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My friend Henya, after years in the Jewish renewal movement, decided that it was not feeding her spiritually. She divorced her husband and went off to India. There, in the foothills of the Himalayas, she found a guru. She moved into a cave near the guru, adopted the Sanskrit name "Janaki," and immersed herself in sadhana, Hindu spiritual practices. On one of my trips to India a few years later, I visited Janaki in her remote Himalayan retreat. She met me dressed in an ochre sari, wearing her prayer beads. Other than her light complexion, she was indistinguishable from the myriad of saddhus (spiritual renunciates) wandering around India. Then she led me into her cave. When my eyes adjusted to the darkness, the first thing I saw, prominently displayed on the wall of the cave, was a hand- printed poster in Hebrew with God's ineffable name surrounded by Hebrew Scriptural passages. The scene was strangely symbolic. Amidst all the trappings of a highly committed Hindu practitioner, hidden in the deepest recesses, was a cherished Jewish identity. This incongruous juxtaposition abides in the hearts of many Jews who follow Eastern spiritual paths. Sylvia Boorstein is a popular Buddhist meditation teacher, author and founder of the Spirit Rock Meditation Center. In her book That's Funny, You Don't Look Buddhist, she describes how excruciatingly difficult it was for her to define herself as a Buddhist rather than a Jew. Even as a Buddhist delegate at a major interfaith conference, when her turn came to introduce herself by name and religion, the best she could manage was: "My name is Sylvia Boorstein. I grew up as a Jew, and I teach Buddhist meditation." She writes: "Some friends of mine, aware of my great respect for Buddhist understanding and of my dedication to practice, have been surprised at my renewed interest in Judaism. 'Why,' they wondered, 'would you want to complicate yourself with Judaism?' It's not a question, for me, of deciding to complicate myself with Judaism. I am complicated with Judaism." During my own 15 years as a monastic member of a Hindu ashram, I experienced a similar ambivalence. Feeling spiritually failed by my Conservative Jewish upbringing, I had sought and found a satisfying path in Hindu meditation and spiritual practices. Yet, I sometimes felt like a wife who divorces her first husband because he never brought home a paycheck and marries a second husband who supports her in grand style only to feel, whenever she encounters her first husband, that, unaccountably, she still loves him. For many Jews in Eastern paths, their dual identity remains a low-grade ambivalence. For others, it poses a wrenching conflict. David Gottlieb, who grew up Reform, is a writer who has worked in theater and public relations. After years of studying and practicing Buddhism at a Zen center near Chicago, he received lay ordination as a Zen Buddhist in 2002. "I am a Zen Jew struggling to resolve these two identities," he writes. Since more than one-fifth of all American Buddhists are Jewish, this issue of dual identity may be widespread. "My Zen practice caused increasing discomfort and friction," recalls David, "not only within myself but between me and my wife. In time, I came to see certain elements of Buddhist meditation as extremely helpful to me personally, but the adoption of Buddhism as a religion to be a source of internal and external division." David's religious conflict was exacerbated by his wife Galit, who had a strong Jewish identity and education. Soon after starting to meditate at the Zen Center, David brought Galit to see the center and to meet his teacher, a female Zen priest. There, the priest, dressed conservatively in clothes that say, "Hi, I'm a Jungian therapist," greets my wife and shows her the meditation hall... EXPERIENCE AND IGNORANCE David's conflict continued to fester as he became more deeply involved in Zen practice even while faithfully attending their local Conservative synagogue. Finally, his wife's discomfort became unbearable. "David," she told him, "your practicing Buddhism is a knife in my heart." At that point, David decided to write to Rabbi Akiva Tatz, a South African-born physician and author who has a reputation for plumbing the spiritual depths of Judaism. Since the affinity of Jews for Eastern paths is a push-pull dynamic of attraction to the East accompanied by aversion towards many aspects of what they consider to be Judaism, David sought answers for the issues that turned him off about Judaism. With disarming honesty, he labeled his 15 questions, "A Jewish Buddhist's complaints about Judaism and comparisons of Judaism with Zen."
"They are complaints or objections," he wrote to Rabbi Tatz, "due partly to my experience and partly to my ignorance." All true learning starts with an implicit admission of ignorance. Most Jews who spurn Judaism attribute their complaints to their negative experience of afternoon Hebrew school, ostentatious synagogues, and vacuous bar/bat mitzvah lessons. Many years ago, I heard a tape of a panel discussion by Ram Das, Jack Kornfield, and a couple other luminaries of Eastern spirituality in America addressing a question that went something like, "Why don't we relate to Judaism?" Their discussion focused solely on their negative experiences growing up Jewish. Not one of them mentioned the possibility that perhaps -- just perhaps -- they had never learned Torah in the deep way they had learned Buddhism or Hinduism. In admitting that his "complaints" were partly due to his own ignorance, David Gottlieb opened the way for a dialogue with a rabbi that was dazzling in its illumination. Their two-year correspondence has recently been published as a book, Letters to a Buddhist Jew. In its depth and wisdom, it is, in my estimation, one of the most important Jewish books published in English in recent times. GOD AND BUDDHISM David Gottlieb's 15 questions span such subjects as God, chosenness vs. universality, self-knowledge, Torah from Sinai, legalism, spiritual vacuity, suffering, meditation, and joy. Although some questions relate to basic Buddhist concepts such as "emptiness," most of the questions and all of Rabbi Tatz's profound answers relate to issues that will edify any thinking Jew. The book analyzes all of the major differences between Buddhism and Judaism. The cardinal difference regards God. Buddhism is a non-theistic, some say atheistic, religion. The Buddha, in all his teachings, never mentioned God. David: Although Zen Buddhism does not deny the existence of a Divine force at work in the Universe, it does not focus on a God who must be obeyed or, more importantly, believed in. Buddhism focuses on what can be experienced, and although many believe they can experience God... can they, really? A second divergence is that Buddhism, like all meditative paths, asserts that the meditator can experience ultimate reality directly; one need not subscribe to beliefs one cannot corroborate through one's personal experience. Rabbi Tatz analyzes this contention. He points out that to deny the reality of all that cannot be directly experienced is not only egocentric but also spiritually limiting: "No matter how broad my consciousness may become, if I never approach those dimensions beyond my conscious apprehension I may be excluding the major part of reality from my worldview and my world-work."
Another key difference is the practice that constitutes each of these spiritual paths. The Buddhist "Eight-fold Path" includes right thought, right speech, right livelihood, etc. It is a quintessential process of working on oneself to increase awareness (mindfulness) and eliminate attachments in order to attain enlightenment. The focus is ultimately on self-development. The essential practice of Judaism, on the other hand, is the performance of commandments as the means of developing a relationship with God. Its focus is not on the self, but on relationship. To the extent, Rabbi Tatz asserts, that "Buddhism posits no more to its view of human development than the training of mind and the refining of experience to the exclusion of a relationship with God; if it sees awareness of the Universe without awareness of its Source as sufficient, that would not be valid for Jews." Ironically, many Buddhists regard God as a limiting concept, as a mental trap to be avoided in the quest for pure "emptiness." Sylvia Boorstein recounts how in the middle of an extended meditation retreat, she experienced what she understood to be the "presence" of God. When she reported this to her teacher, his response was: "Be careful, Sylvia. Don't reify." ARE ALL THOSE STATUES IDOLS? The chapter on idolatry is scintillating in its brilliance. Although Buddhist Jews are adamant that the statues of Buddha so ubiquitous in Zen centers do not constitute idolatry because they are merely meditation aids, representing the calm, centered self, Rabbi Tatz explains that this is the very crux of idolatry. After a detailed elucidation of the "devolving chain of causation" from the higher worlds to the lowest, physical world (ours!), he defines idolatry as "the idea of relating not to the supernal Source of all existence, the ultimate Oneness, but to the channels that bring down energy into the world." And what is the motive for focusing on anything lower than God? "The underlying reason for forgetting the Source and remembering the intermediate levels is the most basic of all vested interests: the focus on self." While it is easy to see that a primitive idolater worshipping the rain god has only his crops and prosperity in mind, Rabbi Tatz shows how all focus on the intermediate channels, such as the most subtle and sophisticated elucidation of astrology, is really a product of egocentricity. Likewise, a statue of a pagan deity and a Buddha statue representing the enlightened self are both projections of self: The heart of the difference [between Judaism and idolatry] is this: true service understands that God is everything, I am only to serve; idolatry understands that I am everything, and my gods are to serve me. ... You will note that images of idolatrous worship are very often human in form. Idolatry is really worship of the self, and the graven images are projections of that self. STANDING OUTSIDE THE OPEN DOOR
At several different points in their correspondence, David brings up the problem of access. While Buddhism is "extremely accessible," he writes, "Judaism, on the other hand, is confoundingly inaccessible, and the deeper one tries to go, the denser the thicket of laws, and texts, and beliefs, and practices gets." David: The highest level of Jewish scholarship no long reaches even a sliver of the Jewish people. We are in danger of becoming an illumination aristocracy, where an anointed few delve into layers of knowledge for which the majority of us are ill-equipped, and becoming more so. More minds each day are not just numbed but positively alienated by their de facto exclusion from the levels of Jewish knowledge to which only the illuminati retain access. Ultimately, any Buddhist Jew who is true to his Buddhism must engage his Judaism, for the simple reason that Buddhism subscribes to the Law of Karma. About 14 years ago, Ram Das (born Dick Alpert), the most sought-after Eastern spiritual teacher in America, was a guest at my Shabbat table in the Old City of Jerusalem. Asked why he had made this pilgrimage to Jerusalem, which included talking to some leading rabbis, Ram Das replied that he had to face the karmic reality that he had been born as a Jew. Clearly he felt there was something he was supposed to learn from Judaism. David's Gottlieb's objections are, he says, based on both his experience and his ignorance. Nothing can undo the negative experience, the sense of superficiality and spiritual stagnation, of Jews who grew up in the American Jewish mainstream. There is, however, an antidote for the ignorance: Letters to a Buddhist Jew.
Published: Sunday, May 15, 2005
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Well, meeh no offense but, I really don't have any interest in Buddhism...To me Buddhism looks like a religion that no offense but it looks like a religion that worships idols....but I know it is more peaceful, but I kind a stick with Judism What sylvia said yes it is kind a like a pain in the heart......when seeing people worship Buddha...we have God, he is peaceful he is all-powerful and why would we need Buddha...but no offense it just a sayin'...oh well to all you Buddha worshippers...well it is your choice...but I know I have God with me and without him everything is peaceful...
(2) Moshe 8/23/2007 9:56:00 PM
Access Problem
I think there is an access problem with Judaism. Firstly, if a person wants to learn about Judaism, there are many books, but not enough clear guidance how to buy the ones that are vitally important to read. Here's a start:
Science and Torah: Fossils & Faith, In The Beginning, Genesis and The Big Bang, and The Science of G-d, Resurrection and The Age of The Universe (Kaplan)
Tanach: Me'Am Loez, Ner Uziel
Others: Rejoice O Youth, Book of Our Heritage, Juggler and The King, Judaism on Trial, Permission to Believe/Receive, Hasidic Tales of The Holocaust, Shmooze, Letters to a Buddhist Jew, Eye of a Needle, Nineteen Letters, Sabbath-Day of Eternity, Tefillin (Aryeh Kaplan, great author), Shema (Lamm), Michtav MeEliyahu, Hasidic Tales of The Holocaust.
(3) Kev 5/12/2006
I am a Buddhist
There is something very important to me which I dont understand. Why is it that Rabbi Tatz says that Buddhists should seek to investigate about G-d? Buddha(cant spell his real name) went on a spiritual journey to seek an answer to life's existance because he saw people dying and falling ill and all the bad things, abandoning his luxurious life in the palace while doing so. Isnt it already an example of kindness and love for mankind? The jews has the torah to guide them about G-d, what has people of the east and other parts of the world got? Buddha doesnt say anything about G-d is because he doesnt know if G-d exist or what G-d is like if G-d really exist. Buddhism wouldnt have concepts of benevolence, appropriateness and not speaking ill of other if all it care about was the spirituality of oneself. You dont have to convert to Buddhism to benefit from it, and Buddhism has contributed greatly to the stabilty and peace of China over those years in history. If you want to talk about China's poor human rights record it definitly isnt as if nations in the middle east and europe has any better. Killing innocent lives all because they do not share the same beliefs is far worse. I am referring to some Abrahamic faiths, dont need to go further. I dont expect and wish for Jews to convert to Buddhism, but my main point is given that people in the east and south of Asia and other places around the world has no torah to guide them about anything, the creation of Buddhism itself is already a great and wonderful thing. Whats gonna happen in China without Confucianism and Buddhism may be even more castastrophic. Blaming Buddhism and other non-Abrhamic religions for idolatry is unreasonable. I have far more respect of Buddha than some major religious figures, who are pure wicked and evil in heart.
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