry in strategic leadership with a concentration in church and state. He has been a visiting academic at Oxford University where recently co-convened a historic colloquium on racialized Christian Nationalism. Schenck tells the story of his religious journey in a memoir, Costly Grace: An Evangelical Minister’s Rediscovery of Faith, Hope and Love (HarperCollins). His essays on the intersection of religion and public life have been published by Religion News Service, USA Today, TIME Magazine, the Chicago Tribune, Washington Post, and The New York Times, among other national journals.

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Miller Center for Interreligious Learning & Leadership: Faculty & Staff
Liz Aeschlimann
Dignity Project Fellowship Program Director
Wise Huston Chabot
Contextual Education Fellow
Kyle Desrosiers
Program Administrator
Rafi Ellenson
Rabbinic Intern
Rev. Dr. Soren M. Hessler
Instructor of Christian and Interreligious Studies
Dr. Axel Marc Oaks Takács
Editor-in-Chief of the Journal for Interreligious Studies
Rabbi Or Rose
Director
Rosys
Associate Program Director of the Dignity Project
Rev. Rob Schenck
Visiting Faculty

Linda Yael Schiller, MSW, LICSW

Linda Yael Schiller, MSW, LICSW
Tamid of Hebrew College

Linda Yael Schiller is an international speaker, dreamwork specialist, and integrative mind/body/spiritual psychotherapist.

She is the author of PTSDreams: Transform your Nightmares from Trauma through Healing Dreamwork, (2022, Llewellyn Worldwide Publishing) Modern Dreamwork: New Tools for Decoding Your Soul’s Wisdom (Llewellyn 2019), Comprehensive and Integrative Trauma Treatment (Western Schools, 2010) and numerous articles, book chapters, and audio programs on dreamwork, trauma treatment and relational group work.

Linda is professor emeritus of Boston University School of Social Work, recognized internationally for her original theory of relational group work and for teaching excellence. She regularly teaches dreamwork to both professionals and the public of her Integrated Embodied Dreamwork approach and her creative Dreamwork Through the Lens of Kabbalah. Her innovative nightmare treatment protocol is based on best practice in trauma treatment and Jungian active imagination called “The GAIA* Method (Guided Active Imagination Approach)”. Her next book, Ancestral Dreaming: Conversations with our Ancestors and Healing Intergenerational Wounds (Llewellyn) is due out September 2025.

Matthew Schultz

Matthew Schultz
Tamid of Hebrew College

Matthew Schultz is an author and rabbi-to-be living between Boston and Tel Aviv. He is currently studying at Hebrew College and expects to be ordained in 2025. He is the weekly columnist for the LA Jewish Journal and the author of the “Dispatches from the Promised Land” newsletter on Substack. https://matthewschultz.substack.com/

Natasha Shabat

Natasha Shabat
Tamid of Hebrew College

Natasha Shabat is an independent scholar who learned Hebrew as an adult and has been teaching Biblical and Modern Hebrew full- time to adults since 1997, in congregations, community centers, and private homes. Her students — whom she teaches in groups, individually, and by video and telephone — include rabbis and rabbinical students, cantors, lay leaders, Me’ah graduates, Hebrew-school teachers, Hebrew-school dropouts, and Jews-by-choice. Among her students are doctors, lawyers, professors, business leaders, homemakers, grandmothers, great-grandfathers, West Point graduates, and Christian clergy. Natasha is a graduate of Harvard University in Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations.

Rabbi Michael Shire, PhD

Rabbi Michael Shire
Academic Director, Master’s in Jewish Education       Tamid of Hebrew College

Part-time Rabbi at Central Reform Temple, Back Bay, Boston

Education

Hon. Doctorate, Jewish Religious Education, Hebrew Union College
Doctorate in Jewish Education, Hebrew Union College, Los Angeles
Rabbinical Ordination, Leo Baeck College, London
MA Jewish Studies, Leo Baeck College, London
MA Jewish Education, Hebrew Union College, New York
BA Hons. Hebrew Literature and Jewish History, University College London

Biography

Rabbi Dr. Michael Shire grew up in Birmingham England and completed his B.A. Hons in Hebrew Literature and Jewish History at University College, London. He continued his studies at Hebrew Union College both in New York and Los Angeles completing a M.A. and Ph.D. in Jewish Education. His research work, later to be published, proposed a curriculum orientation for spiritual enhancement in Jewish educational settings. He concurrently served as director of education at Temple Beth Hillel, a large Reform synagogue in North Hollywood, California. On returning to Great Britain in 1988, he took up the post as the national director of the Centre of Jewish Education developing the infrastructure, day schools and professional and academic learning of Jewish education in the UK. Following further study, he was ordained as rabbi at Leo Baeck College in 1996. In 2001, he merged the Centre of Jewish Education with the rabbinic training school, Leo Baeck College, and became its vice-principal for an additional eleven years. He became the professor and dean of the Shoolman Graduate School of Jewish Education in 2011 and subsequently was appointed as chief academic officer of Hebrew College from 2015-2020. He has been widely published in the field of Jewish education and spiritual education. In addition, he has published four books of creative liturgy with medieval illuminations in association with the British and Bodleian Libraries. He is founder of the Torah Godly Play pedagogic methodology and serves as trustee of the Pursuit of History, the Association of Institutions of Graduate Jewish Education.

Selected Publications and Presentations

Judaism and Childhood, The Sage Encyclopedia of Children and Childhood Studies (Sage Publishing, 2020)
Mazal Tov: The Rituals and Customs of a Jewish Wedding, Frances Lincoln (UK) and Stuart, Tabori and Chang (USA), 2003.
The Illuminated Haggadah, Frances Lincoln (UK) & Stuart, Tabori and Chang (USA), 1998 (Co-productions in Germany, Holland, France, Russia and Israel).
“Responding to the Questions of Uncertainty Online,” Wabash Center website, May 12, 2020
“Torah Godly Play: An Innovative Approach to Religious Education for Shlemut”  in “Gleanings: A dialogue on Jewish Education” Volume 6:2 2019
Leo Baeck and Oppeln, Poland in Manna Spring 2011
Rabbinic Training and the Interfaith Imperative in Pursuit of History.

Rabbi Moishe Steigmann

Moishe Steigmann, The Mindful Rabbi, is the founder and director of a non-profit organization, Own Your Judaism: Where your life journey and your Jewish journey meet. He seamlessly blends ancient Jewish wisdom with contemporary passions and practices. Through his teachings, writings, and workshops, he continues to influence and lead the conversation on mindful living within and beyond the Jewish community. He also speaks, hosts livestream conversations, and offers Jewish Life Coaching and organizational consultation.

Born and raised in Milwaukee, Rabbi Steigmann is a proud father of two children, loves sports, is passionate about living gratefully, and enjoys almost all puzzles and games.

Mona Strick `19

Rabbi Mona Strick
Tamid of Hebrew College

Rabbi Mona Strick`19 received rabbinica ordination and a Masters in Jewish Studies from Hebrew College. She has previous taught adult learning courses on the topics of teshuva, pPrayer, psalms, Shir Hashirim, Pirkei Avot and Parenting through a Jewish Lens. She has taught classes exploring Jewish texts and values to college students through JLF at BU Hillel: (Family & Friends: Complicated Relationships, Badass Biblical Women, Sex, Love and Romance, Health, Illness and Death) and is a member of the BU Hillel board.

Rabbi Strick works as an Interfaith Chaplain at the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center providing spiritual care and emotional support to patients, families and staff.

Dr. Susie Tanchel

Dr. Susie Tanchel
Hebrew College Vice President
Education

Ph.D., Brandeis University
B.A., Brandeis University

Dr. Susie Tanchel joined Hebrew College in the summer of 2020, after serving as the head of school at JCDS, Boston’s Jewish Community Day School.

During her nine-year tenure at JCDS, Tanchel was an accomplished and deeply beloved leader, guiding the school to preeminence as a national model of excellence in pluralistic Jewish education, and creatively embodying its abiding commitments to community, centrality of Hebrew language, and teaching the whole child.

She was a recipient of the 2018 Covenant Award for Jewish Educators.

Aron Wander

Aron Wander
Tamid of Hebrew College

Aron Wander is a Hebrew College rabbinical student, a writer, and an organizer. He is an alum of the Dorot Fellowship in Israel, served as the Rabbinic Intern at Temple Emunah of Lexington and Ohel Ayalah of Long Island City, and worked as a Rabbinic Fellow at Temple Israel of Boston.

His writing has appeared in Lehrhaus, Jewish Currents, and Gashmius, and his poetry has appeared in The Curator, The Shore, and Thimble Literary Magazine.

Fran Zamore

Fran Zamore, MSW, is a veteran social worker, mindfulness and meditation teacher, and Wise Aging facilitator. After over 30 years of experience as a clinical social worker/therapist focusing on personal and spiritual growth and mind-body-spirit connection, Fran is now focusing on facilitating Wise Aging groups and leading Jewish mindfulness meditation. Fran is the co-author of GriefWork ~ Healing from Loss, The GriefWork Companion ~ Activities for Healing and GriefWork for Teens.

Fran is a member of Adat Shalom Reconstructionist Congregation in Bethesda, MD, a longtime participant in programs of the Institute for Jewish Spirituality, and active with Jews United for Justice, among other social justice organizations.

Shlomi Zan

Shlomi Zan
Ulpan

Shlomi is an experienced educator with both children and adults. In Israel, Shlomi taught Hebrew and History in high school for four years, and served as a head of an elementary school for five years. Currently, Shlomi teaches Hebrew both at Gann Academy High School and Hebrew College. He holds a bachelor degree in History from Hebrew University, Jerusalem, an M.A in Public Policy, from Tel Aviv University, a Teaching Certificate from Beit-Berl College, and a Public School Principal Certification from Kibbutz Seminar College in Tel Aviv. Shlomi lives in Brookline with his husband and their dog, Joy.