36 Under 36: FORWARD-LOOKING RABBIS

Rabbi Melissa Weintraub, 32

by Jewish Week special report

Melissa Weintraub, 32
Rabbi, Israeli-Palestinian reconciler, terror and torture expert

Like many life decisions, Rabbi Melissa Weintraub’s work was determined by an element of destiny. She had always been interested in peace-building, but it wasn’t until she encountered a group of Palestinians in Beit Zahor, outside Bethlehem, as a student in 1996 that the path to her future coalesced. “I went [to the village to see an Israeli-Palestinian dialogue group] and was mind-blown and moved and really deeply impacted by the Palestinians and Israelis in that group,” says Weintraub. “Curiosity drove me there, and a deep commitment to the Jewish people,” she says. “I felt a real sense of calling in hearing their stories, felt right away that my destiny was going to be

wrapped up with theirs, building that nonexistent bridge.”
After six years of living in Israel and rabbinical training at JTS, she developed the idea for Encounter (http://encounterprograms.org) an educational organization that provides Jewish leaders from across religious and political spectrums a chance to engage with Palestinians – and each other.

“Our mission is every bit as much about catalyzing dialogue within the Jewish community as between Jews and Palestinians,” she says.

Encounter brings together “unlikely suspects” to talk directly and “build an environment that creates a safe enough container religiously and emotionally that they can hear the narrative of the other and take it in,” she says of the Jews and Arabs who have met over the four years of Encounter’s existence.

As for the future, Weintraub will continue her reconciliation work and plans for “Encounter having become a laboratory and catalyst for all kinds of projects and helping to restore a healthier spirit to the internal Jewish conversation about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and [playing] a role in moving the peace process forward.”

Favorite City (other than Jerusalem): Luang Prabang, the Holy City of Laos. Liquid Obsession: Passionate about a significant number of the 850 kinds of Belgian beer. In a Past Life: A Pakistani Qawwali singer and a Sufi musician.
— Carolyn Slutsky

Rabbi Julia Andelman, 32
Rabbi, composer championing multi-generational Judaism

When Rabbi Julia Andelman began serving as the first female rabbi of Congregation Shaare Zedek (founded in 1837), she anticipated a challenge bringing what she had learned in the independent minyan movement, comprised mostly of young people, to a long-established, multi-generational community. But two years into her job, Rabbi Andelman says working with everyone from children to the elderly has been one of the most gratifying, substantive experiences. “It feels more real, like a communal version of a Jewish family,” she says. “There’s something really holy about feeling we come together according to patterns of Jewish life.”

Andelman is an accomplished singer and arranger/composer, and her CD of Hebrew lullabies, “The Bedtime Sh’ma,” along with a children’s book of the same name, won three national Best of 2007 awards. She brings new meaning to Jewish ritual and community with what she considers a mixture of tradition and young, savvy perspective. One of her favorite parts of being a pulpit rabbi has been preparing life cycle events; she finds she is especially skilled at writing thoughtful eulogies. And working with people who she would otherwise never be close to brings a special holiness. “I see the image of God in people where I couldn’t see it before,” she says. “Not being able to write anyone off shows me we shouldn’t write anyone off.”

In the next few years, she plans to bring a new social justice focus to Shaare Zedek, and hopes to create a consultancy program to go to communities across the country and enhance davening.

“Ultimately,” she says, “I care about making life more meaningful for people through Judaism.”

TV Obsession: “Law and Order” (“who isn’t?” she asks). First job: Working on an assembly line for medical devices, which taught her a bit about what most people’s lives are like on a daily basis. Olde Music: Sang with the Harvard-Radcliffe Collegium Musicum, which specializes in Renaissance and early music.
— Carolyn Slutsky

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