Rabbi Lazer Brody was born in Washington, D.C. in 1949. After receiving his bachelor's degree in agriculture from the University of Maryland in 1970, he moved to Israel and joined the Israel Defense Forces regular army, and served in one of the elite special-forces units. He is a decorated combat veteran of two wars and dozens of counter-insurgence and anti-terrorist missions on both sides of Israel's borders.
After surviving a near-suicidal mission to Beirut during the Israel-Lebanon conflict of 1982, Brody could no longer ignore the hand of G-d in his life. He became a baal-tshuva and left his mountaintop farm to study Torah in Jerusalem.
Nine years of intensive Talmudic, ethics, and legal studies, led to his rabbinical ordination in 1992. He devoted another two years of postgraduate study to personal and family counseling, and subsequently spent two years as rabbi and spiritual rehabilitation director of a major Israeli prison. There, he created a highly successful program of spiritual rehabilitation for prisoners based on Tshuva.
In 1996, Brody moved to Ashdod and became the understudy of the famed Melitzer Rebbe, a contemporary giant in rabbinical law and personal counseling. Two years later, Rav Shalom Arush opened a branch of his renowned of the "Chut Shel Chessed - Breslev" Yeshiva in the port city of Ashdod, and appointed Brody as the "Rosh Kollel", or Dean of the rabbinical program. In 2006, the kollel merged with the main yeshiva in Jerusalem, and Brody became the mashpia ruchni of the yeshiva. A year later, he became the editor in chief of Breslev Israel's highly popular English-language website at breslev.co.il. Rabbi Brody is also the founder and director of Emuna Outreach. Between Breslov Israel and Emuna Outreach, he devotes his time to spreading emuna and particularly the teachings of Rebbe Nachman of Breslev around the globe.
Brody's first book, "Pi Habe'er", is a Hebrew-language contemporary commentary of Torah based largely on the teachings of Rebbe Nachman of Breslev. The book has been widely acclaimed, and has received the approbations of Rishon Le'Tzion Rabbi Ovadiah Yossef, the Bes Din of the Eda Haredis in Jerusalem, Rabbi Eliezer Berland, and others. His second book, "Nafshi Tidom", also in Hebrew, is a unique guide to coping with verbal abuse, embarrassment and insult.
Brody's third book - his first in English - is "The Trail to Tranquility", is available at www.lazerbrody.net.
Rabbi Brody is the English voice of his teacher and spiritual guide, Rabbi Shalom Arush. His English-CD renditions of Rabbi Shalom Arush's teachings have already appeared in dozens of different titles and have been distributed worldwide in over 250,000 copies during the last 24 months alone. "The Garden of Emuna", is a worldwide bestselling translation of Rav Shalom Arush's "B'Gan Ha'emuna". "The Garden of Yearning" is a translation of Rav Shalom Arush's "B'Gan Haga'aguim", and the "Garden of Peace" is a translation of Rav Arush's newly-released marital guide for men, "B'Gan HaShalom."
Other Brody books include the English-language "Chassidic Pearls" collection of original parables on the weekly Torah portion, and a delightful children's book, "The Worry Worm," beautifully illustrated by Rebecca Shapiro.
"Lazer Beams," Rabbi Brody's award-winning daily web journal, has been instrumental in bringing thousands of people closer to Hashem.
Contact: You can reach Rabbi Lazer Brody by email here.
Hear David Dome sing about Rabbi Lazer Brody here. See the lyrics here.
Read about "Rabbi Rambo" here.
Original portrait by Disney illustrator Ken (Baruch) Becker
