Michael Lerner

Rabbi Lerner is editor of Tikkun magazine, winner of the mainstream media Religion Newswriters Association Best Magazine of the Year in 2014 and 2015. He is also Chair of the interfaith (and also secular-humanist-and-atheist-welcoming NSP Network of Spiritual Progressives, and rabbi of Beyt Tikkun Synagogue-Without-Walls in Berkeley, California. Rabbi Lerner is author of 11 books including two national best-sellers, Jewish Renewal--a theological introduction to Judaism and The Left Hand of God: Taking Back Our Country from the Religious Right. He co-wrote with Cornel West a book called Jews and Blacks: Let the Healing Begin. His book The Politics of Meaning presented the ideas that Hillary Clinton endorsed and invited him to the 1st Clinton presidency's White House to strategize about how to implement these ideas until it became too politically risky for her after the media dubbed Lerner "Hillary's guru" (he always denied having that influence over her). He also wrote The Socialism of Fools: Anti-Semitism on the Left, Spirit Matters, and his most recent book is called Embracing Israel AND Palestine: A Strategy for Middle East Peace (available at www.tikkun.org/eip). Rabbi Lerner was awarded a ph.d. in philosophy from the University of California, Berkeley and a ph.d. in Social and Clinical Psychology from the Wright Institute in Berkeley, and taught at a variety of universities before starting Tikkun magazine in 1986. He was mentored by Abraham Joshua Heschel when Lerner studied at the Jewish Theological Seminary and later by Rabbi Zalman Schachter Shalomi before hereceived rabbinical ordination from a Jewish religious court "beyt din" consisting of 3 rabbis who had themselves received orthodox smicha (ordination). He is a member of the Board of Rabbis of Northern California. Rabbi Lerner welcomes emails from those who fundamentally agree with his approach and wish to work with him in building a global Network of Spiritual Progressives at rabbilerner.tikkun@gmail.com To subscribe to the print edition of Tikkun (not available at the Tikkun website except for those who are paid subscribers), go to www.tikkun.org/subscribe. To join the Network of Spiritual Progressives, go to www.spiritualprogressives.org/join. Joining at the $50 level or above also brings with it as a benefit a one year subscription to Tikkun magazine. For information on the religious services and Torah study which Rabbi Lerner conducts (and to which non-Jews as well as Jews who don't believe in the God they were taught about in their childhoods are very welcome) go to www.beyttikkun.org