RabBiLOG
The Pagan Egg of Spring
The deeper we go into the roots of our traditions, the more we learn that we are connected and the perceived veils of separation fall away.
Many of our religious traditions are rooted in pagan traditions, that predate Western religions. Pagan traditions and rituals grew as all cultures grow, to address human needs. The wisdom of our human need is profound, creative, and calls us to come together, not be apart or to be at war with other tribes (religions).
Sometimes those distinctions and separations are expressed in symbols and small acts. But as the Ancient Rabbis said: “If you believe you can destroy (separate,) believe you can build/repair.”
For example egg decorating!
Somewhere along history spring egg decorating was claimed as Christian (the Easter Egg) and will not be made by people who consider themselves Jewish. And it i regional specific to the US and other predominantly Christian countries. I grew up in Israel and it was great fun to decorate eggs; not Easter eggs but “symbol of spring and renewal” eggs which we place on the seder plate. When I moved to the US I was disappointed that this custom is not enjoyed by Jewish communities, because it is for Easter not Passover.
I was glad to see this article by Jahanabi Barooah with the history of the Easter Egg and beautiful pictures of decorated eggs to remind me how much I love this art.
“Brightly decorated eggs have become integral to the celebration of Easter today.
However, the tradition of painting hard-boiled eggs during springtime pre-dates Christianity. In many cultures around the world, the egg is a symbol of new life, fertility and rebirth. For thousands of years, Iranians and others have decorated eggs on nowruz, the Iranian New Year that falls on the spring equinox.
Some claim that the Easter egg has pagan roots.” (source Huffington Post)
If you wish to decorate eggs and felt reluctant because it is not your tradition, maybe this information can help you change your mind. Enjoy!
Happy Spring, Passover and Easter to All!
Spring Cleaning Meditation
Happy Spring!
I love Spring’s beauty. I am able to spend more time outdoors and sense the freedom nested in new beginnings. I also love spring-cleaning! I take it seriously, it is an important part of my heritage. Although cleaning for Passover (Pesach in Hebrew) can be hard work, we do it because we want to feel more free; Passover is the holiday of liberation and freedom.
Each corner and crevice of each room in the house (and let’s not forget car, office, classroom, etc.) receives attention. The prescribed religious aim of the cleaning is to clear out any leavened bread and products, but to me, it is only the beginning for the occasion to engage in deep cleaning and organizing my living environments.
How can we bring more meaning to the ritual cleaning?
If on Rosh Hashana, the Jewish New Year in the fall, we busy ourselves with the accounting of the soul (heshbon hanefesh,) Passover is a time to do the “accounting” of our physical spaces. To me, the process of preparing for Passover; attending to the different areas and things around us, is perhaps the most memorable and cherished Passover tradition.
I have fond memories helping preparing for Passover as a child. Washing down walls (seriously, no joke) emptying cabinet and closets and sorting through what to keep and what to discard, cleaning surfaces, etc. When we arrive at the Seder (festive meal of Passover) we feel lighter and sparkly clean.
These days I live in a relatively small space and I do not wash down the walls, but I love going through this ritual cleaning before Passover. I am joyfully going through the ritual of deep cleaning and hope you are doing the same. See Spring-cleaning meditation below.
I wish you a sweet and liberating Passover and Easter. May your joy bursts with sweet fragrance and beauty of a delightful spring.
Blessings and love,
Rabbi Sigal
Spring Cleaning Meditation
Intention: I attend to my physical space with care; let go, clean, organize and create the pleasing and comfortable space where I live carefree.
Plan: Allocate time each day to attend to an area of your dwelling. Do not plan on a whole day of cleaning, but if you do take long breaks. You will be more productive with shorter periods over several days. Invite people you share space with to help and/or attend to their spaces and things.
Action: Sit quietly for a few moments, notice your breath, relax the body, and connect with your intention. Look around and let your body sense and determine which area you will be attending to. Formulate an approach and have the items you need with you (i.e. cleaning supplies, bags, boxes.) Stay focused on what needs to be done and try not to be distracted by things that you couldn’t decide about in the moment or make you stop “keeping your practice.” Have a space or a box dedicated to “I am not sure where and if I need it or what to do with it” and come back to it later.
When we approach spring-cleaning as a meditation practice, we bring our intention to focus our attention in a way that is supportive. We treat it as a practice, and just as a seated meditation practice or a prayer, we commit, give our attention to the practice, and then walk away from it feeling better about ourselves, knowing we are keeping our commitment to cultivate the life and environment we desire.
Hearing Silence in Religion
Is “doing,” for the sake of doing, the center of Jewish practice?
To some.
But, is “doing,” alone fulfills the goal of spiritual practice, “fulfills the mitzvot(commandments)?”
Probably not, if we few commandments as spiritual practices.
Reflecting on the relationship between means and ends in spiritual practice brings me to make the following point again. Religion is a backup system (means) to our natural capacity to be awakened and living to our potential human (ends). We need practices and reminders which religions (and I am thinking meditation and yoga as well) are made up of those.
Looking to ground this teaching in history… Although the Bible is all about doing and external actions, with very little inner reflection, immediately after it was recognized as problematic. And as a response, the ancient rabbis introduced the concept of “kavanah” (intentionality and focus in prayer) and later on “Taamai Hamitzvot” (inner meaning of commandments,) to remind us that the enactment of rituals prescribed in the Bible are not sufficient, because it does not fulfill the need to our mystical (I understand it to mean: internal) lives. And yes, there was the destruction of the Temple that motivated the creativity and ingenuity of the rabbis to invent the new paradigm of prayer and supplication that individuals can utter alone or in a quorum. But, I believe that the move to addressing spiritual life as they did, stemmed from the awakening of the awareness of human internal experience in society at that time. Thanks to the ancient rabbis, in Jewish traditions, we have the foundations of the understanding of spirituality, soul, mysticism and human interiority as we know it today.
Our internal world is touched and expressed in ways that are not easily seen as activities in the world, they are subtle movements inside of our being. Those inner moves that go beyond the rational thinking mind. We know them on the inside and hopefully they inform how we see the world and how we act.
Similarly, Sh’ma, the declaration of faith and obedience in the Bible, to act and obey as we are told, has been re-appropriated over the centuries and embodies spiritual connotations and mean: to listen to the internal voice, to hear God’s call, and to attune and open mind and heart to the hum of the universe and tradition.
To me, Sh’ma is a call to open and be receptive in the broadest possible terms: to life, others, myself, situations, and yes, the call of the Divine that is in them all. The listening and attuning is the primary and on-going “doing” that I am engaged in and I follow, and obey, the moment by moment guidance spontaneously arising to meet each situation.
What I practice, and teach, are methods to cultivate deep Sh’ma, attuning; making room, welcoming, hearing, and living from the heart.
Be still and know that I am God.
(Psalms 46:10)
The heart is the center of our being, pre-language and thought. Where we encounter God, truth, and our true nature. It is the SILENCE we know in our soul when we are deeply listening, which to many of us is the experience of God.
To me, religions are like languages:
no language is true or false; all languages are of human origin;
each language reflects and shapes the mindset of the civilization that speaks it;
there are things you can say in one language that you cannot say
or cannot say as well in another; and the more languages you know,
the more nuanced your understanding of life.
Judaism is my mother tongue, yet in matters of the spirit
I strive to be multi-lingual.
In the end, however, the deepest language of the soul
is silence. ~Rabbi Rami Shapiro
MezuZEN: a Personal Western Wall for your home to keep you centered and peaceful
Your “I am-ness”
Walt Whitman wrote: “I am large, I contain multitudes.”
Our sense of our “I am-ness” on an ongoing basis is much smaller than what Walt Whitman described. Not because we are different than him, but because we are simply forgetful of our true nature.
We forget because we get lost in the 3 pound organ in our skull, our brain; the most amazingly complex and smart system there is in the known universe. We take ourselves to be a small section of of the system, and I mean a VERY small, miniscule part of the brain, and we call it I , Me; believing that is all of me. We burn patterns into the pliable circuitry of the brain and reinforce them through repeated thinking and actions, to be our limited truth, when in fact huge regions of the grey matter are utterly neglected. Multitude parts of ourselves, our brain, are not even formed or revealed and are waiting to be born and discovered.
If you tried to wrap your arms, or even your brain, around your true “I am-ness” you would not be able to do so, because you are infinitely larger than your imagination. And your imaginative capacity can not be projected into the future, because it is not known yet. It is being born in the moment each moment. New gazillion brain connections are being formed contentiously. The potential is unlimited. Yes, you are unlimited!
This is what scientists are discovering about the brain that connects to the way I understand and experience the mystery; spiritual field, godliness, mysticism, universal mind, consciousness, & awareness.
Kabbalists call that mystery Ain-Sof, that which is without-end in space and time. It works for me.
Let’s live this new year remembering that we are infinite, our brains are without-end, we are unlimited, and love is what’s real.
Sh’ma! Listen and hear the mystery.
The Gift of a Retreat: A Time To Come Back Home to Yourself
Take a moment to think about a significant moment in your life. An experience when you felt really alive and grateful. It was probably a time of some significant sweet sacred sharing and being that filled your soul. It was probably not acquiring another physical thing.
We are so inundated with material things and life’s details and chores that the need to get away, “stop the world and get off,” taking a few days off for a retreat is a necessity NOT a luxury for our well-being.
I was counseling a family that was under a tremendous amount of stress and the adults in the family lost the ability to make good decisions and relate to each other with kindness and thoughtfulness. I could have advised them to implement several methods of coping with the challenges in their lives, but instead, I suggested they go on a retreat.
When they returned they reported that being away made a huge difference in their daily life. While away they had time to slow down, get quiet, reflect, and gain perspective about their daily routines and family dynamics. They were able to connect to their essence and core of their soul. They were home in themselves and from that place, life is much easier to manage, or even enjoy.
This holiday season, as I have been doing for many years, I lead retreats at Kripalu Center for Yoga & Health during the winter break. We gather in the quiet of a beautiful facility and grounds and deeply retreat and renew body, mind, and soul.
This year I have two retreats and they are open to all who want to experience a deep nourishing retreat where we slow down and listen to the whispers of our hearts. We yoga, move, meditate, deeply relax, chant, sing, and share precious moments of connection.
Please consider giving yourself, and others, the gift of a retreat this year. I would love to see you there.
Lighting the Inner Menorah
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When we enter the Month of Kislev, the 3rd month on the Jewish calendar, and the season of cold & dark winter nights and shorter days, we need reminders of light and warmth. No wonder we all count the days toward the celebrations of light in our different traditions. The pagan origins of all the winter holidays speaks to the human need for light and warmth on all levels; body to soul, during this time of year.
In our religious observations we sometimes forget these essential needs and that the rituals and celebrations of winter holidays are a response to it. We ask the why of history, tell the stories of old, and don’t always bring it into our hearts to reflect upon our basic human needs of body and soul. In Jewish tradition in addition to the commemoration of the rededicated Temple, the lights of Hanukkah are lit during this time of year remind us of the hope of warmer days and more light. Lighting the candles for 8 nights is the main activity of the holiday. We increase the light each day, adding another candle, to mirror the growing hope in our hearts and minds for a “brighter” future.
To experience a more meaningful and joyous holiday we need to refocus our attention on what the holiday is about and how it connects to our lives today.
Hanukkah is the holiday of light and hope. It is the time of re dedication of our spiritual center. A time of making room in our soul and heart so we could clearly see the guiding light and purpose of our lives.
Please make time to reflect alone, or with your family and loved ones, on the following questions: How can you bring spiritual meaning and joy to your Hanukkah holiday? What would be meaningful to you? Reflecting in this way can help you make good decisions that are more creative and relevant to your life and your family.
For a more meaningful experience I suggest you separate candle lighting from Gift giving by at least 20 minutes and instead do an activity together; cooking, eating, singing, meditating, and playing games.
In Jewish mystical teachings (Kabbalah) we learn about the inner kindling of the fire of the heart and lighting the light of the Soul. The soul is likened to a flame and humans are likened to vessels containing divine sparks. When we light the external candles we are reminded of the light of our soul.
Jewish traditions tell us that focused actions and rituals aid in the cultivation and deepening of our enlightenment, awareness, and joy. I want to invite you to explore few practices to deepen the experience of light and joy during Hanukkah.
Gazing Meditation:
When you light the candles each night sit quietly and gaze into the flames as long as they are lit. Contemplate the flame and imagine bringing the light into your heart illuminating any dark recesses and infusing bright places with more light to make them even brighter. Let the imagery help you heal and sooth your being, and notice what comes up for you in the process of doing this practice for 8 evenings in a row.
Music:
Play music and sing fun songs. You may want to use recorded music to create the atmosphere you want, perhaps experimenting with different kinds of music for each night or let family members share music of their choice on different nights.
May your Hanukkah, Christmas, & Quanza be full of light and blessings and may they fill you more and more each night.
I wish you an enlightening holiday season,
Rabbi Sigal
http://www.kripalu.org/presenter/V0003290/rabbi_sigal_brier
Reflecting on my rabbinic studies
I was a yogini for many years prior to deciding to study at a rabbinical seminary. I already had a graduate degree in psychology and experience with transformational personal growth work. Before rabbinical school my interest was to bring the spirit into the workplace; increase people’s happiness and satisfaction at work by choosing and integrating into work the calling of the heart as well as skills and talents. I was engaged in research and applied methods to discern what are the ways we can find to express our authentic expression in our work in organizations. The connection between authentic living in all aspects of our lives was a driving factor in all my studies and work.
Then, after I tasted a little of Judaism as a spiritual practice I wanted to reclaim more of it. Prior to that spiritual taste, I experienced Judaism as tribal, historical, survivalist, nostalgic, law driven, excluding of women, and apologetic, but not in the least spiritual. It was something I grew up “doing,” I did not experience it as soul nourishing or inspiring. The spiritual nourishment I found in meditation, reading, education, poetry, music, and yoga was outside of Jewish tradition.
Entering rabbinic studies and the pulpit was a journey to heal and reclaim the soul of Jewish spiritual practices.
My work throughout the years has been integration of practices to create opportunities for direct experience of the mystery and cultivation of wide-open field of awareness. What has not worked for me, and many others, is the “doing Judaism for the sake of preserving alone.” Remembering and channeling all experiences thorough nostalgic reminiscent lens, a primary way of “doing” Judaism in many organizations, has a limiting effect, the opposite of expansiveness and richness, and precludes us from being in the present of our lives and experience life as it unfolds.
If we limit religious experiences and approaches to the past, we cannot reclaim them in the present and living through us. When We cling on to stories of the past we miss the gift of this moment.
I want to live Jewish-ly in the present, and yes, remember the past and learn from it, but mostly be in the life, in the world, and in the breath here and now. I love, and value, history and tradition, but feel that spiritual practices that support cultivating the comprehension that we are one and unique at the same time, that we are here to live fully and learn, etc. are not given the air time we need.
I love the knowledge I gleaned in my rabbinic training along other areas of interest. Through all my trainings and work the focus remain constant; healing the sense of separation, integration, and deep listening to life as it unfolds, moment to moment.
Sh’maYoga grew out of this. It is an integration of Kabbalah and yoga, but more than that it is a practice of deep listening, the yoga of listening.
Happiness & Moral Action
In The Limit of Empathy article in the New York Times by David Brooks, he outlines the disconnect between feeling empathy and right action.
“Empathy makes you more aware of other people’s suffering, but it’s not clear it actually motivates you to take moral action or prevents you from taking immoral action.” He writes about the overemphasis we place on empathy in our education, religion, and the cultivation of moral action, while research does not show a link between the two.
a bit into the article Brooks includes this interesting findings, which I intuitively know. “Some influences, which we think of as trivial, are much stronger — such as a temporary burst of positive emotion. In one experiment in the 1970s, researchers planted a dime in a phone booth. Eighty-seven percent of the people who found the dime offered to help a person who dropped some papers nearby, compared with only 4 percent who didn’t find a dime. Empathy doesn’t produce anything like this kind of effect.” A dime!
Granted, the research was a while ago, but I hope there are other researchers who are looking at the connection between happiness, contentment, positive feelings and right action, and finding similar outcomes in diverse situations. And I hope there are researchers who are looking at the effect of longer term and sustained state of happiness and joy on our behavior.
I think society’s construct lead us to believe right conduct is about following prescribed rules, something that takes effort, and willfulness because it not in our human nature. And thus, perhaps talking about happiness along with moral behavior feels a little self indulgent and too easy. We were conditioned to think we should be focusing on the outside, not ourselves, do for others and the world and not worry about our joy. Turn out we may be missing the point about self care that is directly related to doing good for others. Being happy and practicing compassionate and loving self care leads to behaviors that are compassionate and caring. When we feel happy we invite people to share in it.
I am an empathic person and care about acting in moral and compassionate manner. I know that when I jump to help others compassionately, selflessly, and generously, I am feeling fullness and joy in my heart that make my actions a natural and spontaneous expression of my being. When my cup is full and I see a lack or a need, my action pour out of that fullness with no effort or calculation and I do the “right thing”. I do not need codes of conduct to tell me that.
I do believe that religion, spiritual practices, or any other “filling” inspirational, physical, and intellectual activities for that matter, can support us in becoming “filled” (content, fulfilled), not because they prescribe a code of ethics, but because they provide the means to cultivating joy. And, yes, sometimes we need the external code to guide us until we calibrate our inner compass, which we do by feeding it with authentically fulfilling and happy moments.
I live and teach with the awareness that we all have in us the capacity to moral and right action if we let our authentic being be nourished and live freely. So go ahead and treat yourself to something delicious & fun to put a smile on your lip and in your heart. In addition, intend to sprinkle random acts of loving-kindness, leaving “dimes” here and there for others to find and have the experience of positive emotions. Who knows, those “dimes” may start chains of positive experiences that influence and raise the level of kind-action in the world.