Pir Netanel (Mu'in ad-din) Miles-Yépez, D.D., is the current head of the Inayati-Maimuni lineage of Sufism, co-founded with Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, fusing the Sufi and Hasidic principles of spirituality and practice espoused by Rabbi Avraham Maimuni in 13th-century Egypt with the teachings of the Ba'al Shem Tov and Hazrat Inayat Khan. He studied History of Religions at Michigan State University and Contemplative Religion at the Naropa Institute before pursuing traditional studies in both Sufism and Hasidism with Zalman Schachter-Shalomi and various other teachers, including Pir Puran Bair and Thomas Atum O'Kane. He likewise counts Father Thomas Keating as an important influence. He has been deeply involved in ecumenical dialogue and is considered a leading thinker in the InterSpiritual and New Monasticism movements. He is the co-author of two critically acclaimed commentaries on Hasidic spirituality, A Heart Afire: Stories and Teachings of the Early Hasidic Masters (2009) and A Hidden Light: Stories and Teachings of Early HaBaD and Bratzlav Hasidism (2011), the editor of The Common Heart: An Experience of Interreligious Dialogue (2006) and Living Fully, Dying Well: Reflecting on Death to Find Your Life's Meaning (2009). He currently teaches Contemplative Islam and Sufism in the Department of Religious Studies at Naropa University.