معرفی
Michael A. Helfand is the Brenden Mann Foundation Chair in Law and Religion and Co-Director of the Nootbaar Institute for Law, Religion and Ethics at Pepperdine University's Caruso School of Law. He concurrently serves as the Florence Rogatz Visiting Professor at Yale Law School and holds roles as Senior Legal Advisor to the Orthodox Union’s Teach Coalition and Senior Fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute. His academic career began at Pepperdine in 2010, where he teaches Contracts, Arbitration Law, Jewish Law, and seminars on Law and Religion. Prior to academia, he clerked for Judge Julia Smith Gibbons of the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals and practiced complex commercial litigation at Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP.
Dr. Helfand's research focuses on the intersection of law and religion, particularly religious legal systems' interaction with U.S. law. He explores topics including religious arbitration enforceability, religious autonomy doctrines, and tensions between religious practices and civil rights. His work has been published in top-tier law reviews such as the Yale Law Journal and New York University Law Review, and he frequently contributes commentary to public outlets like the Wall Street Journal and Los Angeles Times.
Key academic contributions include groundbreaking analyses on implied consent frameworks in religious institutions, doctrinal critiques of accommodation jurisprudence, and the application of Jewish law principles to modern legal issues. His scholarship bridges theoretical legal analysis with practical implications for religious communities and secular governance structures.
Honors include selection for the Harvard/Stanford/Yale Junior Faculty Forum (2013) and editorial leadership roles in interdisciplinary initiatives. He has advised on policy matters involving religious liberty protections and serves as a thought leader in both academic and communal contexts.
