Posted on March 6, 2026 by Rabbi Noah Diamondstein
Dear friends,
This week’s Torah portion, Parashat Ki Tisa, features the famous text: “V’shamru v’nei Yisrael et haShabbat la’asot et haShabbat l’dorotam, b’rit olam.” “The People of Israel will observe Shabbat, to make Shabbat across their generations, an eternal covenant.” V’shamru is one of the touchstone texts that illuminates for us the particular value of Shabbat as part of Jewish life. We are imitative of God, each week doing our work for six days, then taking the seventh to “shavat vayinafash.” The root of Vayinafash is ‘nun-pey-shin,’ as in “nefesh,” the Hebrew word for life-force or soul. This verb, however, is written in the passive voice, and so translates as: “and be enlivened,” or “and be re-souled.” Indeed, our tradition imagines that we are granted a second soul on the Sabbath, that taking this time intentionally is a chance for us to double our spiritual capacity.
In the spirit of taking a sacred moment to reflect, I want to take this opportunity to lift up the name of an incredible giant of Torah who passed away this week, buried just this morning–Rabbi Dr. Andrea L. Weiss (pictured below). Rabbi Andrea Weiss was a prominent American rabbi and global leader in the Jewish community. As provost of Hebrew Union College, Rabbi Weiss became the first-ever woman to ordain rabbis in the Reform movement and was one of very few female rabbis to ever ordain Jewish clergy. A scholar of the Hebrew Bible, she won the American Jewish Book Award in 2011 as co-editor of The Torah: A Women’s Commentary (CCAR Press, 2008), the first-ever Hebrew Bible commentary made up of scholarship by women rabbis, poets and scholars. A moving tribute to Rabbi Weiss can be found here.
Not only have I been profoundly impacted by the Women’s Commentary–one of the most profoundly relevant, beautiful, and useful Jewish books progressive Judaism has ever produced–but I have been impacted by Rabbi Weiss in one far more personal way. Due to my ordination being moved to Zoom due to the pandemic in 2020, I was unable to receive “s’micha” the formal, physical laying-on of hands that ordains a rabbinical student into a rabbi. A year later, though, at my first CCAR convention as a working rabbi, my class held a private ordination ceremony at which Rabbi Weiss ordained me and offered me special words of blessing. Our movement has been forever transformed by her leadership and scholarship, and her memory is most assuredly already a bittersweet blessing.
In the spirit of Rabbi Weiss’ leadership, I would urge you to join Rabbi Gluck and me in attending our program on March 26th, at which we will hear from another pathmaking and inspiring female leader of our people: Anna Kislanski, Director General (CEO) of the Israel Movement for Reform and Progressive Judaism. This program will be an important moment for our congregation to better understand the current issues facing Israel broadly and Israeli Reform Judaism in particular. More information can be found here.
Have a sweet Shabbat,
Rabbi Noah Diamondstein