Rabbi Harold M. Schulweis

Rabbi Harold M. Schulweis is one of the best-known pulpit rabbis in America, serving as Rabbi at Congregation Valley Beth Shalom in Encino, California. He combined a Talmudic education at Yeshiva College with graduate studies in modern philosophical and theological thought at New York University, the Jewish Theological Seminary and the Pacific School of Religion, from which he received his Th.D. in theology. He has lectured in philosophy and theology at CCNY, the University of Judaism and Hebrew Union College.

Rabbi Schulweis has been instrumental in the development of synagogue programs such as the Synagogue Havurah Program (since adopted nationally), Para-professional Counseling Center, Para-Rabbinics and Jews-by-Choice, Outreach to the Developmentally Disabled (Shaare Tikvah and Chaverim), the VBS Day School, as well as addressing the issues of Jewish education and interfaith dialogue. He is the founding Chairman of the Jewish Foundation for the Righteous, an organization that identifies and offers grants to those non-Jews who risked their lives to save Jews threatened by the agents of Nazi savagery. After the revelation of the genocide in Darfur, Sudan, he recently founded the Jewish World Watch project to raise the moral consciousness within the Synagogue community. Synagogues and other religious institutions are now supporting this effort across the country.

Rabbi Schulweis has authored many books, including: Approaches to the Philosophy of Religion (Prentice-Hall), For Those Who Can't Believe (Harper Collins), Finding Each Other in Judaism, In God's Mirror, and two books of original religious poetry and meditation: From Birth to Immortality and Passages in Poetry. Currently, he is completing a book entitled Godliness (Jewish Lights). His Evil and the Morality of God (Hebrew Union College Press) is regarded as a classic.

He and his wife Malkah Schulweis are the proud parents of Seth and Kathleen, Ethan and Cindy and Alissa and Peter. They are blessed with nine grandchildren, the lights of their lives.