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SharePeople of the Body
Jews are sometimes called “people of the book.” But as many scholars have observed, they are equally the people of the body. Consider the core practices of mainstream Jewish religion. Traditional observance of the Sabbath and holidays involves not beliefs or “spiritual feelings” but taking and refraining from certain physical actions. Jewish dietary laws are about foods, not sentiments; Jewish ethics is about action, not intention. Even Jewish prayer - built around the kneeling (Barchu) listening (Shema) and standing (Amidah) prayers - is based not upon some abstract soul or spirit, but upon the body. This body-centricity of the Jewish tradition is well known in academic and scholarly circles but, ironically, forgotten in many religious ones.
God in Your Body: Kabbalah, Mindfulness, and Embodied Spiritual Practice, Dr. Jay Michaelson
תַּנְיָא אָמַר רַבִּי יְהוּדָה: כָּךְ הָיָה מִנְהָגוֹ שֶׁל רַבִּי עֲקִיבָא, כְּשֶׁהָיָה מִתְפַּלֵּל עִם הַצִּיבּוּר — הָיָה מְקַצֵּר וְעוֹלֶה, מִפְּנֵי טוֹרַח צִבּוּר. וּכְשֶׁהָיָה מִתְפַּלֵּל בֵּינוֹ לְבֵין עַצְמוֹ — אָדָם מַנִּיחוֹ בְּזָוִית זוֹ, וּמוֹצְאוֹ בְּזָוִית אַחֶרֶת. וְכׇל כָּךְ לָמָּה? מִפְּנֵי כְּרִיעוֹת וְהִשְׁתַּחֲוָיוֹת.
With regard to one’s intent during prayer, it was taught in a baraita that Rabbi Yehuda said: This was the custom of Rabbi Akiva, when he would pray with the congregation he would shorten his prayer and go up, due to his desire to avoid being an encumbrance on the congregation by making them wait for him to finish his prayer. But when he prayed by himself he would extend his prayers to an extent that a person would leave Rabbi Akiva alone in one corner of the study hall and later find him still praying in another corner. And why would Rabbi Akiva move about so much? Because of his bows and prostrations. Rabbi Akiva’s enthusiasm in prayer was so great, that as a result of his bows and prostrations, he would unwittingly move from one corner to the other (Rav Hai Gaon).
When a person is drowning in a river and he makes movements in order to extricate himself from the water, those who see him will no doubt laugh at him and at his motions. Thus, when a person prays and makes motions, one should not laugh at him because he is saving himself from the malicious waters which are the. . . foreign thoughts which come to distract him during prayer.
Take for example the teaching of Rabbi Moshe Hayyirn Ephraim of Sudilkov (ca. 1737-1800), which builds on a parable learned from his grandfather, the Baal Shem Tov. In a comment on the biblical verse "And all the nation saw the sounds" (Exodus 20:18), found in the context of the Sinai theophany the master seeks to explain this apparent oxymoron. An analogy is offered of a musician who played with great sweetness upon his instrument, to the degree that all who heard his sounds drew close and leaped in joy—all that is except a deaf person who was present and called such behavior utter folly.
- Degel Mahaneh Ephraim, Parashat Yitro
An Act of Naming
We no longer react to the sense of wonder and beauty in creation like the medieval philosopher, who could derive from nature the logical conclusion that the world must indeed have been made by a great end carefully planning creator. We have no logical inference here, but only ongoing intuition. That intuition is guided by a critical choice we have made, the choice to speak religious language. The step from “wonder” to “God” is not an active inference, but an act of naming. In saying “God” in prayer, I give the object of my wonder a name. It is I, or we, as a community, who performed that act of naming. It is we who attach the word “God” to our search for meaning to our desire to find a word for that which invokes our sense of awe and wonder, for that which humbles and inspires us, for that which calls us to its service.
Our quest is not a question, one in need of a specific answer. But the quest itself leads us to an act and affirmation. There is a point in our search where we say “Yes!” This is the only answer we need, and it comes forth from our own inner depths.
Seek My Face, Speak My Name: A Contemporary Jewish Theology, Rabbi Arthur Green
Just as the Holy One, Blessed be He, fills the entire world, so too the soul fills the entire body.
Just as the Holy One, Blessed be He, sees but is not seen, so too does the soul see, but is not seen.
Just as the Holy One, Blessed be He, sustains the entire world, so too the soul sustains the entire body.
Just as the Holy One, Blessed be He, is pure, so too is the soul pure.
Just as the Holy One, Blessed be He, resides in a chamber within a chamber, in His inner sanctum, so too the soul resides in a chamber within a chamber, in the innermost recesses of the body.
Therefore, that which has these five characteristics, the soul, should come and praise He Who has these five characteristics.