A Time for Silence
by Velvel "Wally" Spiegler

A massive, billowing white tent stood on a mountain top like a lone clipper ship; inside about thirty people sat around a circle in deep meditation, perched on cushions and wrapped in blankets to keep out a late May afternoon chill. A cool breeze swept across my brow as I thought to myself, "funny this doesn't seem Jewish". This scene took place about fifteen years ago at an avant guard Orthodox retreat on the New York side of the Berkshires; my first experience with Jewish meditation. At the time it seemed really "far out", but today meditation is common place, practiced by thousands of Jews all across the country.

Meditation is not new to the Jewish people. The prophets were known to receive their Divine messages in meditative states, and reports of Sages sitting in meditation date back to before the destruction of the Temple. A number of commentaries on the Sefer Yetzirah, the earliest of the kabbalistic texts, describe it as a manual of meditation, and centuries later an entire school of Jewish mysticism sprung forth in Safed focusing on meditation as the source of knowledge of absolute truth. However during the age of Jewish enlightenment, reason dominated the scene and meditation faded backstage, and that's the way it's been ever since.

Perhaps it was the unfolding of the human potential movement of the seventies, that drew my interest to meditative practice. Or maybe it was an attempt to safely recreate the altered states of consciousness from psychedelic induced experiences that were openly discussed in those days. I was also looking for answers to stressful situations I was going through at that time. I finally decided I had enough torment so I chose to give up therapy and take responsibility for my own life.  What I found from meditation was a clearer way of viewing the world, one that transforms illusion into reality. Most of our problems come from not seeing reality. "Serving other gods" is the Torah's metaphor for illusion, and we are duly warned against it.  We observe illusion when we bow to the god of our passions and desires, when we worry about what others may think if we're not wearing the right clothes, driving the right car, or making enough money. We know reality when we serve God, everything and everyone with unconditional love, the power that heals all.

I began my practice with a mindfulness meditation that I learned at an Interface workshop; simple enough for anyone to learn. I sat comfortably, relaxed with closed eyes and just followed my breaths going in and coming out. At first I sat  quietly for short stretches of three to five minutes. Later on I comfortably extended it for twenty to thirty minutes,  In the silence, I soon discovered the incessant chattering of my consciousness: physical sensations, thoughts and feelings, begin to resonate throughout my mind. I consulted my manual for the next step; there wasn't much published at that time on Jewish meditation. It said, "just watch without judgment what's happening" and nothing more; so I did just that for a while. In time I learned more and more about my thoughts and feelings, as I recreated my own psychotherapy, and unresolved emotional baggage began to disintegrate. The word for this process in Hebrew is hitbonenut, the search for self-knowledge.

As I became more proficient at this practice, I learned that meditation ismore than merely sitting still for lengths of time;  it is a state of mind that I can enter before engaging in everyday activities. I found in that state (scientists call it the alpha state where brain waves vibrate at slower rates than normally), I can be more open, focused, engaging, reflective and effective in everything I do: davven (pray),  perform Mitzvot, learn Torah or even take out the garbage. When we meditate we focus on our body, our mind and our emotions (they are also related to our spiritual world), that's all we can be in touch with when we close our eyes. We can't communicate with spirit, God, Shechinah directly but we can contact it indirectly through these faculties.

Meditation has, at times throughout history, been an integral part of Jewish tradition. It was necessary to live life more fully, but in today's hectic world it may be even more essential. There are times to be busy thinking, doing, and creating, but we need to know that there is also "a time for silence" (Ecclesiates 3:7).