Gershon Winkler Rabbi

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Jewish Mysticism/Jewish Shamanism Expert

Gershon Winkler Quick Facts

Main Areas: Teacher of Intensives on Jewish Shamanism and Ancient Jewish Mystery Wisdom
Career Focus: author, speaker
Affiliation: Walking Stick Foundation

Gershon Winkler is the author of fourteen books, mostly on Jewish theology, folklore, and mysticism, including Kabbalah 365: Daily Fruit from the Tree of Life and Magic of The Ordinary: Recovering the Shamanic in Judaism. Father of four and grandfather of seven, he has lectured and served as Scholar-in-Residence at colleges and universities, and for ecumenical and Jewish retreats, across Israel, Europe, and North and Central America. He is also founder and executive director of Walking Stick Foundation, a non-profit organization devoted to the recovery of aboriginal Jewish spirituality. Over the past 25 years, Rabbi Winkler has served as itinerant rabbi for Jewish communities across West Virginia, southwest Colorado, New Mexico and western Montana, and as a visiting faculty member at Chochmat Halev Center for Jewish Meditation, California Institute for Integral Studies, Naropa University, SEED Graduate Institute, Esalen Institute, Academy of Jewish Religion, Marywood University, Elat Chayyim Jewish Retreat Center, The Center for Energetic Healing, and HaMakom Center for Jewish Spirituality in the Judean Desert. He also served as Hillel Director for West Virginia University between 1987 and 1993, and as Contract Rabbi for two federal prison camps in Morgantown and Alderson, West Virginia as well as for several state prisons across Colorado, from 1988 through 2004. Winkler considers himself non-denominational and was ordained at Yeshivat Beit Yosef-Novoredok (Ultra-Orthodox) in Jerusalem in 1978 where he was initiated by the Rosh Yeshiva (Dean), the late sage and Kabbalist Rabbi Eli’ezer Benseon. His own journey of spiritual dissolution and re-emergence has brought him to a gleaning of the rich teachings from Judaism’s lesser-promulgated ancient Hebraic and Aramaic texts. Described by the Jerusalem Post as "A blend of the wit of Robin Williams and the wisdom of the Baal Shem Tov," Rabbi Winkler flavors his teaching-style with hefty doses of stand-up humor, pragmatic wisdom, and spirited chants. He is a maverick teacher who is known for his uncanny ability to render user-friendly, bite-size, and accessible the otherwise-cryptic wisdom of Tenakh, Talmud, Midrash, and Kabbalah.