Meet Your Instructor

Rabbi Miriam Margles

Senior Core Faculty

Miriam has a long and rich association with IJS, having taught on various retreats and programs over the years. She joined the Institute as a Senior Core Faculty after over a decade as the rabbi of the Danforth Jewish Circle in Toronto. Her career has included service as a founding faculty member at the Romemu Yeshiva, serving as a fellow with the Rising Song Institute, co-founding the award-winning educational program engaging with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Encounter, and recording her original Jewish music with the Hadar Rising Song ensemble. Miriam’s album, Zeh HaYom – this is the day, is available at: https://miriammargles.bandcamp.com

Miriam teaches and leads by creating an atmosphere of attentive, brave, playful and open-hearted exploration of Jewish text, prayer and practices, our inner landscapes, resilient connection with others, and relationship with the wider world, all working toward healing, wisdom and liberation. Her work integrates exploration through movement, voice and song and creative writing. She is a graduate of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, an alumna of the Wexner Graduate Fellowship and the Jerusalem Fellows at the Mandel Leadership Institute. She earned an MTS from Harvard Divinity School and a BFA from York University.

Guest Teachers

Rabbi Hannah Dresner

Rabbi Hannah Dresner, an IJS Hevraya member, is the fulltime rabbi of Or Shalom, a Jewish Renewal community in Vancouver, BC. Entering the the rabbinate after an active exhibition and university teaching career in the arts, Hannah considers her rabbinate an aspect of her artistic expression.

Rabbi Yosef Goldman

Rabbi Yosef Goldman is a prayer leader, rabbi, singer, and educator whose original Jewish music is sung in synagogues and schools across the country and in Israel. As a ritual artist and composer, Yosef weaves together ancient devotional music from both his Mizrahi and Ashkenazi heritage, alongside contemporary American and Israeli Jewish sacred music, to foster healing, connection, and social change.

Rabbi Jacob Staub

Rabbi Jacob Staub is Professor Emeritus of Jewish Philosophy and Spirituality at the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, where he co-founded and directs the program in Jewish Spiritual Direction. He edits the website Evolve: Groundbreaking Jewish Conversations.

Rabbi Sheila Peltz Weinberg

Rabbi Sheila Peltz Weinberg served as a congregational rabbi for seventeen years. She has worked in the fields of Jewish community relations, Jewish education and Hillel. She has published widely on such topics as feminism, spiritual direction, parenting, social justice and mindfulness from a Jewish perspective. Rabbi Weinberg has taught mindfulness meditation and yoga to rabbis, Jewish professionals and lay people in the context of the Institute for Jewish Spirituality. She serves as a spiritual director to a variety of Jewish clergy. She is creator and co-leader of the Jewish Mindfulness Teacher Training Program.