Dancing Through Change

It has been five months since Rabbi Wayne’s passing, and the legacy he leaves for us appears to be timeless and universal, an ongoing treasure-trove of gentle wisdom to support and sustain us in the moment. 

It is certainly a time like no other for us and our world. As we come to the New Moon this week, we know that the Jewish High Holidays are exactly one month away. We begin to feel the pull of the September Equinox and the great Season-Turning that approaches. 

In addition to this more immediate transition-time, our whole world is in the midst of a very great transition (which Rabbi Wayne alludes to in this month’s Legacy Piece):  Every 2,000 years, our Earth moves from its current astrological sign into the preceding sign — and Humankind responds accordingly:  6,000 years ago, Earth moved into the sign of Taurus, the sign of the Bull — and the Sacred Cow of Hinduism, the goddess Hathor, the Bull, and the Golden Calf of Ancient Egyptian culture became important symbols; 4,000 years ago, Earth moved from Taurus into Aries, the sign of the Ram — and the Ram’s horn, the shofar, became an important symbol of the emerging monotheistic “Jewish” world; 2,000 years ago, Earth moved from Aries into Pisces, the sign of the Fish — which became a symbol of the belief in Jesus and the new Christianity. And now, 2,000 years later, we are in the process of moving from Pisces into the Age of Aquarius, the Water-Bearer, the symbol of expanding knowledge and rising consciousness. 

If even the change in seasons is an important marker for us, we can only imagine what a big deal it is to change Ages!  Just as Summer gives way to Autumn over a number of weeks, so one Age makes way for the coming of a New Age over many decades. And it is always an extended time of turbulence and uncertainty, deathing and rebirthing. 

In the midst of any transition, when nothing is clear and we truly don’t know where the shifting will take us; when everything feels out of control and we feel small and helpless — it is natural to want to find someone or something that is big enough to help us, to “save” us, to comfort us, to let us feel guided and protected and watched over and safe. Some turn to strongmen, dictators and autocrats. Most of us turn toward the Divine. Especially as the Summer fades and the year begins to die, we get hungry for God.

Rabbi Wayne wrote Dancing With God in 1997, and it was reprinted and given the new name, Soul Judaism in 1999. And it is in this book that he so beautifully speaks about the great shifting, and our growing hunger for the Divine. 

Rabbi Wayne speaks of all of this from inside the Jewish experience. As you read this, if you are not Jewish, or if you want a more universal approach, please change the words Jewish and Judaism into your religion or path — it is all equally applicable. 

These few pages of his are excerpts from Dancing With God, interspersed with quotes from a variety of other teachers, poets, and prophets. He put this together as a handout for a class he taught many years ago. Enjoy!

Again, I thank you from the bottom of my heart for your great ongoing love and support, caring and wisdom. You sustain me and I am grateful.

Ellen, continuing the work of the Elijah Minyan

---

Law  and  Spirit

….remember all of the commandments of God and do them. And do not follow your own heart or your own eyes, lest you go whoring after them.”

_{Nu. 15: 39}

For many modern Jews — especially American Jews who were brought up in a society that grants and celebrates “unalienable rights” — the requirement to follow ancient law poses …a great dilemma: How do I balance the obligation of the law with freedom of choice? How do I accept responsibility without foregoing my rights? How do I assent to boundaries and limitations when I am autonomous and unfettered? Why should I be bound to demands and duties when my spirit can be free and unencumbered?…

….a small but passionate — and growing — minority of Jews adheres strictly and meticulously to the law. Another small group of Jews I committed to the concept of binding law, and struggles to balance legal requirements with modern circumstance. But for the vast majority of contemporary Jews, Jewish law has little power and little relevance.

_{Rabbi Wayne Dosick}

---

Of contemporary Jews: [Most] “will not be told what to eat, where to eat, when to eat; when to rest, where to rest; when to marry, whom to marry, where to marry; whom to mourn, how to mourn, where to mourn. In short, modern Jewish consciousness is less proud of being chosen than in choosing. 

“They are not traditional Jews in the sense that historian Jacob Katz understands tradition: the belief that my public and private life can be regulated by law, and that my meaning and values are derived from ‘total reliance on the distant past.’” 

And, yet, for all their modernity…for all their distance from religion, they express a yearning for “spirituality”…a need for guidance.

_{Rabbi Harold Schulweis}

---

No less than Abraham who found God, and Moses who covenanted with God, no less than the prophets who heard God calling and spoke God’s word, modern Jews hunger for the sacred. They long to hear the voice of God, to feel the presence of God, to know the will of God, to be wrapped in the comfort and love of God.

Contemporary Judaism aches for a rebirth of faith, a balancing of the world of the law with the world of spirit.

There is an inherent human hunger, a continual human yearning for the sacred, for the spiritual, for the transcendent, for the eternal.

There is a hunger for God. 

_{Rabbi Wayne Dosick}

---

During its first two thousand years, Judaism was characterized by direct revelation enhanced by God-given law. In this period — which we now call Biblical Judaism — each person could hope for and expect personal communication and a personal relationship with God.

But then the world changed radically.

Most significantly, direct Divine revelation — personal prophecy was replaced by the advent of Oral Law, the extension of Torah-law that was given at Sinai. 

The rabbis and sages who introduced oral Law contended that God’s word and will would no longer be given directly to individuals, but would come through this new law, articulated by the sages themselves. Continuing revelation, they claimed, came through them alone.

This new Judaism came to be called Rabbinic Judaism.

Just as the primacy of Jewish law was been deeply ingrained into the collective Jewish psyche, another messenger came into the world.

Jesus taught that in the relationship between God and humankind, the world of law is far less important than the world of spirit. Jesus contended that belief, faith, and love, which Judaism assumes and sometimes takes for granted, are the core of the relationship between God and humankind…

Twice in these ensuing two thousand years of Rabbinic Judaism, movements within Judaism — most notably the Kabbalists in the 13th century, and the Chasidim in the early 18th century — have tried to bring Jews back to finding the spiritual, to celebrating faith.

But their attempts were most often smothered and rejected by the rationalists and the legalists. 

In the past 250 years, there have been massive and radical changes in the Jewish and the secular world.

At the same time, human consciousness is expanding to ever-greater awareness. 

The universe continues to unfold bit by bit, revealing its mysteries, divulging its secrets. The veil is lifting. This distinction — and the distance — between this side and the other side is ever-fading.

With all these sweeping changes in our world, our behaviors, and in our psyches, the once innovative and comfortable world of Rabbinic Judaism is no longer enough for most of us. Its simplistic, innocent answers no longer satisfy our expanded minds; its insistence on the primacy of law no longer speaks to our questing heart and souls. 

_{Rabbi Wayne Dosick
Soul Judaism  / Dancing with God}

At some future time, eyes will gaze upon us. They will perceive that we were once in an inter-face between civilizations. They will say of us that we used our new freedom…either to vanish as a people, or to re-educate ourselves, build our broken core from the treasures of the past, fuse it with the best in secularism, and create a new community, a third civilization of the Jewish people. This is the adventure that lies before us. 

_{Rabbi Chaim Potok}

The birthing has begun.

A new Judaism is being born.

We call Judaism’s coming new era, Judaism’s third era, Neshamah Judaism,

Soul Judaism. 

Neshamah Judaism will be defined by its core manifestation — the intimate spiritual soul-connection of each person with God. 

Our sense of mitzvah (and our connection to community) will continue to command and inspire us. Our commitment to following God’s ethical mandate will remain unchanged and unchanging.

Yet coming into Neshamah Judaism will mean returning to Judaism’s original roots, to the ever-possible reality of direct revelation, of personal prophecy, of deep and sacred communication. It will mean returning to the intimate one-to-one relationship between God and each individual human being.

_{Rabbi Wayne Dosick
Soul Judaism  / Dancing with God}

The time for Jewish spiritual renewal has come. 

The time has come for the symbolic rebirth:  to blend and merge the world of law and the world of spirit….

Law is the human spirit at its finest: enlightened, empowered, and enabled; able to make choices, assume responsibility, and affect result. Law is the human spirit at its most free, the ultimate moral courage to say, “No.”

God’s law exists simply and profoundly to celebrate the spirit: the spiritual connection between God and God’s people; and the human spirit of God-like holiness.

When the long-awaited union of law and spirit finally comes…each human being will be assured that God knows you, God loves you, and is with you always. 

At this most exciting and awesome moment in Jewish history, a moment that comes only once every two thousand years, we stand at the birthplace of Judaism’s coming new age.

Judaism’s history and destiny come in us, because of us, and, now through us.

_{Rabbi Wayne Dosick}

Hayashan  yitchadesh,  v’hechadash  yitkadesh
“The old made new, and the new made sacred.”

_{Rav Kook}

As you go on your own spiritual journey, your own SoulJourney, you will find life’s deepest meaning and most profound happiness emanating from the “holy sparks” that come from you and God reaching to touch each other. 

_{Rabbi Wayne Dosick}