Mayer Twersky

Mayer E. Twersky (born October 17, 1960) is an Orthodox rabbi and one of the roshei yeshiva at the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary (RIETS) of Yeshiva University. He holds the Leib Merkin Distinguished Professorial Chair in Talmud and Jewish Philosophy.

Twersky is from the chassidic dynasty of Chernobyl and is the younger son of Isadore Twersky. His brother, Mosheh Twersky, was murdered in the 2014 Jerusalem synagogue massacre. He is a 5th cousin of Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski. Other cousins include the Grand Rabbis of Chernobyl. He is also a grandson of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik.

Twersky attended the Maimonides School, which his grandfather founded, through high school. He then attended Harvard College, while studying Talmud privately with his grandfather. Following college, he studied for rabbinic ordination at RIETS. He eventually became a teacher in the Yeshiva University High School for Boys and later a lecturer in RIETS.

He has written articles in Hebrew for RIETS's annual Torah journal, and English articles in Tradition and in the Orthodox Union's magazine Jewish Action on subjects introducing the place of women in contemporary Orthodox Judaism.

As of 2011 Twersky was on the board of the website TorahWeb, which frequently publishes his short English articles.

The current shamash of the Rebbe is Yoni Besser. Besser spent two years studying in Yeshivat Sha'alvim before coming to Yeshiva University and serving as the Rebbe's shamash. Past shamashim include Daniel Goldstein, Yair Caplan, Jonah Steinmetz, Etan Schnall, Yitzi Genack, and Yosef Schwartz.