Integral Halacha Institute: Dayanim (Adjudicators and Mediators))
Sometime in the early 2,000’s, Reb Zalman offered to give me a second semicha as a Dayan, an adjudicator or conflict resolver. He offered this based on my having trained as a mediator and without a need for further study.
At the time, Reb Zalman was also urging us to study gittin, the process of a Jewish divorce, and so I offered to study this subject prior to accepting the semicha, which I did. He gave me this semicha in 2003.
And, just as I had not remained Reb Zalman’s only rabbinic musmach, we discussed adding more people to this level of ordination and had agreed on the first three. Unfortunately, by the time we put the list together, he had passed on.
At the OHALAH conference in 2017, I passed this level of ordination on to three students and colleagues who had all done especially interesting work in the halachic process. Later, all of us added two more rabbis. In their documents, I described our dayanim as mediators and adjudicators with the authority to teach, consult, and assist in resolving questions in the light of our tradition.
As Reb Zalman encouraged, the contemporary manifestation of the halachic process rests on two pillars. The first is the recognition that we are all living in the midst of a global paradigm shift which calls on us to revise and renew our inherited traditions. These include not only binary gender balancing but also our growing understanding of the many manifestations of gender. The current paradigm shift also calls on humanity to see itself as an interconnected species which needs to act in unison to soften the impact of the climate emergency we have created.
The second is what Reb Zalman called “Backwards Compatibility,” that our halachic process be a demonstrated continuum from the past. In fact, this is an old Jewish practice, to reinterpret past decisions and understandings so that what we do is somehow incremental rather than radical, even when it is radical.
In earlier days, a dayan was someone who heard cases and guided disputants to a resolution, preferably a mediated one, which both sides could embrace. When questions arose about which the dayan was unsure, he would write to someone like the Rambam, a posek (decisor) to clarify the issues at stake. We, dayanim in the lineage of Reb Zalman, are primarily holders of the container which acts to shape the love which ultimately finds its expression in a compassionate end. We can think of it as ever expanding chesed given form in g’vurah and manifesting in the balance that is tiferet. We then are guides, among the guardians of the halachic process in these times.
If you, the reader, feel that you may be called to study for and receive this level of semicha, please contact Reb Daniel (admin@alephcanada.ca). It is understood that you already have rabbinic semicha and are comfortable reading texts in Hebrew. You will also receive material for a short preparatory course so we can all see if this path is for you. Once accepted, study programs will be designed together with the student and uniquely for each participant.
Dayanim
Rabbi Daniel Siegel
Rabbi Daniel Siegel was the Rabbinic Director of ALEPH: Alliance for Jewish Renewal from 1997-2004, Director of Spiritual Resources, Associate Dean of the Ordination Programs, and Chair of the Rabbinic Studies section of that program until the summer of 2015. He was the founding Rabbinic Director of ALEPH Canada and of the Integral Halachah Institute and taught the senior rabbinical students in the ALEPH Ordination Program for many years.
In 1974, he was the first person to receive semicha/rabbinic ordination from Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi as rabbi and colleague. In 2003, he received an additional level of ordination as a Dayan/Adjudicator from Reb Zalman. He has a BA from Rutgers University and an MA from Temple University. Reb Daniel served two college campuses – the University of British Columbia and Dartmouth College – for a total of more than twenty years.
Rabbi
SaraLeya Schley
Rabbi SaraLeya Schley was ordained in 2005 by the ALEPH Ordination Program, for which she currently teaches the Integral Halakha Responsa Workshop. She authored a 2020 responsum about Medical Assistance in Dying that was published by the Integral Halachah Institute and is a Senior Rabbinic Fellow of the Hartman Institute. A resident of Sparks, NV, she is mother to 3 and savta to 4. She continues to be involved with various Renewal communities, including Chochmat HaLev and Wilderness Torah, as an adjunct leader, teacher and elder.
Rabbi Oren Steinitz
Rabbi Dr. Oren Z. Steinitz has served as a prayer leader, teacher and musician in Jewish communities across the denominational spectrum in Israel, Canada and the USA for over fifteen years. Ordained in 2014, he currently serves as the Rabbi of Congregation Kol Ami in Elmira, New York.
In 2020, after years of rigorous studying of the laws of conversion to Judaism and Jewish divorce, Rabbi Oren became the sixth Jewish Renewal rabbi to receive advanced rabbinic ordination as Dayan -- Mediator and Adjudicator of Jewish Law -- from Rabbi Daniel Siegel and ALEPH Canada's Integral Halacha Institute. He is one of a handful of non-Orthodox rabbis trained as a mesader gittin, an administrator of Jewish divorce.
Rabbi Oren holds a doctorate from University of Calgary, researching the attitude towards the “Other” in Jewish and Islamic legal websites, as well as BA and MA degrees from the Ben Gurion University of the Negev (Israel). He taught at the University of Calgary, Mount Royal University, The ALEPH Ordinations Program and the Aquarian Minyan Yeshiva, as well as in different synagogues and Jewish Community Centers.
Rabbi
Simcha Daniel Burstyn
Rabbi Simcha Daniel Burstyn has been a member of Kibbutz Lotan since 1990. He splits his time between physical and spiritual service. He received Smicha as Rabbi from the AOP in 2011, Mashpia' in 2012, and Dayan in 2017. In addition to Ohalah, he is an active member of Rabbis for Human Rights and the Israeli Reform Rabbinical Association. As Regional Rabbi for the Israeli Reform Movement, he teaches youth and adults in the kibbutz and in the Arava Region. His special focus is Judaism and Ecology including the mitzvot of the land.
Rabbi
Raanan Mallek
Rabbi Raanan Mallek serves as the Jewish Chaplain for the US Navy at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam on the island of Oahu, Hawaii. He received ordination as a Dayan (Judge) from the Integral Halakhah Institute where he focused on Mediation and Adjudication (2019). His Rabbinical Ordination and Master of Jewish Studies is from the Schechter Seminary and Institute in Jerusalem (2018). During his studies, Raanan was an interreligious scholar and event coordinator for the Tantur Ecumenical Institute for three years. His certification in facilitation and negotiation is from the Conflict Resolution, Management and Negotiation Graduate Program of Bar Ilan University. In addition, Raanan has a Master of Jewish Education from Hebrew College.
Raanan was a dialogue facilitator for the Hands of Peace organization for three years. Hands of Peace empowers American, Palestinian and Israeli youth to become agents of change. From May 2019 until December 2021, Rabbi Raanan was the Municipal Rabbi of the Masorti (Conservative) Movement in Misgav, Lower Galilee. During this time he served as the Community Rabbi for the Shorashim Village. His second pulpit from January 2022 to August 2023 was as the Congregational Rabbi of the Jewish Congregation of Maui.
Rabbi
Hannah Dresner
Rabbi Hannah Dresner, MFA, serves Vancouver’s Jewish Renewal community, Or Shalom, as full-time spiritual leader. A Kenisa fellow and a clergy fellow of the Institute for Jewish spirituality, Rabbi Hannah has been identified by CLAL as a rabbinic agent of change. Her homiletic speaking and writing, teaching of meditation, niggun, and art as spiritual practice, serve a Judaism that integrates experiences of head, heart and physical being, addressing the breadth of our human needs.