2016 Scholar-in-Residence: Rabbi Seymour Rossel

Rabbi Seymour Rossel’s storytelling career began at the age of three when, according to witnesses, his mother stood him on a table during a party and fed him lines to recite. Soon he became too weighty for most tables and learned the lines for himself. Since then he has been constantly raconteuring. When Seymour is not lecturing on Israel, Holocaust, Bible, archaeology, spirituality, Jewish history, or Jewish education, he is reading, writing, breathing, and telling stories.

Also by way of storytelling, Seymour is the author of thirty-six books, including The Wise Folk of Chelm • Bible Dreams • The Essential Jewish Stories • The Torah: Portion-by-Portion • A Child’s Bible • and A Thousand and One Chickens. He has edited and published over 300 books, working with dozens of distinguished Jewish authors.

Seymour is presently CEO of Rossel Counseling and Consulting, Inc. He lectured for the past eight years at Women’s Institute of Houston. During that time, he spent five years as Rabbi of Congregation Jewish Community North of Spring, Texas. For many years in New York, he served the American Reform movement (URJ) in a number of national positions—as Director of URJ Press • Director of the Department of Education • Director of the Commission on Reform Jewish Education • and Dean of the School of Education of Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, NY.

You can learn more about Rabbi Rossel at Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seymour_Rossel) and his official web site (http://www.rossel.net/).