Jewish Spirituality – David Hampshire

Torah at the heart of what it is to be Jewish

To be a Jew is to live in relation to G-d’s[1] revelation given to Moses, the Torah. The Torah, though, isn’t simply the first five books of the Jewish Bible it encompasses the whole of the Jewish tradition – a tradition that is growing and developing even as you read this. What does living ‘in relation to….’ actually mean? Perhaps it is best summed up as: being faithful to living the Torah in the tradition of the rabbis. As Jews we are not individuals seeking some sort of religious-spiritual path we exist as a community, the people of Israel.

How does the Torah define this people?

In the Torah we are described as a people ‘set apart’ a ‘holy people’ and we exist to witness that G-d created the world and has expectations of all humans. As Jews we do not exist simply for ourselves, like some holy club, we are there as a prophetic witness – a living message. Of course, we don’t always get it right and like all other humans we are flawed and need to return (teshuvah) constantly to our roots – the G-d of Israel.

Our holiness is primarily defined by our keeping of the commandments of G-d passed onto us through our sacred tradition. It is be studying these that we can start to define what a distinctively Jewish spirituality is. Given the space available, though, I am going to focus on some key areas.

The home

In many ways Judaism is a domestic religion. The home is set apart (holy) in a way that is rarely found in other religious traditions. In part this is because we have lived two thousand years without a land or a Temple, and even though we now have a land we still have no Temple. When the altar in the Temple was destroyed the family table took its place. The family table becomes a place of encounter with family members, friends, guests and strangers – as was the table of Abraham and Sarah as can be seen in Genesis 18. As such it becomes a place of meeting with the Living G-d. Meals are surrounded by blessings of thanks – the development of an attitude of thanksgiving is key to Jewish spirituality – and stories as well as conversation. The great Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik (z”l)[2] used to say: Maimonides, Nachmanides and Rashi were frequent guests at his childhood table.

The home is so important that on each doorpost (with the exception of the bathroom-toilet) there is a mezuzah containing passages from the Torah. The key message of the rabbis is that holiness is not something extraordinary but ordinary in every sense. This is seen most keenly on the Shabbat. In many ways that Shabbat has kept the Jews more than the Jews have kept Shabbat as Rabbi Hugo Gryn (z”l) was prone to say. The setting aside of sacred time in the ordinary of the home sanctifies the whole family and all that the family does.

The Beit Knesset

We are not simply families who are disconnected, though, we live in communities. The Beit Knesset is the ‘house of meeting’ and is also called the synagogue. Its primary purpose is to bring Jews together and it does this for a number purposes. Firstly, the study of Torah. It is only by studying Torah that we know how to live according to G-d’s command. Encountering G-d in the Torah is done in community. When studying the Talmud it is usual to do this with a friend. By learning passages from the Talmud and arguing about them and checking each others recall and understanding of them do we get to meet the Living G-d of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses and the rabbis. Study isn’t simply there as an academic exercise it is there to transform the ones who study – transforming us to become ‘ben Torah’, literally a son of the Torah. The ben Torah is one who lives the Torah in their everyday relationships – what Soloveitchik calls the ‘Halakhic man’.

Secondly, for prayer. Orthodox synagogues where there is a large community hold three services a day on weekdays and four on Shabbat. Often these services are combined so people aren’t constantly going back and forth. The purpose of prayer in the Jewish tradition, though, isn’t about trying to get what we want from G-d. The Jewish word for prayer (Tefillah) comes from the verb meaning: to judge oneself. The key question a Jew is required to ask themselves at prayer is: can I stand before G-d on the basis of the sort of person I am and the things I have done? If not then I need to change my life, if so: how can I become more perfect in my service of the G-d of Israel? Daily prayer in community, where possible, is a responsibility – it is about being an adult. It is not about how I feel or the feelings it gives me, it is more important than that. Most of the prayers are made up of blessings, further cultivating the middah (attribute) of thankfulness.

Tikkun olam

As a community, though, we cannot simply look to ourselves – although persecution has often meant that we have had to focus on surviving and social restrictions have had the consequence that we have not been able to engage fully with the world. When we are able to we have a duty to make the world a better place. Rabbi Nachman of Breslov (z”l) said that we should leave the world a better place than we found it. Engaging with others becomes key. The Torah commands us more than thirty-five time to ‘love the stranger’ but only once to ‘love our neighbour’. Loving our neighbour is logical because we share our present and future but why love the stranger? The Jewish mystical tradition (Kabbalah) teachers us that G-d is a stranger and that we discover G-d in that encounter. In fact Jewish folk law often identifies the stranger with the Prophet Elijah who at times comes to test the hearts of people. To this extent Jewish spirituality is wholly practical. The Rebbe of Kotzk told his followers: do not look after your own body and another man’s soul; rather look after your own soul and another man’s body. As Jews we don’t seek to make converts and we believe that people can be ‘right with G-d’ without being Jewish but we do believe that we must work for the good of the whole of humanity and the environment.

So what?

Jewish spirituality doesn’t look very spiritual to some people, it looks far too earthy. If anything Jewish spirituality is about adding a dimension to the life of all of us in the context of a community. It is about the encounter with G-d through faithfulness to the Torah and it is about being constantly grateful – the rabbis teach that we should try to find one hundred occasions for thanking G-d everyday – there is even a blessing for seeing ugly things!

Ultimately, Jewish spirituality is about the meaning and purpose of a people. It is not always a good people or a faithful people and there are individuals who let us down. It is a people, though, striving to become holy in all the right ways. Even non-religious Jews want, on the whole, to make that positive contribution which leaves the world better than they found it. A danger for all Jews is ‘spiritual nostalgia’ – sometimes referred to a Bubba and Chicken Soup – and this is to be avoided. Digging into our roots and looking at where we are going gives us a framework for a spiritual response to the world which at once transforms us and the world at the same time.