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Judaism’s spiritual side

I had envisioned Israel being a completely adventuresome journey. At work I was asked if I was going for spiritual reasons to which I quickly replied, “No.” Of course if that were true I wouldn’t be writing this piece, would I?

I, like most children born into a Jewish family, went through Sunday and Hebrew school. Hebrew school was actually on Wednesdays after regular classroom study where my education continued, but now in Hebrew. We were taught a majority of the stories from the Torah, and without a doubt all the popular ones. One thing missing from that though was the spiritual side of Judaism. If such a thing exists that is.

Before this trip I didn’t know there was a spiritual component to Judaism. I thought Judaism = Tanakh (Torah) just as Christianity = Bible (e.g. Tanakh+New Testament). In the last year or so I have been exploring other cultures as well as religions. I wanted to pursue an inner peace, and explore a more spiritual understanding of the world. The journey started with Buddhism. Unfortunately with the chaos of life, work, and pursuing my own business I did not yet have the time to get below a general understanding of the teachings of Buddhism.

Avraham teaching us about Kabbalah, Tzfat, Israel

Now I find myself in Tzfat, Israel. Starring back at me was Avraham. Avraham is a spiritual man. He began talking about the teachings of Kabbalah. That’s right, Kabbalah. The supposed religion of Madonna and several other A-list celebrities. It’s not my place to question their beliefs, but that is probably the first thing most people think of when they hear the term. I did myself! Actually, Kabbalah was not traditionally taught until after one masters the teachings of the Torah. Only then, usually around age 40, does that person begin to learn the inner meaning of the Torah, known as the kabbalah.

A meditational map of the 100 sounds of the Shofar, Tzfat, Israel

Avraham is an artist, a religious artist if you will. He showed us several pieces of his work, but one in particular seemed to resonant with me. He calls it Tashuv-Hey or in Hebrew, תשובה. This painting represents balance, sort of like the ying and yang. The bottom ה is associated with the desire to receive, the place of conditional love. The upper ה is associated with the desire to give, the place of unconditional love. The Kabbalah explains that through the transformation of the lower ה within ourselves, that is the self-love, to the place of the upper ה, the love of all things, that we become united with infinite goodness.

This image can be viewed two different ways. Similar to the glass being half full or half empty, do you see a single letter at the top or a white background with a cutout of a letter?

The transformation of self-love to a love of all these brings infinite goodness

Imagine for a second that the upper ה, the greater love, is nearly complete, but missing that last piece. Once you have reached that unconditional love, the bottom ה (white letter on the black background) will float up and fill in the black ה at the top. The image is now transformed into a single white rectangle and a single black rectangle. This represents infinite goodness. Can you see it?

If you want to learn more about Kabbalah, Avraham recommended that you start with a book called Jewish Mediation.

Israel in all her beauty

We took the bus up the coast of Israel. We had the Mediterranean Sea over our left shoulder, but I struggled to keep my eyes open. Not because the views weren’t spectacular…because they were! The problem is that I don’t think I’ve slept yet. The first night it was my mistake to not shut the blinds, so we were up at the crack of dawn. Even if we had remembered to shut the blinds, those damn roosters would’ve woken us up just moments later. At least it wasn’t just me that had my eyes closed, but failed to drift away. Both my roommates, Shaun and Mike, experienced the same problem. Good thing our wake up call of 6am didn’t arrive too soon!

Baha’i Gardens in Haifa, Israel

Sorry for the tangent. So yes, Israel is quite beautiful. The two towns we got to experience were Haifa and Akko. Both these towns lie about 24 km (~15 miles) from the border of Lebanon. It’s hard to believe that in 2006 bombs from Lebanon rained down from the skies on both of these towns. Even more unbelievable is that many of the people living here chose to remain in their homes and go about business as usual. Did you change your habits after what happened on September 11th?  I remember a lot of people canceled flights and postponed travel plans.  Actually, I was probably one of about twenty people that went to high school the next day.  We had a school of 1400.

Retirement. Akko, Israel

We slept in a Kibbutz!

A kibbutz, for those unfamiliar with the term, is a planned residential community based on socialistic principals. In a traditional kibbutz you own nothing and share everything. They began as utopian communities, but are becoming increasing privatized. One of the ideals I really like about these communities are the environments they create for children. I had the priviliage of growing up with my brother (what’s up Scotty!), but for those that were only children, a kibbutz gave you twenty children to play with and call family.

Ok, that’s all for tonight. Gnight.