At Congregation Beth Sholom, six people begin their Shabbat observance by donning kippot, taking off their shoes and sitting in silence.
Rabbi Alan Lew guides them through exercises that focus the breathing. They then concentrate on the four Hebrew letters that make up the unpronounceable name of God, envisioning the letters, then envisioning the form of each letter dissolving.
The meditation ends with chanting “Pitchu li” (“Open for me the gates of righteousness and I will walk through them to praise you, God”).
Once the sole province of male kabbalists over 40, Jewish meditation is being revived in a less esoteric, more egalitarian form.
“Meditation is really larger than esoteric meditation devised in the 13th century.” says Nan Fink, co-director of Chochmat HaLev. Based in Berkeley, Chochmat HaLev offers meditation groups throughout the Bay Area.
Fink is a contributor to “Meditation from the Heart of Judaism,” edited by Chochmat HaLev co-founder and co-director Avram Davis. She is also working on her own book for beginning meditators.
Fink sees three types of Jewish meditation emerging.
“One of those channels is Kabbalah-Chassidism; the second channel is awareness meditation that many people learn in Buddhism but are now using in a Jewish context.” The third channel, she says, is meditating on Jewish images and Hebrew words.
Davening Shacharit (morning service) led to her meditation practice.
“I learned what it was to concentrate on that, to put your whole self into that. That was the first step. I then devised a way in which, instead of saying all the words, I meditated on the different sections of the service.”
For Beth Sholom’s Lew, it was practicing meditation as a Zen Buddhist that opened him to the richness of the Jewish prayer service. He now leads meditations four times a week at his synagogue, before minyans and Torah study. Lew is also a contributor to Davis’ book, in which 22 Jewish meditation teachers reflect on their experiences.
“Meditation opens you to everything, particularly to those areas of life that are subtle and spiritual,” Lew says. “When you just sit and focus your awareness, you begin to notice things that you don’t ordinarily notice. The Jewish prayer tradition is very rich in these kinds of things.”
Sylvia Boorstein, a self-described “mindfulness teacher” and author of “That’s Funny, You Don’t Look Buddhist: On Being a Faithful Jew and a Passionate Buddhist,” meditates as part of her spiritual practice.
She leads what she calls a mindfulness service each Wednesday with Rabbi Jonathan Slater at Congregation Beth Ami in Santa Rosa. They daven either the traditional Minchah (afternoon) or Ma’ariv (evening) service but much of it is spent in silence, focusing on the intention of the prayer.
In “On Mindfulness,” her essay in Davis’ book, she describes mindfulness as “balanced awareness of the truth of present experience.”
Sitting and walking meditation helped her develop this capacity.
“This particular attention to the essentially neutral activities of breathing and walking develops composure in the mind, which then supports the ability to pay balanced attention to the entire range of body and mind experience,” she writes.
The mitzvot, she says, are also a kind of mindfulness practice.
“The mitzvot are a relational way of cultivating attention. Normally people think about meditating privately but you can do it relationally.”
The emphasis on the communal in Judaism is also part of its meditative tradition.
“The goal isn’t to go off on one’s own and reach enlightenment but rather to participate in the group” says Daniel Matt, professor at Berkeley’s Graduate Theological Union’s Richard S. Dinner Center for Jewish Studies. A contributor to Davis’ book, he leads a meditation minyan once a month at Congregation Netivot Shalom in Berkeley.
Judaism discourages meditating exclusively by yourself, Lew confirms.
“On the deepest level, meditation connects you to the fact that you are not in fact a discrete, isolated individual. If you sit off by yourself, you’re prone to delusions that you’re some kind of discrete thing. You don’t really experience your connection to everyone and everything in the world.”
Jewish meditation is not meant to cultivate detachment but attachment, says Davis, who also wrote “The Way of Flame,” an introduction to the practice of meditation.
“Judaism embraces the idea of relationships, love, passion. In Judaism these are the keys to unlocking the doors of enlightenment.”
Ego, meditation teachers agree, can get in the way.
“Pride really excludes God,” says Matt. “The mystics take ani [I] and transform it into ayin [nothingness].”
Meditation can also involve cultivating a “noble boredom,” according to Los Angeles meditation scholar Rabbi Jonathan Omer-Mann, who writes an essay in Davis’ book. But the repetitive discipline is important, Lew says.
“The problem with the American approach to spirituality is that they think of it as a leisure activity, something you do on the weekends. If spirituality emerges from the marketplace of leisure activities, it’ll never go very deep.”
Davis says there is a longing for stillness in people, especially now, when most Americans live busy and complicated lives.
“People are torn in many directions. At the same time there is an intrinsic need to touch the place of the divine within ourselves. For many people meditation is the best doorway. This has always been a part of Judaism but not much talked about.
“That which has always been a bud will become a full flower.”