Rami Avraham Efal, Rabbi, Israel-born and descendent of Polish and Hungarian Holocaust survivors, is a student of the late Zen Buddhist teacher Bernie Glassman and world renowned peace-builder Dr. Paula Green. A Zen practitioner since 2005, he lived, studied and rigorously trained for four years at Zen Mountain Monastery and the Zen Center of New York City where he received lay Zen Buddhist ordination (Jukai) in 2011. He is a dharma holder in Glassman’s Zen Peacemaker lineage, the former executive director of Zen Peacemakers International and has organized and co-led the Bearing Witness retreats in Auschwitz-Birkenau and the Native American Bearing Witness programs. He is a certified trauma-informed mindfulness teacher through the Engaged Mindfulness Institute, a level 3 Way of Council facilitator, a cross-cultural conflict transformation practitioner trained at School of International Training in Vermont, and a graduate of the Davvenen' Leadership Training Institute (DLTI) for Jewish prayer. He has volunteered as a chaplain-intern offering grief counseling in Trauma 1 hospitals and hospices in New York. Rami has trained as a cantor and received smicha, rabbinic ordination and authorization to teach, from Aleph Ordination Program in the Neo-Hassidic Jewish Renewal lineage of Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi z”l in January 2024. In June 2024, Rami received a second smicha to teach Neo-Hassidism from prolific professor Rabbi Arthur (Art) Avraham Green, student of R. Abraham Joshua Heschel.

Rami offers spiritual direction, pastoral care, ancestral chaplaincy, musical prayer, teaching on Jewish non-duality & mysticism, Buddhist meditation, nonviolent communication, and contemplative creativity in the New York area & internationally. He self-deploys on chaplaincy, humanitarian & bearing witness missions globally, and is a published and presented visual artist.