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Unit One: Sharing the Vision C muga ;.ssu;;z.k gcddh gubigp; pycp czpug oimhnj pi c kcgju cnv csphmu sinjgujcphin' yu hn;pg.spuv yh; ;usgupcga pi pcfu ckk sckk; pycp scou hn duzigu pun iwskisf ucsy oignhnj' cnv ursubp zig uougjunshu;' pi urbkchn pycp pyu gcddh ec; puobigcghka .ncmchkcdku' dusc.;u "Eyu gcddh; h; d.;a ;p.vahnj cnv pyhnfhnj/" Eyu sinjgujcphin ec; .b hn cgo;/ Yie vcgu pyu gcddh ;bunv yh; d.;hnu;; yi.g; vuub hn pyi.jyp? Mi yu sycnjuv yh; hn;pg.sphin;: "Eukk pyu sckkug; pycp pyu gcddh h; hn sinzugunsu/" Eyu nue urbkcncphin ec; jguupuv fhnvka da inu cnv ckk/ ****** We are usually expected to be “in conference,” not in thought. Nonetheless, mostly, this year, we ask you to study and to think -- and to think together, bravely. You will explore ideas that may seem far removed from the project-oriented “Let’s just get it done” attitude that characterizes the way our culture usually teaches us to approach problems. Try to restrain your natural inclination to “do something now,” and take time to think through the issues of what your synagogue is all about. If you do not question assumptions, the most you will manage to accomplish will be incremental change. Some “quick fixes” may happen here and there, but you will not make substantive spiritual changes in your community, and your ritual alterations will become tiresome and hardly worth the effort. The old way of doing things will reassert itself and you will probably move on to other projects that also will not really handle the underlying issues that need attention. SYNAGOGUE 2000 1.1 1 Eventually, of course, your study and thinking has to generate activity. And so it will. But if you rush the activity, you will miss the “Vision looks inward and forest for the trees. You will tire of the energy required for the tasks, and forget the rationale becomes duty. Vision looks behind them all. Without a larger vision to sustain outward and becomes the work you do, you will be unable to attract aspiration. Vision looks others to what they will perceive as just more upward and becomes synagogue programs or activities. Your best faith.” efforts may even die for lack of others to keep them going. So take this opportunity to study and Stephen S. Wise learn, to observe and to question, to reflect on your own spiritual journey and that of your synagogue. Action will follow. (See Unit One: Appendix, “What We Mean by Spirituality”) For Discussion: 1. In what ways do you agree/disagree with the point of view presented in the reading? 2. Are you personally more comfortable being a “doer” or a “thinker?” In what ways? 3. What suggestions do you have for the team’s work? ****** SYNAGOGUE 2000 1.2 2 READ AND DISCUSS Reshaping Ritual and Beyond Changing the way we pray together in public is a hard thing for synagogues to accomplish. Prayer is ritual, after all, and ritual seems to go back “forever.” Some people automatically think, “We've always done it that way!” It is second nature for them to go through the motion of davening1 the way they always have, running by rote through the service from beginning to end. Others, who are unhappy with a rote service, stop coming. Those who like it remain. Then it appears as if “everyone” at the service thinks it is terrific. Attempts to introduce change are met with hostility from the “regulars” who find nothing wrong. Very few people are well versed in a new field of study called “ritual theory,” which deals with the “way that worship works.” Some people know a lot about the history of our prayers, the melodies that go with one service or another, and the Halakhah that defines how the prayers are said. But these elements came into being at a time when the service was part and parcel of a Jewish social setting where modern problems like Jewish identity and the nature of God were not the issues they are today. Your study, therefore, will deal with the prayers, the music and the Halakhah. But it will also draw on ritual theory to let you see how well your worship is working. ****** As your SYNAGOGUE 2000 team focuses on worship and prayer, you will come to understand: • Prayer does not exist in a vacuum. • Ritual is a reflection of the community in which it takes place. • Changing the service requires attention to the congregational setting in which it occurs. You will have the option, in a few minutes, to think through an example of a family ritual that failed. It illustrates the principle that most problems in ritual are really problems in communication. Dysfunctional families have dysfunctional rituals. The same is true of synagogues. 2. It is hard to know what word to use when discussing synagogue services. Some people like to call it “worship” or “prayers”; others still prefer Tefillah or just davening. Sometimes, the generic “ritual” suffices. Similarly, our institutions are variously called “synagogue,” “temple” and shul. Terms vary among us, often according to movement, but frequently also depending on regional usage. If you see a term with which you are unfamiliar, please just translate it into the one you prefer. SYNAGOGUE 2000 1.3 3 To be sure, prayer in Judaism is a matter of Halakhah; it is a requirement. Our own satisfaction may not be the “be all and end all.” But there is no reason to believe that we should on that account actually remain dissatisfied. Satisfaction does matter. Ritual should move us, be more than pro forma, and certainly not be boring. This curriculum will, therefore, explore the aspects of prayer and ritual. But each of you are asked as well -- even more importantly -- to internalize the broad vision of spirituality that motivates the Synagogue 2000 project. You will be asked to build, expand or maintain a spiritual community that suffuses the entire culture of your synagogue: how it cares for its members, how it studies, how it does good deeds, how it welcomes people and how it creates a life of prayer. As a team, you will be asked to grapple with these two things: (1) prayer and services, that is, ways to explore or maintain change on Shabbat, Holiday, and daily services, and (2) the spiritualization of the synagogue community; that is, ways to effect the ambiance of the underlying synagogue system in which prayer and ritual occur. For Discussion: 1. How do you feel about services? 2. What is your understanding of prayer? 3. What does “synagogue as ‘spiritual community’” mean to you? ****** READThe Birthday AND DISCUSS Party: A Ritual that Didn’t Serve (found in Unit One: Appendix) SYNAGOGUE 2000 1.4 4 Unit One: Appendix I. What is Jewish Spirituality? II. The Birthday Party: A Ritual That Didn’t Serve SYNAGOGUE 2000 1.5 5 I. What is Jewish Spirituality? Hard to Define As with all great and lofty concepts, “spirituality” is hard to define, but easier to recognize. What is love? What is dignity? What is integrity? Spirituality is another one of those things that matters profoundly but is hard to capture without just pointing to an example or two, and saying, “See? It’s like that.” A more serious difficulty with defining spirituality is that the languages of western civilization have been heavily influenced by Christianity, so until recently, “spirituality” was a word that was associated with Christian usage. People regularly pointed to “spiritual” monks or nuns, but not rabbis, even though it takes just a moment’s thought to realize that people would have pointed also to Nachman of Bratslav, and did point to Abraham Joshua Heschel, as equally “spiritual.” Interestingly enough, however, both Nachman and Heschel “qualified” as spiritual not so much on Jewish grounds but because in addition to their substantial Jewish qualities, they exemplified the Christian definition of people who were apparently intoxicated with God, completely selfless, and more or less beyond anything any “normal” person could aspire to. To some extent, that Christian use is still alive and well. It is related to the Christian notion of the holy spirit that comes upon the chosen few and infuses them with the divine. In Shakespeare’s day, “spiritual” was the opposite of regal; it was the church as opposed to the British crown. Nowadays, it is commonly thought of as what proper church representatives are supposed to be like as opposed to politicians: unconcerned with affairs of this world, beyond avarice and power; uninterested in business affairs; even unworldly. Some of these values are Jewish too: Judaism also opposes avarice. But some of them are not. Judaism never withdrew from the world the way the monastic tradition in Christianity did. Judaism therefore shares some parts of the Christian definition, but it has its own take on spirituality as well. We should ask, first, what “generic” spirituality might be, that is, how anyone, Jew, Christian, Buddhist, or atheist might be spiritual; and then, how spirituality can be specifically Jewish. Then we can illustrate what Synagogue 2000 means when it says that synagogues can transcend mere ethnicity to become spiritual places. The Demise of Natural Communities Once upon a time, we lived in what are called “natural communities.” We romanticize them now, even though there was a lot that was genuinely positive SYNAGOGUE 2000 1.6 6 about them. I mean farm communities where people lived all their lives, married each other, and settled down into predictable ways of life until they died; or a shtetl community where the role people played in town was relatively predictable -- girls, for instance, grew into women, married young, had children (if they could and become housewives.

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