Rabbi Dan Levin serves as the senior rabbi of Temple Beth El, located in Boca Raton, FL, the congregation where he began his career in 1996. As the congregation’s leader, Rabbi Levin works to create a community where each member is inspired to lead a life of spiritual richness, meaning, purpose, and service. He seeks to build a congregation whose mission is to synthesize the innate questions and moral challenges of the world in which we live with the wisdom and power of centuries of Jewish tradition. It is this synthesis of tradition and the modern world that guides his teaching, worship, and pastoral care. Rabbi Levin believes that God is found in the intimacy of relationship, and seeks to build in the congregation a web of care, love, and oneness with each other, the community in which we live, and with the Jewish people here, in Israel, and throughout the world.
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Each episode of Essential Questions with Rabbi Dan Levin will pose an essential question and invite a conversation with remarkable people in the Jewish world and in our community to consider what those questions and answers mean.
Episodes
Jun 28, 2023
Jun 28, 2023
41 min
In the season 1 finale of Essential Questions, Rabbi Dan Levin speaks with his teacher and friend Rabbi David Ellenson, Chancellor Emeritus and past president of Hebrew Union College – Jewish Institute of Religion, about different ways to think about God within Judaism, and if a belief in God is necessary.
Essential Questions will return for a special season 1 recap on Wednesday, July 19 where Rabbi Dan Levin will be joined by Rabbis Jessica Spitalnic Mates and Greg Weisman. We will also have another bonus episode in August about making the High Holy Days meaningful amidst our busy lives. Thank you so much for listening to season 1 of Essential Questions!
Jun 21, 2023
Jun 21, 2023
59 min
In this episode, Rabbi Dan Levin speaks with Rabbi Jonah Pesner about social justice and its importance in today's society within Jewish values. Rabbi Jonah Pesner serves as the Director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism and has led the Religious Action Center since 2015. Rabbi Pesner also serves as Senior Vice President of the Union for Reform Judaism, a position to which he was appointed in 2011. Named one of the most influential rabbis in America by Newsweek magazine, he is an inspirational leader and tireless advocate for social justice.
Jun 14, 2023
Jun 14, 2023
40 min
In this episode, Rabbi Dan Levin talks with Evan Nierman, author of The Cancel Culture Curse, about the definition and impacts of cancel culture and how we can navigate handling when people make mistakes.
Jun 7, 2023
Jun 7, 2023
43 min
In this episode, Rabbi Dan Levin and Rabbi Ammi Hirsch discuss how to recharge Reform Judaism and how Reform Jews can reconcile a Zionist belief with the political turbulence in Israel.
May 31, 2023
May 24, 2023
May 24, 2023
41 min
In this episode of Essential Questions, Rabbi Dan Levin talks with Rabbi Geoffrey Mitelman, Founding Director of the organization Sinai and Synapses, about how science and religion fit together in our lives.
May 17, 2023
May 17, 2023
1 hr 10 min
Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Bret Stephens spoke at Temple Beth El in May 2023 about the state of Israel as Israel celebrates its 75th birthday.
If you had the chance to hear his conversation with Rabbi Dan Levin in person, you know how incredibly informative it was. If not, you can listen to this bonus episode - a recording of the live conversation they had as they tried to answer the following questions:
- What do the changes in Israel’s government mean for American Jews and Diaspora Jews around the world?
- How is the uptick in global antisemitism related people’s perception of Israeli politics and Israeli leadership?
- How are we as Reform Jews supposed to feel about Israel?
- What is the state of Israel as it celebrates its 75th birthday?
May 10, 2023
May 10, 2023
41 min
In this episode, Rabbi Dan Levin speaks with noted scholar Rabbi Karyn Kedar about how we might use the counting of the Omer to follow a path that leads us to answer the essential question, What Are You Waiting For?
Rabbi Dan Levin
Rabbi Levin is a past president of SEACCAR, the southeast region of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, and serves on the Budget and Finance committee of the CCAR. He is proud to be a member of the President’s Rabbinical Council of the Hebrew Union College – Jewish Institute of Religion, and serves on the Alumni Leadership Council. Previously, he served as a member of the Reform Movement’s Think Tank, a group seeking to create a visioning process for the future of Reform Judaism, and as a partner in the Kalsman Institute for Judaism and Health. He has mentored younger colleagues through the CCAR, The Wexner Foundation, and the CLI Fellows program of CLAL – the Center for Learning and Leadership.
Locally, he has served on the Board of Directors and Executive Committee of the Jewish Federation of South Palm Beach County, as a board member of Ruth and Norman Rales Jewish Family Services, the American Jewish Committee, and the Mathew Forbes Romer Foundation. He was a featured writer for the Union for Reform Judaism’s Ten Minutes of Torah, and blogs.
Rabbi Levin is a Senior Rabbinic Fellow with the Shalom Hartman Institute. A recipient of the prestigious Wexner Graduate Fellowship, Rabbi Levin studied at the Jerusalem, Los Angeles, and New York campuses of the Hebrew Union College – Jewish Institute of Religion, and was ordained in May, 1996. He graduated from Colgate University with a degree in Philosophy and Religion in 1991, and also studied at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He and his wife Aimee are the parents of three children, Ari, Meredith, and Eliana.