Rabbi Rachel Barenblat, M.F.A., Founding Builder; Board member; Lead Architect, Bayit Publishing and Liturgical Arts Working Group. She/her.
Rachel, a fellow of Rabbis Without Borders, was named in 2016 by the Forward as one of America’s Most Inspiring Rabbis . She holds dual ordination as rabbi and mashpi’ah (spiritual director). Since 2011 Rachel has served as spiritual leader of Congregation Beth Israel (North Adams, MA). She also served as past co-chair of ALEPH and interim Jewish chaplain to Williams College. She holds an MFA in Writing and Literature from the Bennington Writing Seminars, and is author of six volumes of poetry, among them 70 faces: Torah poems (Phoenicia Publishing, 2011), Open My Lips (Ben Yehuda Press, 2016), Texts to the Holy (Ben Yehuda 2018), and Crossing the Sea (Phoenicia, 2020). Since 2003 she has blogged as The Velveteen Rabbi, and in 2008 TIME named her blog one of the top 25 sites on the internet. Her work has appeared in Reform Judaism, The Wisdom Daily, The Forward, and anthologies ranging from The Bloomsbury Anthology of Contemporary Jewish American Poetry (Bloomsbury) to The Women’s Seder Sourcebook (Jewish Lights). Her downloadable Velveteen Rabbi’s Haggadah for Pesach has been used around the world. She is visiting faculty at the Academy for Spiritual Formation (teaching both at two-year and at five-day retreats) and has also taught (among other places) at Beyond Walls, a writing program for clergy of many faiths at the Kenyon Institute.
Rabbi Pamela Gottfried, Board member; builder, Bayit Publishing; she/her
Since receiving rabbinic ordination and earning an M.A. in Jewish Education from the Jewish Theological Seminary in 1993, Pamela has taught students of all ages in churches, colleges, community centers, mosques, retreat centers, schools, summer camps, and synagogues. She currently serves as the Scholar-in-Residence at The Weber School, where she is collaborating with General and Jewish Studies teachers to create interdisciplinary courses. She is also the facilitator of two Jewish Book groups, one of which is in its 13th year. Pamela is an alumna of Clal’s Rabbis Without Borders and LEAP fellowships, and a member of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical Association and the Clergy Advisory Group at MACoM: Metro Atlanta Community Mikvah. She is the author of Found in Translation: Common Words of Uncommon Wisdom, and is currently working on a collection of creative nonfiction that includes stories and poems about her 25+ years as a parent and rabbi. In addition to attending Spiritual Poetry Writing classes, she spends her free time reading novels, solving crosswords, playing Scrabble with her spouse, and taking walks with her faithful canine companion, Henry.
Rabbi Cynthia Hoffman, Bayit Board; Builder, Bayit Publishing. They/them.
Cynthia, a writer, intellectual, and teacher, started Rabbinical School at The Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies, and holds dual ordination from ALEPH as rabbi and mashpi’ah (spiritual director). Cynthia attended graduate school in English at UC Berkeley, where they served as Production Director for the early internet zine bad subjects. Their work has appeared in bad subjects, Tikkun Magazine, and Zeek, among others, and in anthologies ranging from The Bad Subjects Anthology (NYU) and Technologies of Writing (Prentiss Hall) to Beside Still Waters, a recent publication of Bayit and Ben Yehuda Press. Disability has taken them out of the public arena, but they continue to write and teach as often as possible. Among their current projects, Cynthia is working with their rebbe Burt Jacobson on his book on The Mystery of the Ba’al Shem Tov. In addition, they are working on two books of their own: one on the philosophy and poetry of the commentary and teachings attributed to the Besht, and another on Mysticism in the Mediterranean Basin, 1200-1500.
Rabbi Dara Lithwick, Board member; Lead Architect/Builder, Builders Blog; Builder, Liturgical Arts Working Group. She/her.
Rabbi Dara is passionate about building bridges between people and communities and promoting inclusion as a fundamental Jewish practice. She is an advocate for LGBTQ2+ inclusion within diverse Jewish spaces, as well as for Jewish inclusion in LGBTQ2+ spaces. When not at work as a constitutional and parliamentary affairs lawyer, Rabbi Dara is active as an outreach rabbi at Temple Israel Ottawa, where she helps lead services and lifecycle events, teach adult and youth programs, and engage in outreach and social action initiatives, and led High Holiday services at Congregation Shir Libeynu in Toronto, the longest standing LGBTQ-inclusive shul in the city. Rabbi Dara is also chairing a Canadian Council for Reform Judaism group to develop a Tikkun Olam strategy for Canada and is the Canadian representative to the Union for Reform Judaism’s Commission on Social Action. She also serves on the JSpace Canada Advisory Board, and on the LGBTQ2+ Advisory Council at CIJA, the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs.. Rabbi Dara and her partner love chasing their two children around Ottawa.
Rabbi David Evan Markus , J.D., M.P.P., Founding Builder; Board member; Builder, Builders Blog; Builder, Liturgical Arts Working Group. He/him.
David brings extensive experience as pulpit rabbi, lawyer, public official, educator and nonprofit leader. He is rabbi and spiritual leader of Temple Beth El of City Island (New York, NY); past co-chair of ALEPH (the Jewish Renewal movement’s umbrella organization); faculty at the Academy for Jewish Religion; faculty in spiritual direction for the ALEPH seminary; and blogger for multiple national platforms (My Jewish Learning, The Wisdom Daily, The Forward, The Jewish Studio). A fellow of Rabbis Without Borders, David publishes widely on governance, management, liturgy and spiritual development in Jewish contexts, and has an active spiritual direction practice specializing in clergy development. By day, David presides in the New York courts in a parallel public service career that also included presidential campaigns, all branches and levels of government, and graduate faculty in government and public administration for Fordham and Pace Universities. David holds dual ordination as rabbi and mashpia (spiritual director) from ALEPH; a Juris Doctor magna cum laude from Harvard Law School; and a Masters in Public Policy from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, which named David a global “Innovator in Public Service.”
Rabbi Mike Moskowitz, Founding Builder; Board member; Lead Architect, MenschUp and BeALight.. He/him.
Mike studied at the Mir Yeshiva in Jerusalem where he received smicha. He then continued his studies at BMG in Lakewood where he received an advanced degree in Talmud. For 15 years, he was engaged in Jewish outreach and education as the Dean of Students of the Yeshivah of Virginia. Most recently he has served as a rabbi at Columbia University and of the Old Broadway Synagogue in Harlem. Mike is a vocal advocate for inclusivity, LGBT rights, and social justice. He writes frequently at the intersection of transgender issues and Jewish thought. Formerly senior educator at Orthodox social justice organization Uri L’Tzedek, and currently Scholar-in-Residence on Queer and Trans Issues at CBST, Mike is working on a doctorate in Talmud at The Jewish Theological Seminary – JTS.
Steve Silbert, Board member; Lead Architect, Visual Torah and Bayit Games; Builder, Liturgical Arts Working Group. He/him.
Steve is the left-handed youngest son of an artistic mother and a rocket scientist father. He takes after his father in his interest in logic and science. Steve worked hard to not take art classes as part of his education. Even so, Steve has been sketchnoting since 2015, proving that sketchnoting is about ideas, not art. He uses sketchnotes in his professional role as an Agile Coach, where he teaches visual facilitation basics in software development and marketing. In 2016 he joined a group of Christians who sketchnoted sermons in their churches. Hesitant to use tablet on Shabbat, Steve began the practice of finding an online dvar Torah for each week’s upcoming Torah portion and sketchnoting concepts from that dvar Torah.
Bayit Counsel
Steven Green, Bayit Counsel
Steven returned to his Jewish roots thanks, in large measure, to the work and legacy of Reb Zalman. The Judaism he left decades ago bears little resemblance to the “renewed” world he came back to. Seeking an authentic spiritual practice and a transformative path led to a number of different practices over the years in Eastern and Western religious/spiritual traditions which came full circle to a Renewal rabbi who shone a bright light on what was always there. Steven, an attorney, practices family law and spends never enough time with his wife in the idyllic setting of Londonderry, New Hampshire.