Bio
Jay Michaelson is the author of nine books, including Everything is God: The Radical Path of Nondual Judaism and God vs. Gay? The Religious Case for Equality, a Lambda Literary Award finalist. His recent book The Heresy of Jacob Frank: From Jewish Antinomianism to Esoteric Myth, was published by Oxford University Press and won the 2022 National Jewish Book Award for scholarship. His latest book is The Secret that Is Not a Secret: Ten Heretical Tales; it is his first work of fiction. He holds a Ph.D. in Jewish thought from Hebrew University, a J.D. from Yale Law School, and nondenominational rabbinic ordination.
Michaelson’s scholarly work on Jewish mysticism and messianism has been published in journals including Theology and Sexuality, Modern Judaism, and Shofar, and anthologized in volumes including Queer Religion, Imagining the Jewish God, and Jews and the Law. He has held teaching positions at Chicago Theological Seminary, Harvard Divinity School, and Boston University Law School.
Outside the academy, Michaelson works as a journalist, teacher, and rabbi. He is a frequent commentator on CNN and a contributor to Rolling Stone, The Daily Beast, The Forward, and other publications. In the meditation field, he is the program director of the New York Insight Meditation Center and the director of the Adamah Jewish Meditation Retreat. He worked as an LGBTQ activist for ten years and has been included in the “Forward 50” list of influential American Jews. He lives outside of New York City.