Rabbi Alisa Zilbershtein, Assistant Rabbi, Beth Tikvah Synagogue

2pm

Rabbi Zilbershtein speaks Ukrainian and Russian languages and is eager to welcome refugees and immigrants from the Former Soviet Union (FSU) into the Jewish community of Toronto. She will speak about her life and the Jewish community in Kyiv before and during the ongoing war, and her experience coming to Toronto.

Rabbi Alisa Zilbershtein holds an M.A. in Jewish Civilizations from Hochschule für Jüdische Studien, Heidelberg, Germany and is a graduate of the Jewish Theological Seminary (JTS), New York. After ordination at JTS, she planned to go back to Kyiv, Ukraine to work as a rabbi but, in July 2022, she and her husband resettled in Toronto due to Russia’s war on Ukraine. Rabbi Zilbershtein had been living in Kyiv, Ukraine where she taught History of Jewish Philosophy at the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy. Now Assistant Rabbi at Beth Tikvah Synagogue in Toronto, she specializes in pastoral care work and is experienced in grief and loss processing and spiritual crisis counselling.