I’ve been chewing over a problem—an especially tough esthetic-political-spiritual problem—and I wonder if you can help. Let me explain. Whether you look at the news or at the new TV season, at the local multiplex or the art gallery, at the nightclub or the bookstore, there’s no denying that our culture is generating boundless imagery …
Rosh HaShanah, the Jewish New Year, begins Friday night. As readers know, I’ve been working on my cheshbon hanefesh—soul accounting—in preparation for the deep rituals of t’shuvah—reorientation—that mark the period of the High Holy Days. One part of that work requires searching my heart and mind for knots of unfinished business: do I need to …
Last month I quoted Gandhi on inner guidance. “For me, he wrote, “the Voice of God, of Conscience, of Truth or the Inner Voice or the still small Voice mean one and the same thing.” The Torah reading for the week just ending underscores the same truth, exhorting the people to follow what they know …
At this time of year, when I am doing my cheshbon hanefesh (soul accounting) in preparation for the High Holy Days that herald the New Year, I become especially attuned to reminders and signs. My everyday world is cluttered with ordinary reminders. I would not say I am particularly forgetful–in fact, I’m still pretty good …
“Don’t scare yourself. Stop terrorizing yourself with your thoughts. It’s a dreadful way to live. Find a mental image that gives you pleasure (mine is yellow roses), and immediately switch your scary thought to a pleasant thought.” Rabbi David Wolfe-Blank, Meta-Siddur According to the secular calendar, this coming Monday is the yahrzeit–the anniversary of the …
It appears that we are in a time of spiritual convergence. The rapid expansion of communications technologies has propelled the writings of countless spiritual traditions through cyberspace, making it clearer than ever that beneath their differences, they speak of the same profound truths. As Gandhi said, “Even as a tree has a single trunk, but …
Do you hear a faint crackling sound? Don’t be alarmed, it’s just a paradigm shifting. And about time too. Today’s New York Times carries a report on policies proposed by the Association of Art Museum Directors; AAMD says museums should take care in exhibiting sacred objects. A particular focus is on indigenous objects, such as …
When I was first learning to drive, every movement of the steering wheel caused the car to veer too far in one direction, and when I attempted to correct by steering the other way, I often went too far back. Until I’d practiced a few times, I drove like a drunken skater. And so we …
I’m part of an online listserv for Jewish progressives that’s in an uproar these days over a rabbinic sex scandal. A spiritual leader repeatedly crossed the line, engaging in secret relationships with women students, whose status in relation to his own should have put them at arm’s length. He lost his post, then announced that …
You know what I think of predictions, right? If you need a little reminder of the perils of prognostication, consider that we’re coming up on the 40th anniversary of the late Timothy Leary’s 1967 prediction that “Deer will be grazing in Times Square in forty years.” Actually, this morning I was thinking of a line …