With just a tad of frivolity, Rabbi Kivelevitz and Prof. Juni conduct joint armchair psychoanalysis of the Purim narrative. With Kivelevitz highlighting the textual nuances in the primary scenes, Dr. Juni presents the serious pathology of narcissism as a character disorder of both Achashverosh and Haman, while Kivelevitz hones in on impulse control issues of the protagonists. Juni explains the irrational, grandiose, and self-defeating behaviors by pointing out that the pursuit of narcissistic self-aggrandizement is nothing more than a desperate effort to avoid repetitions of early traumatic disappointment, hurt, and embarrassment. Taking the socio-cultural perspectives, Kivelevitz shows how personal pathology finds expression in hedonistic excess, racist stereotyping, and attempted genocide.

Prof. Juni is one of the foremost research psychologists in the world today. He has published ground-breaking original research in seventy different peer reviewed journals and is cited continuously with respect by colleagues and experts in the field who have built on his theories and observations. 

He studied in Yeshivas Chaim Berlin under Rav Yitzchack Hutner, and in Yeshiva University as a Talmid of Rav Joseph Dov Soloveitchick. Dr. Juni is a board member of the Association of Orthodox Jewish Scientists and has regularly presented addresses to captivated audiences. Associated with NYU since 1979, Juni has served as Director of MA and PhD programs, all the while heading teams engaged in cutting-edge research. Professor Juni's scholarship on aberrant behavior across the cultural, ethnic, and religious spectrum is founded on psychometric methodology and based on a psychodynamic psychopathology perspective. He is arguably the preeminent expert in Differential Diagnostics, with each of his myriad studies entailing parallel efforts in theory construction and empirical data collection from normative and clinical populations.

Professor Juni created and directed the NYU Graduate Program in Tel Aviv titled Cross-Cultural Group Dynamics in Stressful Environments. Based in Yerushalayim, he collaborates with Israeli academic and mental health specialists in the study of dissonant factors and tensions in the Arab-Israeli conflict and those within the Orthodox Jewish community, while exploring personality challenges of second-generation Holocaust survivors.

Below is a partial list of the journals to which Professor Juni has contributed over 120 article (many are available online): Journal of Forensic Psychology; Journal of Aggression, Maltreatment, and Trauma; International Review of Victimology; The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease; International Forum of Psychoanalysis; Journal of Personality Assessment; Journal of Abnormal Psychology; Journal of Psychoanalytic Anthropology; Psychophysiology; Psychology and Human Development; Journal of Sex Research; Journal of Psychology and Judaism; Contemporary Family Therapy; American Journal on Addictions; Journal of Criminal Psychology; Mental Health, Religion, and Culture. 

As Rosh Beis Medrash, Rabbi Avraham Kivelevitz serves as Rav and Posek for the morning minyan at IDT. Hundreds of listeners around the globe look forward to his weekly Shiur in Tshuvos and Poskim. 

Rav Kivelevitz is a Maggid Shiur for Dirshu International in Talmud and Halacha as well as a Dayan with the Beth Din of America. 

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