Rabbi Marla Hornsten - mhornsten@temple-israel.org 
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Rabbi Marla Hornsten came to Temple Israel in July of 2000 after her rabbinic ordination from the Hebrew Union College-Jewish institute of Religion, having attended both the Los Angeles and New York campuses. Her first duty at Temple Israel was to hop a plane to Jerusalem just 36 hours after her arrival in Michigan with 80 Temple teens!
Over the years that Rabbi Hornsten has been at Temple, she has led a variety of early childhood, youth and young adult programs. In the religious school, she currently oversees the 7th grade Monday Night School program and coordinates the graduating senior class as well. She is well known for her “cooking elective” which weaves Jewish law and tradition with rugelach and challah. “Rabbi Marla” as she is affectionately known, also leads the junior youth group (JYFTI—Junior Youth Federation of Temple Israel) for 4th -8th graders with monthly programs and overnight school retreats.
As the first woman Rabbi at Temple Israel, she is proud to have created a variety of women’s programming including a monthly Rosh Chodesh women’s spirituality group, mikveh tours and immersion experiences. She has written many healing services for both men and women using the mikveh, and considers herself the unofficial “mikveh lady” at Temple Israel.
In her life previous to Temple Israel, Rabbi Hornsten earned a B.A. in European Studies from Scripps College, an M.A. in Modern European History from the Claremont Graduate University; and an M.A. in Hebrew Letters from the HUC-JIR. Her rabbinic thesis was titled: Claiming Hagar: A Search for Identity in Rabbinic Midrash, which combined her love of text with her commitment to women and women’s identity.
Rabbi Hornsten is a native of Mercer Island, Washington, and makes frequent trips to the Pacific Northwest to visit her family. In her spare time, she enjoys the outdoors, keeping fit, cooking, knitting and crocheting which she learned from her grandmother, reading, playing violin, and watching Star Trek reruns among many other things.
She met her husband, Dr. Sheldon Stern, at Temple Israel (a match made by her fellow clergy) & they have 4 amazing children: Erica, Jessica, Benji & Danny.
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