Judaism as a Spiritual Religion:
Every Bush Is Burning

Introduction

When you are in the midst of a spiritual revolution, it is difficult to prove. It is like being a lighted lantern and looking for darkness. Every way the lantern turns, there is light. Or, if you prefer, it is like being a fish looking for water. As long as you are in the water, no matter which direction you turn, you can’t see it.

The only way to discover if you are in the midst of a spiritual revolution is to see beyond your generation -- to gain a greater perspective. What we discover, when we apply this method to Judaism is that Judaism is a spiritual religion: that it has a tradition of spiritual revival that beats like mighty waves against the solid shores of ritual and halachah, constantly eroding and reshaping them. You can walk the shores of ritual and halachah today, studying and mapping them, but tomorrow when you return to them, the rituals and halachah will have changed, the shape of the shores will no longer match your map.

This is not an argument against Orthodox Judaism. It is not a Reform or a Conservative view of Judaism. It is the truth of Judaism through the ages. So, what I am about to describe to you is not a modern movement, but what we should call "Quintessential Judaism," with a capital "Q."

The Primary Element

The hallmark of Quintessential Judaism is that it is a spiritual religion. This was not an easy discovery to make. It is so obvious that it is as transparent as the air we breathe and depend on. At any given moment, books are published that state what Judaism is. You can read one book that describes the meaning of Jewish holidays and life cycle events, another that describes Jewish laws and customs, another that describes Jewish beliefs and practices. Provided that they were written within a close proximity in time, they will give you a picture of Judaism at that moment. The picture looks solid. It’s all you need to know what to believe and how to behave to live your life Jewishly. Or, so it seems.

But this picture is not Judaism. It is only a snapshot of organized Jewish religion today. And you and I know a lot about snapshots. A snapshot might show the skyline of New York with the twin towers in it. The next snapshot, in the very same album, may show the skyline of New York without the twin towers. Looking at the first photo, we know it to be an accurate reflection of its time. But we also know that it is not New York today. Nor is it the way New York looked before the twin towers were built. To tell when the second snapshot was taken is more difficult. We have to look for other signs: newer buildings, older ones that no longer exist, changes in film or technology, and so on.

When Nachman of Bratzlav says that "Every blade of grass has an angel standing over it, whispering, 'grow, grow,'" we hear something about Judaism that is missing from the snapshot. And when Deuteronomy tells us

Surely, this mitzvah which I command you this day is not too awesome for you, nor is it beyond reach. It is not in the heavens, that you should say, "Who among us can go up to the heavens and get it for us and impart it to us, that we may observe it?" Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, "Who among us can cross to the other side of the sea and get it for us and impart it to us, that we may observe it?" No, the word is very close to you, in your mouth and in your heart, to observe it …

we learn something about Judaism that can’t be found in any snapshot. And, when Jacob, after wrestling until daybreak with a stranger, finally confronts his brother Esau and says, "to see your face is like seeing the face of God," we find a kind of Judaism that no photograph could ever hope to capture.

To understand Quintessential Judaism, we have to look beyond descriptions of Jewish practice, ritual, custom, and law. These things are organized religion at a particular moment in time. But the primary element of Quintessential Judaism, the air it breathes, is the search for God, and this is what we today call spirituality.

Our problem is that it is easy for us to teach the elements of organized religion. We can easily convey the laws of mourning or explain the holiday of Sukkot. We can easily state the customs of Havdalah or drill students on the Hebrew of the Kiddush. But how do we convey the tug we feel in our hearts when the State of Israel is portrayed in an ugly way on the evening news? How do we explain that, for those of us who experience our Judaism spiritually, not only did Moses once stand at the burning bush, but, in fact, every bush is burning, and all we have to do is turn aside to look? How can we help our students—young and old—to understand that the only commandment that is ever important is the commandment you are doing at the moment you are doing it?

To convey Quintessential Judaism, we have to reduce it to words without reducing it to things. Mysteriously enough, the way to do this has been passed on to us by our tradition. It is in what is whispered from the kabbalistic master to the eager disciple, it is in how the Tanach encases its teachings in a holy journey, it is in the reason that the Shemoneh Esrei, the eighteen blessings, actually contains nineteen blessings. The core of Quintessential Judaism is the history of the Jewish people, but not a history of facts, it is in a history of faith. It is actually what Will Herberg used to call, "faith enacted as history."

I say, "mysteriously enough," because the first time that you hear this answer, it probably seems entirely impractical. Yes, I want to help others become more spiritual. Yes, I too want to become more spiritual, more sensitive to the God I am seeking. But how does "faith enacted as history" help me create a curriculum to teach spirituality?

To teach Quintessential Judaism, we first have to dissect it, break it down to something that can be explained, then put it back together -- and all this without losing its essential mystery. I will do this for you now, but with one caveat: since Quintessential Judaism is a process -- constantly happening, continually changing -- and I can only explain it by making it static for a moment, so this explanation will become a kind of snapshot. It will be fixed and lifeless the moment I finish explaining it.

Nevertheless, for many of you, it will leap like lightning from my lips to your ears and you will "get it." For others, it may only seep in slowly; in time, you will begin to see it. And there are among you those who already know Quintessential Judaism, even if you had no words before, with which to describe it.

The Process

In Quintessential Judaism the players are constantly changing -- the Jews of one generation are replaced by the Jews of the next generation, the idea of God in one time and place is replaced by the idea of God in another time and place. We could ask the question, does this mean that God is actually changing? But this would be a useless question. God cannot be defined by human beings since human understanding cannot encompass God. God may exist in this world or outside of this world or both, but all of God that we can describe is ideational. Our God is a human creation, an idea that changes even as we change. For Quintessential Judaism, then, the quest for God that we call spirituality, is a quest for an idea of God that is meaningful to us. It is a quest to bring meaning into our lives.

It becomes a Jewish quest when it is undertaken by the community of Jews that exists in a particular time and place. It is never the only spiritual quest. It is never superior to any other people’s quest for meaning. It is only our quest as Jews. At any given moment, Christians, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Romans, Greeks, Babylonians, Egyptians, and so on are all on the same quest -- they are all attempting to bring meaning into their lives, all seeking truths about their ideas of God and godliness. And there is even a sort of mutuality and synchronicity in the questing. It is no accident that the period we call the days of the Judges is identical to the Homeric period in Greece, or that the teachings of Judah the Pious were circulated simultaneously with the teachings of St. Francis of Assisi. Nor is it an accident that these teachings bear close resemblance—that the heroes of the days of the Judges look like and behave like the heroes of Greek myth— and that the mysticism of Judah the Pious is nearly identical to the mysticism of St. Francis. Spirituality responds to its era and to the meanings that make sense to the people of its era.

I already compared the process to waves beating on the shoreline, so let me continue that comparison to make the process clear. This time, let’s call the shoreline "religion" and call the waves "spirituality." On the shoreline are a bunch of people who have recently bought property. They want to protect their investment. They don't want to see what they have built eroded by the ravages of the sea. Let's call these people who guard the shores of religion, "priests." Out there, on the waters, you have another group of people who ride the waves of spirituality. For them, the meaning of life has nothing to do with investments or ownership. They want to ride the crests of the waves and they are willing to be thrown ashore wherever the waves take them. We could call them "surfers," but a better name for them is "prophets."

You can be sure that "prophets" don't have many nice things to say about "priests," and vice versa. The priests say that God wants to be served in a regularized and structured way. They build bulwarks against the ravages of the sea, piling up bags of sand or putting up sturdy docks and building massive harbors. The sea is powerful and it may take generations to build up the necessary protection so that the priests feel safe and secure in their property, in their harbors, behind their bulwarks. The prophets say that God cares for none of these outward signs of safety and security. God wants to be served by the heart and the mind, by the balance that allows prophets to ride the crest of the waves.

Most of us are away from the shoreline. We hear what the priests are saying, and it often seems to make the most sense because we are entirely landlocked. But we also hear what the prophets are saying and sometimes it makes the most sense because it speaks to our souls in that crazy, wild language that only souls speak to one another.

That is how the process of renewing Judaism works. That is the basis for Quintessential Judaism.

Instances

Looking back in history, we can spot moments when the sea overtook the shoreline and the words of the prophets broke through to the people living inland. Likewise, we can see periods of time when the words of the priests held sway and the inland people felt secure and safe because they were sure that they knew what God wanted. What may surprise us is not the changes that were constantly taking place, or even the breakthroughs of the spirit that were constantly taking place, but the regularity of it all. The changes and the permanence are all happening all the time. That's what Quintessential Judaism teaches us -- that the process of seeking God is always happening.

It all sounds very plausible, but you probably want some proof now. Imagine that you are alive at the time of the First Temple. You have some flocks of sheep and goats. You have some property with some olive trees and pomegranate trees on it. You belong to a tribe. You trust that your right to your property comes directly from God. You believe that your tribe received its land, and your family received its land, in a sacred lottery that was held long ago, in the time of Joshua. As a landowner, you are likely to believe what the priests of the Temple are saying. God may be everywhere, but God particularly dwells in the Holy of Holies in the Temple itself. And only the High Priest can enter the Holy of Holies, and then only once each year. You and your family will never get that close to God. But you can share a meal with God. In fact, God has invited you to come to Jerusalem three times a year to do just that, to be part of the endless religious ceremony of ritual sacrifice. You will give a carefully selected animal to the priests. They will slaughter it and scatter its blood at the foot of the altar. And they will return much of this now-sacred gift to you, so that you can share it with your family and friends, knowing that you have made it sacred food by sharing parts of it with God and parts with the priests and their families. This is the essence of Jewish religious practice in the time of the First Temple.

Nevertheless, for generations now, things have been changing. The voices of the prophets -- always there, but not always heeded -- have been growing stronger. The little plots of land set aside for each family has not proved sufficient as the population has grown. The oldest son in each family may still have enough to feed his household, but younger sons and their families are often forced off the farm and into cities. Many can only make a living by selling themselves as indentured slaves. A wide gap has opened between those who have land and those who have none. Widows and orphans go begging through the streets -- only a few of them are able to glean the fields. Many exist barely on the edge of hunger, and some women are even forced into prostitution to feed their young ones. The Temple

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