Rabbi Michel Schlesinger comes to us from the Congregacao Israelita Paulista in São Paulo, Brazil, the largest synagogue in Latin America, where he was Senior Rabbi from March 2007 to 2021. He had been Assistant Rabbi at the CIP since August, 2005. He has a Bachelor of Laws from the University of Sao Paulo, and his rabbinical ordination and a Masters in Talmudic Studies and Halacha from the Schechter Institute of Jewish Studies in Jerusalem. He took additional coursework at the Rabbinical Management Institute in Los Angeles, the Jewish Theological Seminary, and the Leo Baeck Institute in London. He has published a book, Dialogues of A Rabbi.
While at CIP, Rabbi Schlesinger also represented his congregation at the Jewish Confederation of Brazil for Interreligious Dialogue, the National Catholic-Jewish Dialogue in Qatar, Religions for Peace, the International Council of Christians and Jews, and the Abrahamic Forum.
Since 2022, Rabbi Michel Schlesinger has been an adjunct professor at the Jewish Theological Seminary where he teaches Talmud and Halakhah (Jewish Law) to future rabbis, cantors and educators.
Rabbi Schlesinger, his wife, Juliana, and their two daughters, Naomi and Tamar, are excited to be part of the HERJC community. They are enjoying the welcoming and open-hearted nature of our community. It has been particularly gratifying to meet the membership in person.
Adam Gillman, Rabbinic Intern
Adam Gillman (he/him) is thrilled to join the HERJC community as rabbinic intern. A fifth-year rabbinical student at the Jewish Theological Seminary, Adam anticipates receiving rabbinic ordination in May 2023.
A native of Seattle, he is passionate about creating accessible and empowered communities through dialogue, activism, and text study across diverse spectrums of religion, age, ideology, and identity. Adam has served as a rabbinic intern at Congregation Sons of Israel in Nyack, New York, and completed a unit of clinical pastoral care at the New Jewish Home in Manhattan. Additionally, Adam is an iFellow through the iCenter, which empowers Jewish educators to nurture lifelong relationships with Israel within their communities.
Before beginning Rabbinical School, Adam studied at The Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies in Jerusalem. He served as a Conflict Resolution Fellow, where he worked with Israeli and Palestinian youth through Kids 4 Peace, an international peacebuilding organization. He also spent several years within the growing JewishAmerican farming movement at Isabella Freedman in Connecticut and The Pearlstone Center in Maryland. Adam has a BA in Liberal Arts from Western Washington University and a minor in American Indian Studies.
Rabbi Andrew Warmflash is widely regarded as an outstanding speaker and teacher whose sermons and classes are inspiring, engaging and relevant. He is known as a warm, compassionate spiritual guide who can offer wise counsel and real comfort at difficult times.
Rabbi Warmflash assumed the pulpit of the Hewlett East Rockaway Jewish Centre in 2007. Prior to coming to our synagogue, he served as the Rabbi of the Jewish Community Center of Fort Lee, NJ and as the Senior Rabbi of Temple Emanuel in Newton, Massachusetts, the largest Conservative Synagogue in New England. He began his career as the founding rabbi of Congregation B’nai Tikvah in North Brunswick, NJ.
A New Jersey native, Rabbi Warmflash holds a Bachelor of Arts with majors in Psychology and Philosophy from the University of Pennsylvania and received his Rabbinic Ordination at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, which also awarded him a Doctor of Divinity degree in 2007.
Rabbi Warmflash has served on the Board of Trustees of the Schechter Institute Rabbinical School in Jerusalem and MERCAZ. He is a past co-chair of The Rabbinical Assembly Social Action Committee, was a member of the New Jersey State Commission on Racism, Racial Violence and Religious Violence, the New Jersey Interfaith Commission of NCCJ and co-chaired the Inter-Religious Leadership Group on Central American Immigration.
Rabbi Warmflash and his wife Beth Heit are the proud parents of Aryeh and his wife Yael, Ora and her husband David, and Talia and are thrilled to be Ilana, Matti and Ayelet’s grandparents.
