Our Rabbi, Rav Aryeh Wineman, has been the thoughtful and respected leader of our community for many years.

Rabbi Wineman's style is a mixture of intellectual honesty, Kavanah, and concern for Community.

Intellectually, Rabbi Wineman is a careful and meticulous scholar, imparting to his students and congregants the clear need to deal honestly with ourselves and with our Judaism. In approaching the texts of Judaism, he asks us to acknowledge the historical background in which Torah came to be, and to insist that Torah, then and now, is an ongoing process, not yet completed. And that all of us are part of that process. All of us help to write Torah.

Emotionally, Rabbi Wineman believes strongly in the importance of Kavanah, that prayer and Service become something (or can become something) when they truly involve a person's inner self. He believes that Judaism's richness and its truth is not exhausted by its words or by its logic. Interesting, this has taken him to a close study and appreciation of the Hassidic masters of the 18th and 19th centuries, including R. Nachman of Bratslav and R. Menahem Nahum of Chernobyl.

Rabbi Wineman is also active in our larger community as evidenced by his involvement with many groups: he is the advisor of the RPI/Russel Sage Hillel and has helped teach English to New American immigrants recently arrived from the former Soviet Union. Within the larger Troy and Capital District Jewish community he helps organize the Troy Community Yom ha'Shoah [Holocaust Remeberance Day] observance every year and is active with the Capital District Board of Rabbis.

[And here's an interesting aside. Every year the Board sponsors an intensive study session for its own Rabbis. A Visiting Rabbi or Scholar is invited from outside the Capital District. Several years back, and for the only time, our (inside) Rabbi was honored to be that scholar-in-residence.]

Rav Wineman is also active is the greater Troy community, each year helping with the Thanksgiving ecumenical service and other community projects.

Before coming to Troy, Rabbi Wineman served as the resident Rabbi of the Nitzanim Youth Village in Israel, as well as Rabbi of Kol Shofar in San Rafael, CA and Beth El in Torrington, CT.

Rabbi Wineman received his Rabbinic ordination from the Jewish Theological Seminary, and holds a doctorate in Hebrew Literature from UCLA. In 1984 he received a honorary degree of Doctor of Divinity from the Jewish Theological Seminary, in recognition of his pastoral and scholarly contributions.

Books:

The Hasidic Parable, Jewish Publication Society, Philadephia, 2001.

Mystic Tales from the Zohar, Jewish Publication Society, Philadelphia, 1997 and reprinted in 1998 by Princeton University Press.

Beyond Appearances. Stories from the Kabbalistic Ethical Writings, Jewish Publication Society, Philadelphia, 1988, 1999.

The Akedah Motif in Modern Hebrew Literature, Ph.D. Dissertation, UCLA.

Rav Aryeh is a very competent piano and guitar player. Many years ago Rabbi Wineman became quite ill. Since (but not before) that time, he has possessed a beautiful voice. Go tell.

Rabbi Wineman will no doubt object to the laudatory tones of this Web page. But it all is true, and seems worthy of being said.

(Read this story our Rabbi might like)