The Continuum of Practice

היום תשעה ושלשים יום, שהם חמשה שבועות וארבעה ימים, בעמר
Today is thirty-nine days, which is five weeks and four days, of the omer
נצח שביסוד
A day of perseverance in a week of foundation

While my Jewish practice is always evolving, koshrut continues to be the one that is most challenging. I guess it would be easier to just accept the traditional constraints, but that works for neither my practical nor spiritual life. When asked about my practice, I say, "I eat kosher." Sometimes that is just accepted; sometimes I'm asked what that means. I explain that it means I have my own way to follow the constraints of the practice as set out by the Torah and the rabbis who interpreted the laws as given there.

Once, when talking to someone about my kosher boundaries, I was asked, "So, do you get to pick and choose which 'rules' you follow?" I'd never thought about it that way, so it took me a moment to reply, "Well................yes."

The whole idea of a practice is that it is constantly moving as your perspective changes with knowledge and time and place and circumstance. It is the continual mindfulness and awareness and critical thinking is makes the practice. I learned that from my teacher, Rabbi Alan Lew.

There is no goal in my practice, there is just a continuum of thinking and action. It is a form of perseverance that serves as a foundation for my life.

It's all about the balance

היום ששה עשר יום שהם שני שבועות ושני ימים בעמר
Today is sixteen days--that is two weeks and two days--of the omer
גבורה שתפארת
A day of strength in a week of compassion

A post about balance from 2011. An ongoing issue in my life . . . 
________________________________________

Which brings up the issue of practice in one's life--how to set priorities, how to find balance. I work in a business that can be 24/7, depending on the specifics of the job. When I began to take on Jewish practice, Shabbat was the first observance I took on. It was interesting to watch my non-Jewish clients be very respectful of my stand to not work on Saturdays, while the Jews couldn't figure out why I was keeping to what they considered to be an anachronistic ritual. But it felt good to stop each week no matter what was happening around me--to make a stand for my time to pray, to rest, to revitalize--body and soul.

This practice of blogging the omer is not as concrete as keeping kosher or not working on Shabbat. It is a practice that is particular to me, not a tribal custom. Yet it has its own importance and needs to be honored. And so I carve out some time during the day to write, time that could and maybe should be spent on other things that would be more productive and/or more lucrative.

Keeping to a practice has its own rewards that are not always apparent in the moment. That is certainly true during this omer period. I can say that I am learning that finding balance is not always dependent on equality of time. It's more like the balance of a board on a point--its balance come from equal weight on each side. But sometimes, when the weight is unequal, you just need to move the fulcrum.

. . . and then sometimes it's all about the matzah.

היום ארבעה ימים בעמר
Today is four days of the omer
נצח שבחסד
A day of perseverance in a week of loving kindness

One aspect of eating kosher, especially in an environment where those who eat kosher are very much in the minority, is mindful eating. Yes, there are other reasons for eating kosher and other ways to eat mindfully, but that's the subject for a different essay. My point in bringing this up is that mindfulness is ratcheted up a notch during Passover. You get used to making various food decisions and adaptations of meals during the year, but during Passover the avoidance of chametz brings another layer to think about.

One challenge is making foods that don't involve matzah in any form. It's just not good for the digestion to eat so much of it. But it is the basis of so many recipes, when you add in all the matzah meal that so often is an ingredient.

I happily had my weekly trip to the Civic Center Farmers' Market this morning, and will be cooking with lots of fresh, seasonal vegetables. Tonight it's soup, tomorrow a kugel--which will have some matzah meal, but I will keep it to a minimum.

I'll look at this extra layer of mindfulness as a positive, not something to complain about. It's always good to eat fresh, seasonal foods, liberate myself from the pervasive influence of processed food on our diet.

Practical + Spiritual = Survival

היום שלשים ימים בעמר
Today is three days of the omer
תפארת שבחסד
A day of compassion in a week of loving kindness

I see Jewish ritual practice as fluid, a conglomerate of intersecting layers. Some layers exist in space, others in time, and still others cut through both time and space. Then there are the layers within the layers. Some divisions in space occur in one room, some across the universe. Time can be a day, a week, a month, a year, or multiple years through the millennia.

Then there is the practical vs spiritual aspect of many rituals, which can be rooted in tradition yet can change with each generation. Sometimes what seems very practical in one era would feel obsolete in another. The rituals surrounding kosher food is one example that comes to mind. I've had people explain to me how the rules of kashrut work in ancient times to keep people healthy. For example, they tell me, the clay dishes used were very porous, so not mixing milk and meat on the same plates would lessen the chance of eating spoiled food.

Giving health reasons for practicing kashrut is fine, the famous medieval Jewish commentator--and doctor--Maimonides would agree with that. But that is not the only reason to take on this practice. In the Torah, the reason for keeping kosher is so that we can approach holiness. What does that mean? Time to go to another level.

Maybe it's a way to be mindful about all aspects of what you eat--where it comes from, how it's prepared, what goes into the cooking. Eating is a very physical reminder that we are connected to other parts of the planet and need to think about the effects our intake will have on the rest of the world. And maybe we need to be reminded that nourishment includes feeding our soul as well as our body.*

My point in all this is to appreciate this multi-level Jewish practice that our ancestors have given us. Instead of kashrut, I could have written about Shabbat and the need for rest or Pesach as a way of clearing out the stale. All good ideas on a practical level. But there are always other strata in which to experience those rituals. Some work better than others for different people in different cultures in different generations.

And I think that is one reason why Judaism still exists when other peoples have not. We may be a vast, diverse tribe, but a people who can weave together the practical with the spiritual--feeding body and soul--will survive.


*For some other thoughts on the why of kosher in this era - check out this article from MyJewishLearning.com and this article from The National Jewish Outreach Program.

Loooking for lessons in the Kosher Nation

היום שלשה וארבעים יום שהם ששה שבועות ויום אחד לעמר
Today is forty-three days, which is six weeks and one day, of the omer
חסד שבמלכות
A day of loving-kindness in a week of majesty

Today I received my copy of Kosher Nation: Why More and More of America's Food Answers to a Higher Authority by Sue Fishkoff. It will be the next book in line for me to read. Friends have given it good reviews. But more importantly, I hope it gives me some ideas on how to teach the concept of kashrut to my students next year.

I teach in a Reform synagogue where the laws of kashrut are no longer followed. However, the students often bring up the subject. They are curious about the what and why's of the practice.

I need to be careful how I teach this--after all, it is not part of the culture of their synagogue and unlikely a part of their home life. When it comes up, I talk about mindful eating--being aware of what is in the food, where is comes from, how it gets to the plate. I show them the animated G-dcast for Shemini which gives the kashrut laws in song. I point out that the verses following the laws talk about each of us being holy--a kind of "you are what you eat."

But I'm hoping this book will enable me to bring in a worldly relationship to kashrut that would be in line with the philosophy of the Reform movement while letting me be true to the mitzvah aspect.

I'll post my own review when I'm done and let you know :)

We are just one part of creation.....

היום עשרה ימים שהם שבוע אחד
ושלשה ימים בעמרToday is the tenth day, making one week
and three days of the omerתפארת שבגבורה
A day of compassion in a week of strength

Yesterday I wrote of the new Koren siddur I'm using, for which Rabbi Sir Jonathan Sacks, Chief Rabbi of Britain, wrote the introduction, translation, and commentary for this siddur. I've been receiving his weekly Torah commentaries for a couple of years. Through his writings, I often find new ways to look at the parshiot, which is the best you can hope to get from teachings.

This week's parsha, Shemini, Leviticus 9:1 - 11:47, lays out the laws of Kashrut--what can be eaten, what shouldn't be eaten. I highly recommend reading Rabbi Sacks' commentary--you can find it here. He shows how the practice of kashrut serves as a reminder that humans are just one element of creation, not the center. He uses the description of creation contained in Job as opposed to the Genesis creation story to make his point:

Job is the paradigm of the righteous individual who suffers. He loses all he has, for no apparent reason. His companions tell him that he must have sinned. Only this can reconcile his fate with justice. Job maintains his innocence and demands a hearing in the heavenly tribunal. For some 37 chapters the argument rages, then in chapter 38 G-d addresses Job "out of the whirlwind". G-d offers no answers. Instead, for four chapters, He asks questions of His own, rhetorical questions that have no answer: "Where were you when I laid the earth's foundation? . . . Have you journeyed to the springs of the sea or walked in the recesses of the deep? . . . Does the rain have a father? . . . From whose womb comes the ice?"

G-d shows Job the whole panoply of creation, but it is a very different view of the universe than that set out in Genesis 1-2. There the centre of the narrative is the human person. He/she is created last; made in G-d's image; given dominion over all that lives. In Job 38-41 we see not an anthropocentric, but a theocentric, universe. Job is the only person in Tanakh who sees the world, as it were, from G-d's point of view.

Particularly striking is the way these chapters deal with the animal kingdom. What Job sees are not domestic animals, but wild, untameable creatures, magnificent in their strength and beauty, living far from and utterly indifferent to humankind:

Do you give the horse his strength or clothe his neck with a flowing mane?
Do you make him leap like a locust, striking terror with his proud snorting? . . .
Does the hawk take flight by your wisdom and spread his wings toward the south?
Does the eagle soar at your command and build his nest on high? . . .
Can you pull in the leviathan with a fishhook or tie down his tongue with a rope?
Can you put a cord through his nose or pierce his jaw with a hook? . . .
Nothing on earth is his equal- a creature without fear.
He looks down on all that are haughty;
he is king over all that are proud.

This is the most radically non-anthropocentric passage in the Hebrew Bible. It tells us that man is not the centre of the universe, nor are we the measure of all things. Some of the most glorious aspects of nature have nothing to do with human needs, and everything to do with the Divine creation of diversity. . .

. . . We now understand what is at stake in the prohibition of certain species of animals, birds and fish, many of them predators like the creatures described in Job 38-41. They exist for their own sake, not for the sake of humankind. The vast universe, and earth itself with the myriad species it contains, has an integrity of its own.

I hear the vegetarians saying, "Okay, so shouldn't we just not eat other creatures-wouldn't that practice better serve the point?" Yes, but the reality of the situation, from thousands of years ago when this was written up through today, is that mankind will eat meat. So I can appreciate setting up a practice when one must be mindful of what is eaten. What this teaching adds for me is the realization that we need to remember to view the other creatures of the world on their own terms, not as subservient species.

Because the chanting of Shemini falls within the omer period each year, I have looked at the issue of kashrut and what that means on both a personal and group level each year. And each year I see these teachings from a different perspective. You can see those posts here and here. It's a good bet there will be another one next year -- it's just all a part of the joy of studying Torah.

UPDATE: I am happy to have such a knowledgeable group of readers. I received an email last evening gently correcting my statement that Shemini is read during the omer period each year. On leap years, in which an entire month is added to the Jewish calendar, the chanting of Shemini will happen before Pesach begins. Thanks to all of you for helping maintain the integrity of this blog.

Kashrut - Unify or Divide Community?

היום ששה ימים לעמר
Today is the sixth day of the omer
יסוד שבחסד
A day of foundation in a week of loving kindness


This coming Shabbat we read Shmini--one of the parshiot in the Torah that lists which creatures to eat and which not to eat--the foundation of the laws of Kashrut.

In this week's "Today's Torah" drash I receive from the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies, Rabbi Bradley Artson comments on the practice of Kashrut:

"Kashrut offers an opportunity to harness the act of eating to contribute to who we are and what are our values. Kashrut summons us to elevate eating from an animal response to an encounter with holiness, transforming our kitchens and our dining room tables into sacred altars, our meals into reminders of our deepest values as Jews. . . .
For thousands of years, the dietary laws served as a vehicle for solidifying Jewish identity, for forging a link with Jews throughout time and across the globe as well as for strengthening the connection between Jews and their Judaism. Jewish meals forge a potent bond, linking family and friends into communities devoted to a more humane order on earth. . . .
Finally, the practice of kashrut, motivated at its core by a recognition of the holiness of every living creature, has instilled sensitivity to the suffering of animals and of our responsibility to other forms of life. True, the practice of the dietary laws requires commitment, self-discipline, and striving."

I wrote something similar last year on the third day of the omer - you can read it here. So I can't say that I disagree with Rabbi Artson on his view as a whole, but I'm not comfortable with the tone of his drash. You see, when he talks about "Jewish meals" and "kashrut," he's thinking only in terms of his Conservative movement view of those things. And because of that, he doesn't address the difficult issues surrounding the practice of kashrut in Jewish America today.
While I believe that kashrut is one of the practices that kept Judaism alive for all these thousands of years, I find that today it often serves to divide Jews to the extent of making some Jews scorn the practice completely. I know many people who eat mindfully and compassionately. I am a part of communities who bond over food. But it is often hard to reconcile each person's or group's version of what is kosher so that the caring act of sharing food becomes a seemingly judgemental event with some feeling either they are not good-enough Jews or their practice is not being respected.
It is a dilemma that is being felt by many Jewish communities across the nation. I wish that Rabbi Artson had addressed that, and given us some guidance as to how our communities can deal with these issues--or even recognize that the issues exist.
To me, it shows me one more reason to believe the Jewish Conservative movement has it's proverbial head in the sand----and may find itself deeply buried there if it doesn't start to pick up it's head and live in the real world.

Jews + Christmas = Chinese Food!

The Jewish/Chinese Food connection has been, I'm sure, the subject of many a sociological thesis. For today, I bring you an NPR report, "A Fine Day for Chinese Food." You can listen to an interview with Donald Siegel, the author of From Lokshen to Lo Mein, a Kosher-Chinese cookbook. You'll find a couple of recipes there as well.

I admit to a fondness for what I would call the "original" Jewish Kosher Chinese cookbook published in 1963, The Chinese-Kosher Cookbook by Ruth & Bob Grossman--who wrote a series of these books, including a French-Kosher & an Italian-Kosher. It has been a re-released and you can find copies of the original on used book sites. I've already put in my dibs on the copy my mom has, bought when it first came out. The recipes may or not be great, but the names were great. I can't remember or find any of the names from the Chinese-Kosher book, but these names from the others will give you the idea: Filet Minyan, Pate de Foie Schmaltz, Blintz Suzette, Shicker Chicken Kiev.

So as I head off to my mah jongg game, also appropriate, I think, for a Jew on Christmas, take a listen, and have a nosh--an eggroll, perhaps.......

Happiness is . . .

. . . having a pastrami sandwich for lunch.

Now, that may not sound very joy-inducing to many of you. Remember, I follow the practice of eating kosher and I live in San Francisco--a great food town but low on the scale when it comes to kosher eating establishments. Don't shed too many tears for me, the choices are great on the vegetarian side of things so it's not like I make too many sacrifices when going out to eat. But there is no going out for a meat meal on any level.

EXCEPT....there is The S.F. - New York Deli. This tiny oasis of kosher meat sandwiches is tucked in a corner of Justin Herman Plaza in downtown San Francisco. It's not a neighborhood I frequent so the deli has fallen off my radar. But today I had to pick up an animation file at Video Arts, which is near Pier 39. Driving home on Embarcadero with an empty stomach at 1 p.m., the urge for a pastrami sandwich tugged at me when I realized the deli was near.

I came home with the sandwich on marble rye, augmented it with some Betampte saurkraut and washed it down with a Dr. Brown's Black Cherry soda. I will admit that it wasn't a Ben's experience, but it was a lunch to savor.