Faculty and Staff

Meir Soloveichik is director of the Straus Center for Torah and Western Thought at Yeshiva University, a senior fellow at Tikvah and rabbi of Congregation Shearith Israel, the oldest Jewish congregation in the United States. He was recently appointed by the President of the United States to the Presidential Commission on Religious Liberty and served as Vice Chair of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. He is the author of Providence and Power: Ten Portraits in Jewish Statesmanship (Encounter Books, 2023) and Sacred Time (Maggid Books, 2024), and his podcasts and lectures can be found at MeirSoloveichik.com.

Rabbi Dr. Stu Halpern is Senior Advisor to the Provost of Yeshiva University and Deputy Director of the Straus Center for Torah and Western Thought, and he is responsible for developing educational and communal initiatives that bridge Torah and general studies. Dr. Halpern received his undergraduate degree from the University of Pennsylvania, a master’s degree in Psychology in Education from Teachers College at Columbia University, a master’s degree in Bible from the Bernard Revel Graduate School of Jewish Studies, an MBA in Nonprofit Management from Touro University, a doctorate in education from the Azrieli Graduate School of Education and Administration, and rabbinic ordination from Rabbi Chaim Brovender. He has edited or co-edited 17 books, including Esther in America; Gleanings: Reflections on Ruth; Books of the People: Revisiting Classic Works of Jewish Thought; and Torah and Western Thought: Intellectual Portraits of Orthodoxy and Modernity, and he has lectured in synagogues, Hillels, and adult Jewish educational settings around the world.

Dr. Tevi Troy is a Senior Fellow at the Ronald Reagan Institute, a former Deputy Secretary of Health and Human Services, and a best-selling presidential historian. His latest book is The Power and the Money: The Epic Clashes Between Commanders in Chief and Titans of Industry. Dr. Troy has extensive White House experience, having served in several high-level positions over a five-year period, culminating in his service as Deputy Assistant and then Acting Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy. Dr. Troy has a B.S. in Industrial and Labor Relations from Cornell University and an M.A and Ph.D. in American Civilization from the University of Texas at Austin. Dr. Troy lives in Maryland with his wife, Kami, and they have four children.

Dr. Shaina Trapedo is an Assistant Professor of English at Stern College. She is committed to exploring the connections between literacy, cultural identity, and social engagement in her teaching and scholarship. She received her Ph.D. from the University of California, Irvine, and her current book project, From Scripture to Script: David, Daniel, Esther and the Performance of Early Modern Identity, considers the affordances and risks of hermeneutic engagements on the Renaissance stage.

Ezra Seplowitz is a rabbinical student at the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary (RIETS) and a fellow in the Rabbi Jacob H. Kupietzky Memorial Program for the Study of Kodshim. He is also pursuing a master’s degree at the Bernard Revel Graduate School of Jewish Studies. Seplowitz recently served as a rabbinic intern at Congregation Ohab Zedek on Manhattan’s Upper West Side and currently serves as a rabbinic intern at the Young Israel of Oceanside. He graduated summa cum laude from Yeshiva University in 2025 with a degree in Jewish Studies, along with minors in psychology and music. As an undergraduate, Seplowitz was a Straus Scholar and received both the Student Library Research Award for Honors Students and the Dean Isaac Bacon Award for Excellence in Humanities and Jewish Studies.

Talia Feldman is the Events and Communications Manager at the Straus Center for Torah and Western Thought. She is a recent graduate of Yeshiva University, where she earned a BA in Media Studies with honors and now also serves as the university's Gruen Education & Engagement Director. Her undergraduate thesis, "What Are You, Exactly?: Defining Human Life in Philip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?", explored questions of identity and personhood through the lens of speculative fiction. Prior to joining the Straus Center, Talia freelanced with organizations including DHNY and Eventique, developing experience in event production and communications.

Dr. Jacob Wisse is an Associate Professor of Art History at Stern College for Women of Yeshiva University, where he has been named Lillian F. and William L. Silber Professor of the Year. He received his BA in Art History from McGill University; and his MA and Ph.D. from the Institute of Fine Arts of New York University, specializing in northern European art of the late Medieval and Renaissance eras. His book on City Painters in the Burgundian Netherlands is to be published by Brepols Press. In collaboration with Rabbi Dr. Soloveichik, he has developed and taught interdisciplinary courses that bridge visual culture and Jewish thought, such as The Image and the Idea, Rembrandt & the Jews: Art as Midrash in 17th-century Amsterdam, and Wholly Moses.

Rabbi Dr. Ari Bergmann holds a Master’s in Liberal Studies and a Ph.D. in Comparative Religion, both from Columbia University.

He is Talmud professor at Yeshiva University and founder and Chief Investment Officer at Penso Advisors LLC.

Rabbi Dr. Dov Lerner is a Clinical Assistant Professor at the Straus Center for Torah and Western Thought—with responsibilities for teaching courses in the college, mentoring students, conducting research, and publishing writings reflective of the center’s intellectual emphases. He received both his BA in English literature and his semikha from Yeshiva University, and his MA, in Religion, and Ph.D., in the History of Judaism, from the University of Chicago's Divinity School. In 2023, Rabbi Lerner was selected for The Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks Scholars Programme. He lives in Queens, NY, with his wife and two children, where he serves as the Rabbi of the Young Israel of Jamaica Estates.

Rabbi Shalom Carmy teaches Jewish studies and philosophy at Yeshiva University, where he is Chair of Bible and Jewish philosophy at Yeshiva College. He is also the Editor Emeritus of Tradition, the theological journal of the Rabbinical Council of America; an affiliated scholar at Cardozo Law School; and a member of the Erasmus and Dulles Forums. He is an expert on biblical theology and interpretation; modern Jewish thought (with an emphasis on Rabbis Soloveitchik and Kook); religious Zionism; liberal arts and religion; the interface of traditional Talmud study, modern scholarship, and theology; and the life of the thinking religious individual. Rabbi Carmy has twice been Professor of the Year at Yeshiva College and received the Baumol Teaching Award. He publishes regularly in Tradition, First Things, and other journals.

Rabbi Dr. Mordechai Schiffman is an assistant professor at the Azrieli Graduate School of Jewish Education and Administration, an instructor at the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary and the Wurzweiler School of Social Work. He has been on the rabbinic staff of Kingsway Jewish Center in Brooklyn, New York, since 2011 and practices as a licensed psychologist in New York. He received his MA from Azrieli, his rabbinic ordination from RIETS, and his doctorate in psychology from St. John's University. He is the author of Psyched for Torah: Cultivating Character and Well-Being through the Weekly Parsha.

Dr. David Lavinsky is associate professor of English at Yeshiva University. He specializes in medieval literature and cultural history; vernacular practices and epistemes; late scholasticism; hermeneutics and translation; heresy; Jewish-Christian relations; manuscript studies and the history of the book. Dr. Lavinsky has published in numerous academic journals including Speculum and The Medieval Review and is the author of The Material Text in Wycliffite Biblical Scholarship.

Rabbi Daniel Z. Feldman is a Rosh Yeshiva at the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary at Yeshiva University, as well as an instructor in the Sy Syms School of Business, and has taught for the Wurzweiler School of Social Work and the Katz School of Continuing Education. He also serves as the Executive Editor of the RIETS initiative of YU Press. He is an alumnus of Yeshivat Kerem B’Yavneh and received his ordination (Yoreh Yoreh and Yadin Yadin) from the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary, where he was a fellow of the Bella and Harry Wexner Kollel Elyon.

Rabbi Dr. Edward Reichman is an emergency medicine physician in the Bronx, New York, and a professor in the Department of Emergency Medicine and Department of Epidemiology & Population Health at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. He received his rabbinic ordination from the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary of Yeshiva University and writes and lectures internationally in the field of Jewish medical ethics. His research is devoted to the interface of medical history and Jewish law. He has been a mentor of the Medical Ethics Society of Yeshiva University since its inception. He is the author of The Anatomy of Jewish Law: A Fresh Dissection of the Relationship Between Medicine, Medical History & Rabbinic Literature.

Dr. David Johnson is an associate professor of philosophy at Yeshiva College. He holds a PhD from Princeton University. Dr. Johnson is interested in logic, epistemology, and the philosophy of religion. He is the author of Hume, Holism, and Miracles and Truth Without Paradox. 

Dr. Joseph Angel is a scholar of ancient Judaism with a focus on religion and history in the Second Temple Period. He is the author of Otherworldly and Eschatological Priesthood in the Dead Sea Scrolls, which explores the imaginative depictions of angelic and messianic priestly figures in the Dead Sea Scrolls as a reflection of the religious worldview of the Qumran community and broader segments of Second Temple society. His other publications include articles on ancient Jewish magic, the Second Temple of Jerusalem, and Qumran liturgy, as well as commentaries on Second Temple period texts such as the Damascus Document and “New Jerusalem.” He is the recipient of research fellowships from the Alexander von Humboldt and Yad Hanadiv/Beracha Foundations.

Rabbi Dr. Itamar Rosensweig is a maggid shiur (professor of Jewish law and jurisprudence) at Yeshiva University, a dayan (rabbinic judge) and chaver beit din at the Beth Din of America, and the rav of the Shtiebel of Lower Merion. He holds a secondary appointment as an assistant professor of philosophy at Yeshiva College and serves as the chair of Jewish studies at the Sy Syms School of Business. He received his semikha, Yoreh Yoreh and Yadin Yadin, from RIETS, where he was a fellow of the Wexner Kollel Elyon and editor-in-chief of the Beit Yitzchak Journal of Talmudic and Halakhic Studies. He received his BA, with honors, in physics and philosophy from Yeshiva University and an MA and PhD in medieval Jewish history from YU’s Bernard Revel Graduate School. He also holds an MA in Philosophy from Columbia University and a PhD in Philosophy from the University of Pennsylvania.