Rabbi Mike Moskowitz is known for his work with the LGBT community.

Rabbi Moskowitz was assigned secular, then identified as ultra-orthodox for twenty years, and now embraces a religiously non-conforming identity.

Rabbi Moskowitz lives in Lakewood, NY.

Moskowitz grew up in a secular Jewish family in Virginia and encountered religious observance through USY, the Conservative Jewish youth group.

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Rabbi Moskowitz has three ultra-orthodox rabbinic ordinations.

He spent a decade in the largest yeshivas in the world and studied the entire Babylonian Talmud.

He studied for four years each at the Mir Yeshiva in Jerusalem and Beis Medrash Govoha in Lakewood, two prestigious Haredi institutions, and work as a student advisor and leader of a Torah study program, or kollel, back home in Richmond.

Rabbi Moskowitz explored academic Talmud at Yale and at Jewish Theological Seminary, where he is currently completing a Doctorate in Hebrew Literature.

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Rabbi Moskowitz founded and headed a Kollel- a sacred think tank, served as a rabbi at Columbia University, and of the Old Broadway Synagogue in Harlem.

Rabbi Moskowitz was in the news in 2018 for joining New York City’s Congregation Beit Simchat Torah. ^[1]

Rabbi Moskowitz currently serves as scholar-in-residence for trans and queer Jewish studies at Congregation Beit Simchat Torah. Moskowitz sees serving queer Jews is a fulfillment of his duty as an Orthodox rabbi, not a contradiction.

Rabbi Moskowitz started counseling transgender Jews three years ago when he worked with Columbia University students on behalf of Aish HaTorah, an Orthodox outreach organization.

He also met queer Jews while serving concurrently as rabbi of the Old Broadway Synagogue.

In 2016, his relative became trans, which intensified his commitment to integrating the LGBT and Orthodox communities.

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