Rabbi Lavey Derby
Senior Rabbi
Kol Shofar’s Senior Rabbi, Lavey Derby, will be on sabbatical until August of 2008. Associate Rabbi Chai Levy will be functioning as Senior Rabbi during his absence.
Rabbi Lavey Yitzchak Derby has been the Senior Rabbi of Congregation Kol Shofar since 1993. He has been instrumental in building our synagogue community on the principles of Torah study, spiritual quest and practice, and social action.
Prior to his appointment at Kol Shofar, Rabbi Derby served as the executive director of the Council on Jewish Life, the premier community-building department of the Jewish Federation Council of Greater Los Angeles. Rabbi Derby was responsible for developing innovative programs to meet the challenges and concerns of the Los Angeles Jewish community, including programs focused on synagogue affairs, Jewish arts and culture, outreach to Jews with disabilities, outreach to Israelis, outreach to intermarrieds, accessible Jewish spirituality and Jewish education for community lay leadership.
Rabbi Derby also served as director of Jewish education at the 92nd Street ‘Y’ in New York where he developed a Jewish educational program that consisted of public lectures, workshops, films and other cultural events. He organized ‘CONNECT,’ an outreach program for children and adults that provided educational programs and retreats for unaffiliated Jews and interfaith couples with the goal of involving them in Jewish community and life. He helped facilitate the creation of ‘DEREKH TORAH,’ an intensive 30-week course of basic Jewish study for Jews by birth and potential Jews by choice conceived of by Paul and Rachel Cowan.
Rabbi Derby served as scholar and director of program development at the CLAL - the National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership working with Rabbi Yitz Greenberg. Currently, he is on the faculty of the Wexner Heritage Foundation. He has lectured extensively across the country and has taught widely on subjects ranging from rabbinic and Jewish thought to Hasidism and contemporary Jewish spirituality. He is past President of the Northern California Board of Rabbis, and a rabbinic fellow of the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem.
Rabbi Derby earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in philosophy from Columbia University and Bachelor of Arts degree in Hebrew literature from the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York. He earned a Master of Arts degree in Jewish Studies from the Seminary, where he was ordained in 1976. In 1979, he certified as psychotherapist by the Alfred Adler Institute in New York.
Rabbi Derby can be reached 415.388.1818 ext. 100 or at lderby@kolshofar.org.
CLICK HERE FOR RABBI DERBY'S DRASHOT AND TEACHINGS.
For Rabbi Derby's Idra teachings, classes and groups, please also see our page with information about the Idra events.
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Rabbi Chai Levy
Associate Rabbi
Rabbi Chai Levy is the associate rabbi of Congregation Kol Shofar, where she has served since 2002, teaching, listening, celebrating, singing, dancing, and playing music with adults and children of all ages. Her spiritual leadership is most guided by the wisdom of the Hasidic masters and Jewish feminist thinkers.
Originally from Richmond, Virginia, Rabbi Levy received her BA in Religious Studies and Women’s Studies at the University of Virginia. She was ordained in 2002 by the Jewish Theological Seminary, the Conservative movement’s rabbinical school in New York City. She also spent three years living and studying in Jerusalem at the Hebrew University, Pardes, and Machon Shechter.
Before coming to Kol Shofar, Rabbi Levy worked as a chaplain at Mount Zion hospital in San Francisco, as a Jewish outdoor environmental educator in New England, and as a coordinator of inner-city service programs in Washington, DC.
Named after her grandmother and great-grandmother, Chai is an acronym of Chaya-Yehudis, which she interprets to mean “to give thanks to God for life and for being a Jew.”
Rabbi Levy can be reached 415.388.1818 ext. 100 or at clevy@kolshofar.org.
CLICK HERE FOR RABBI LEVY'S HOME PAGE, WITH DRASHOT AND WRITINGS, CLASSES, AND A VARIETY OF USEFUL RESOURCES.
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