Lately, I have been thinking about the Jewish New Year and High Holiday season akin to a mindfulness meditation intensive. In the Zen and other Buddhist traditions, monks and nuns training in monasteries spend summers and winters in intensive meditation practice periods lasting about three months long each. In the Zen tradition, this is called an ango. The Jewish tradition doesn’t really have an ango or something similar, though we can and should.
A Jewish High Holiday Meditation Intensive
While the Jewish High Holidays begin on Rosh Hashanah, this important time of self-discovery and repentance begins seven weeks earlier on the holiday of Tisha B’Av, or the Ninth of Av. Tisha B’Av is an annual fast holiday wherein we mourn the destruction of the First and Second Temples in Jerusalem.
During the seven weeks between Tisha B’Av and Yom Kippur, we sit before the Divine as Moses did in an intensive period of incubation and deep listening. This 49-day intensive culminating in the ten days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur are a built in yearly period of intensive spiritual practice.
As if we are on meditation retreat, we are invited to treat each moment, each breath, and each encounter and person in front of us with the sensitivity and openness of a child’s fresh eyes. This is what Shunryu Suzuki Roshi – one of the founders of Zen in the United States – called the “beginner’s mind.”
A New Beginning
As the Jewish New Year celebrates new beginnings – we realize that each and every day is a new beginning. Each and every breath in meditation is a welcome gift and a new revelation.
In a few weeks at Simchat Torah, we restart the annual lectionary cycle. We will start the cycle of the weekly parashah – or weekly Torah portion – all over again.
We go back to the beginning. We go back to Genesis. Year after year, we are always starting over. Moment after moment, we go from ashes to atonement.
Even this Mindful Judaism blog itself is a new beginning. I first posted a blog entry just a couple of weeks ago and started the website in many ways, after recently completing my Jewish Mindfulness Meditation Teacher Training Program, in honor of the Jewish New Year and these new beginnings.
There are always new beginnings!
Teshuvah
It is easy to forget. It is easy to lose perspective and take each moment for granted. You do it. I do it. We all lose track of this perspective. It is too easy to lose track of ourselves and who we really are.
It is natural to err. We all make mistakes. It is being human. What is important during this period of intensive spiritual practice – and at all times – is to do teshuvah, to return to ourselves. Where ever we are, we return to what and who is directly in front of us. Where ever we are, we return to this situation in this moment. There is no choice!
The Jewish tradition teaches that Rosh Hashanah marks the sixth day of creation. On this day, the Book of Genesis – or Sefer Bereshit – tells that primordial Adam – and all of humanity – is created in the Divine image.
Each year, we are created anew. Each year, we mark a new beginning and are called to awaken to the voice and vision of the Divine in everyone and everywhere. This is teshuvah!
Happy New Year!
May you have a Loving New Year!
May you have a Peaceful New Year!
May you have a Safe New Year!
May you have a Happy New Year!
Happy New Year 5778!!
As always, if you are interested in learning more about Jewish Mindfulness Meditation or how to create a more meaningful spiritual path for you and your loved ones, please make sure to sign up and click the “Stay Connected Now!” button below!
Adam Fogel
www.mindfuljudaism.com