Then, just before the ceremony began, the bride’s great-uncle, a rabbi and Holocaust survivor from Saskatchewan, announced he wanted to participate.
The three American rabbis looked at the “little old man with a big beard and a frock coat who didn’t speak English, and probably recognized intuitively that he could not have been other than a survivor of the war in Europe,” Boorstein writes. With their minds cleared of animosity, the three handed Uncle Avol the ketubah and the ceremony began.
What are the Four Noble Truths? First, everything is impermanent, resulting in suffering. Second, the cause of suffering is attachment; in this case, the rabbis were attached to their roles. When their egos blinded them to higher truths, everybody suffered. Third, when the rabbis dropped their attachments, nobody suffered. Fourth, Right Wisdom, Right Practice and Right Behavior lessen attachment.
“All of the nonsense falls out of your head when it’s screwed on straight,” Boorstein points out in her newest book, “That’s Funny, You Don’t Look Buddhist.”
“When we’re startled, we realize what’s really important,” said Boorstein, who will be speaking about her book Wednesday, Jan. 29 at a Jewish Family and Children’s Services forum in Santa Rosa.
“One of the hopes of meditation is getting clarity without frightening ourselves. We shouldn’t need a startling event to clear our minds.”
A psychologist, grandmother of five and co-founder of Spirit Rock Meditation Center in Woodacre, the 60-year-old writer has been practicing Buddhism for two decades — first as a student, then as a teacher of meditation. She is also the author of “Don’t Just Do Something, Sit There” and “It’s Easier Than You Think: The Buddhist Way to Happiness.”
Boorstein emphasizes that becoming Buddhist never led her to leave Judaism.
“What I really am is reawakened to the extraordinariness of the tradition,” she said.
After a two-decade hiatus from congregational life, she belongs to the Conservative Congregation Beth Ami in Santa Rosa, draws spiritual inspiration from the Jewish liturgy, honors Shabbat and keeps kosher in the homes she and her husband, a psychiatrist, share in northern Sonoma County and in Kentfield.
Her new book, subtitled “On Being A Faithful Jew and a Passionate Buddhist,” reveals the melding of both traditions. Her premise is that the Buddhism she practices — she does not have an altar or operate in the monastic tradition — is fully compatible with Judaism. And many of her students at the Insight Meditation Center in Barre, Mass., as well as at Spirit Rock and other meditation centers, are Jews. Boorstein has also worked in tandem with rabbis.
“It is as nonchallenging to me to be Jewish and Buddhist as it is to be Jewish and humanist,” she said just before leaving for a month in Jerusalem. “I never stopped being Jewish.”
Boorstein was trained by Buddhist teachers in contemplative practices during the 1970s, when there were few meditation teachers operating within a Jewish framework. Today, the practice of Jewish meditation is growing and a number of Jews who have explored Buddhism have returned to the Jewish fold, often renouncing the Eastern religion. Boorstein has not. She has chosen to live in both worlds.
“I could have said, `I’m a Jew who’s influenced by the teaching and philosophy of Buddhism. I’m a mindfulness teacher and a student of Dharma,'” she said.
“The reason I said I’m a Buddhist is it’s part of the Jewish tradition to honor our teachers. Actually, the decision made things more honest.”
Does she still experience suffering?
“I suffer less,” she said. “I don’t think about becoming enlightened. I think about enlightening moments.”
One of the teachings she tries to live by is that “life is challenging, but it gets worse if you fight life.” By way of example, she discusses a story from “Don’t Just Do Something.”
During a month in Jerusalem, Boorstein joined the YMCA and proceeded to swim her laps, back and forth in a straight line. But the pool was filled with large women in shower caps who zig-zagged in all directions, getting angry at her for swimming into them.
Then in the locker room, she realized the women were former Soviets. Their bodies were marked with the fatigue of having lived through 50 years of communism. Like the American rabbis encountering the survivor, she had a compassionate awakening. But its effects were transitory. Even with her heightened awareness, Boorstein still found the women’s swimming habits annoying.
“I realized the capacity of the heart for the compassionate response, but we also have reflexive responses such as annoyance,” she said. “None of us is fully evolved. When we get to be tzaddikim [saints], we’ll get it completely right.”