Spirituality: Just Do It : Part 6

Working on God
by Winifred Gallagher

(Page 6 of 11)

Of the many ways in which B'nai Jeshurun could illustrate a textbook on millennial religion, the most obvious is its embrace of America's increasing religious pluralism. Without blurring or watering down their own traditions, Jews and Christians share the same sacred space and social ministry in their neighborhood. The synagogue's rich community life includes singles' Shabbat dinners and an employment bureau. A homeless shelter, soup kitchen, and tutoring project attest to its engagement with modern realities, as do adult education courses such as "I Can't Read Hebrew, I Never Went to Yeshiva, and I Want to Study Talmud." Although this is a Conservative, or more traditional, synagogue, Rabbi Yael Ridberg has recently joined the staff, and women not only wear yarmulkes and prayer shawls and read the Torah-practices previously reserved for men-but also serve on the board of directors. But most millennial of all is B'nai Jeshurun's emotional, experiential liturgy.

In America, where most Jews belong to the Reform and Conservative movements, most synagogues are sedate places that, with their pews, stained glass, and mostly English prayer, are not unlike mainline churches. Tonight, B'nai Jeshurun is closer to a Hasidic shul. With the strongest members holding the heavy Torahs aloft, we dance, clapping and singing, in circles and snaking lines, celebrating God's gift of words and wisdom. Over the festive din, Rabbi Matalon shouts instructions, which are not always immediately followed. Even the tough New York cops manning the roadblocks that divert traffic around the scene smile to see the city night throbbing with holy joy.

When I ask him later about why B'nai Jeshurun is so special, Rabbi Matalon, who is universally known as Roly, could be describing the classic millennial congregation. "We're an inclusive community where people can know each other, increasingly through small groups. We don't check at the door to see if you're rich or poor, gay or straight, have a religious background or not. Second, because religion can't stay within the sanctuary, we're dedicated to action and justice. God doesn't need our prayers, but our partnership in changing the world. Most importantly, we're spiritual. We look beyond the material life of paychecks and security to some echo of the truth that lasts and is meaningful when everything we take for granted crumbles around us. We believe in liturgy done with passion. Whether painful or joyful, life must be lived intensely, especially when standing before God."

Later, I attend one of B'nai Jeshurun's long Saturday-morning Shabbat services. Covering the Christian mosaics in the front of the sanctuary is a huge banner that reads, "How good it is when brothers and sisters dwell together in harmony." On Sundays, a big wooden cross is brought to the altar where a portable ark containing Torah scrolls now rests. To help congregants find Judaism's spiritual core, the synagogue offers several levels of Hebrew instruction each week. (Although some American Jews can follow the Hebrew liturgy as if it were in English, many more have learned only how to recite the language, much as Catholics once did with Latin.) In a way that English can't, the ancient language helps open "the gates of prayer," Roly explained to me, because it's "tailor-made for the ideas and values of this people." To illustrate, he offered the word kadosh. Its English translation is "holy," which calls up in the Christian grand images of angels and haloes. But kadosh, which derives from the everyday term for "to set aside," simply means that something has been made special, such as food or time, as in Shabbat. "Holy" and "kadosh," said Roly, "open very different doors in the mind. In Hebrew, sanctity is anything that God wants me to set aside for a special purpose. God is the most kadosh of all. In English, we'd lose all these associations. For us, Hebrew isn't just words, but value concepts."

As at the zendo, the service's experiential quality is striking. Music plays a big part in the B'nai Jeshurun experience. As the congregation filters in on this Saturday morning, Ari Priven, the cantor and music director, plays soft keyboard melodies that have a meditative, settling-down quality. After welcoming the congregation, Roly draws our attention to Israel, where the spirit of the Oslo accords has been rapidly fraying. Perhaps, he says, peace is the "lost property" that today's Scriptures insist must be restored to its rightful owners. Then, the prayers of praise that begin the service are accompanied by a rippling improvisational mix of mystical songs and Israeli folk melodies played on guitar, keyboard, and organ. The combination of music and fervent Hebrew soon impels me to daven-rock back and forth in prayer.

Up at the bimah, within a few minutes' time, several engaged couples dance under an improvised chuppah (canopy), mourners stand to commemorate their loved ones, and the sick come forward to pray for healing near the ark. With dispatch, the whole human condition is lifted up and sanctified, gracefully creating what psychotherapists call a corrective emotional experience. Without any preaching, each of us is gently put back in our proper place in the great scheme of things. Like the people who dance, mourn, and ask for healing, we too have been and will be happy, sad, and ill. Like them, we're in good hands. Faces relax, smiles are shared. At one point, the members of the congregation, mostly seated as couples, friends, or families, put their arms around one another's shoulders and sway to the music. When a tall stranger next to me, who has his whole family in tow, slings his arm across my back, I blink away tears.

Already, my reporting has confirmed an insight gleaned long ago from two very different interviews. The first was with an astute psychiatric researcher at the National Institute of Mental Health. While discussing neurotransmitters, he suddenly looked at me and sighed. "The great problem in life," he said, "is how to balance your need for privacy and independence with your need for others and for love. The wrong ratio in either direction can drive you crazy." A complementary and more personal observation came from a cheerful Italian Franciscan. "You have that Irish energy," he told me. "It's wonderful when it's going outward, but when it goes inward . . ." He shook his head.

Copyright © 2000 by Winifred Gallagher.

About the Author

Winifred Gallagher's previous books are Just the Way You Are: How Heredity and Experience Create the Individual, which was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year, and The Power of Place: How Our Surroundings Shape Our Thoughts, Emotions, and Actions. She has written for many magazines, from The Atlantic Monthly to Rolling Stone. She lives in Manhattan and Long Eddy, New York.