Rabbi Dr Aharon Ariel Lavi is a research fellow at the Weisfeld Maayan Center for the Study of Jewish Philosophy in the Face of Tomorrow's Sustainability Challenges at Bar-Ilan University. He is the Managing Director of the Ohr Torah Interfaith Center, which works with religious leaders worldwide to make religion part of the solution to global challenges.

He was also the founder of Hakhel, the Jewish Intentional Communities Incubator in the Diaspora, and MAKOM, the Israeli national umbrella organization of intentional communities (both projects were awarded the Jerusalem Unity Prize by the President of Israel).

Lavi holds rabbinic semicha and academic degrees in Economics, Geography, History, and the Philosophy of Ideas. His PhD dissertation explored the migration of ideas between US Jewry and Israeli society. A 2024 Harvard Divinity School postdoctoral fellow, he continued to research Jewishly inspired community building at Bar-Ilan University’s Weisfeld Ma’ayan Institute in 2025.

He is a published author on Jewish economic and environmental thought, community building, international religious affairs, and more. He also teaches Jewish economic thought and community building in academia.

Outside of his professional life, Lavi is an avid mountain biker, racer, trainer, and trail builder. He lives with his wife, Liat, and their five children in the community they founded together in Shuva, on the Gaza border.