The Jewish Theological Seminary
Conservative Judaism
Rabbi Lisa Gelber
As associate dean of The Rabbinical School, Rabbi Lisa Gelber serves as adviser to second- and third-year rabbinical students, guiding students through the second-year review process, as well as preparations for the year of study in Israel. She also oversees the staff of the Women’s League Seminary Synagogue. In addition, she serves as adjunct lecturer of Professional and Pastoral Skills and teaches Supervised Rabbinic Fieldwork (PRO6405x), a supervision course for upper-level students who provide spiritual leadership in congregations.
A native New Yorker and graduate of Amherst College in Massachusetts with an AB in Religion (magna cum laude, 1989), Rabbi Gelber received rabbinic ordination from The Jewish Theological Seminary in 1996. She spent almost seven years in suburban Seattle, working as a congregational rabbi at Herzl-Ner Tamid Conservative Congregation in Mercer Island, Washington, and a chaplain intern at Harborview Medical Center in Seattle, where she earned a unit of Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE).
She currently serves as vice president of the Board of Directors of FaithTrust Institute, a multifaith organization that provides training, consultation, and educational materials to religious communities and advocates to address the faith aspects of abuse. Rabbi Gelber is an editor of A Journey Torwards Freedom: A Haggadah for Women Who Have Experienced Domestic Violence (Faithtrust Institute, 2003). She served as a consultant to And the Gates Opened: Women in the Rabbinate (Diva Productions, 2005), a video produced in celebration of the twentieth anniversary of the ordination of women at JTS, which aired on ABC. From 2003–2005, she was visiting rabbi to Kehillat Shalom, the new Conservative, egalitarian synagogue on the North Shore, in Skokie, Illinois.
Rabbi Gelber trained in Spiritual Direction through the Morei Derekh program of the Yedidya Center for Jewish Spiritual Direction. She also uses running as a mode of spiritual practice and raises funds for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society through Team and Training (TNT), the Society’s endurance-training program.
Rabbi Gelber's Commentaries
