Dear Friends,
I write on my first day back from sabbatical, which was as expected
a wonderful gift of time and focus and interest. I am looking forward to
seeing you, and hope many of you can join us this ?Shabbat and for the
Tu BeShevat seder (see details above). But I also want to share here my
experiences while on sabbatical. So I will write here each week about a
different part of the sabbatical. Today, I begin with my time at Ohalah,
the conference of the rabbis and cantors of the Renewal Jewish movement.
As some of you commented when I told you of my plans, this was a spiritual
seeking kind of sabbatical, and the conference was a perfect beginning.
Because, while some of what I saw was a little "over the top" for me in
terms of some
"new-agey" feel, most of what I experienced was a directness in prayer
and a belief in God's constant presence that was very appealing and that
I have found in few other places. As I said to someone when I returned,
"Those people talk to God." They really do.
The conference took place in the completely wonderful Boulderado Hotel
in Boulder, CO, and it would be hard to find a more beautiful setting,
There were services three times a day, and I generally went twice, to
morning and evening (but not usually afternoon) prayers. We were given
For me, though, the most deeply moving experience came on the last morning
when Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, founder of Renewal, led
I was very interested in large group presentations and smaller discussion
circles about rabbis' families and their and our special challenges and
I was also very moved by the wonderful chanting and music that were
included in so many sessions and services, especially by a beautiful and
Finally, though it happened at the beginning of my time, I want to tell
you about the ordination that took place there. I arrived on a Sunday at
about
However, I do want us to think of ways we can incorporate some of Renewal's
teaching and example. I have mentioned some, above. I hope that
There is much more to tell. But this is a start. I'd love to hear from
you about your responses or questions or desire to plan something. It is
good to
In hope,
Rabbi Ellen Lippmann
Dear Friends,
Many thanks for all your warm and welcoming responses to my last e-mail
letter. It made me even more eager to share more of my sabbatical experiences
with you. So, on to the monastery!
That's right. When the Ohalah conference ended in Boulder, I flew to
Santa Fe where I rented a car and drove toward Chama to get to the Monastery
I arrived at about 1:00 pm, in time to move into my simple but comfortable
room and head for a prayer service, the first of many. the monks (and
My first meal followed, after a quick welcome and directions ("Here
is where your napkin will be kept") by Brother Andre, the guest-keeper.
Meals
The general mode is quiet, and one can wear a special tag that indicates
that one wishes to stay silent. But otherwise, there is quiet talking in
and
And on Shabbat afternoon there, I met a composer from the University
of Oregon who has been coming there annually, sometimes more than
It is hard not to think of heaven -- or feel God's presence -- in such
a place, and I found it hard, too, not to imagine our biblical ancestors
in their
The monks' prayer gave a steadying regularity to all this exploration.
I learned that they celebrate Christmas until January 11, the day on which
So what do I bring to you of the monastery? A reminder of the value
of regular, daily prayer. The need for more quiet, every day. The importance
of a
In hope,
Rabbi Ellen Lippmann
Dear Friends,
Many thanks for all your continuing responses to my sabbatical tales.
Today, I continue with my and our time in Santa Fe.
I left the monastery on a Sunday morning, and made a last stop at the
Plains of Heaven, entirely alone but for the sound of my breathing and
singing - yes, completely alone in that vast space, I chanted prayers and
sang and danced a bit just for the joy of it. Then I drove on and out,
making a stop in Abiqui and then heading back to Santa Fe, where I met
up with Kathryn who had been on her own retreat. We rented a small apartment
for nearly a week, and spent time in Santa Fe and driving to the surrounding
areas -- our pre-wedding honeymoon.
Let me focus on a few experiences there:
One, we returned to the American Indian Art Institute, a school for
Indian students who are members of tribes. They have an annual exhibit
by the
students, and our second year there proved as moving and stimulating
as the first. Their art -- painting, sculpture, poetry, and material arts
-- is often beautiful, but also powerful in emotional and political ways,
and we have rarely seen work that we respond to as much. This year, we
both fell in love with a painting called "Home," which we bought after
Kathryn had a long conversation with the artist who wanted to be sure his
work was going to a place he would feel good about (we passed). If you
are going to Santa Fe, be sure to see this work and if you can, support
these artists.
Two, an amazing travel day. We drove out to Jemez Springs, where we
visited (but didn't immerse in) a Victorian era mineral springs bathhouse,
Then we drove on to Bandelier National Monument, a park that invites
you to visit ancient Indian homes in caves carved or built into cliffs.
We
From Bandelier, we drove to Los Alamos for a different sort of reflection
on destruction -- a fascinating museum tells the history of the development
Third, another travel day: We drove to Taos and spent part of a day
there before heading to Ojo Caliente, the hot mineral baths we had heard
so
There, we got a brief tour of the different pools: iron and arsenic,
soda, iron alone, and a regular hot tub and cool pool; the mud bath was
closed.
Fourth, and finally, after so many and varied experiences of prayer
and meditation, we went to synagogue. You may recall that I had hoped to
go to
The end of our stay in Santa Fe brought the "away" part of my sabbatical
to an end. I was glad we were on a small plane from there to Denver, so
I
In hope,
Rabbi Ellen Lippmann
Dear Friends,
Now, let me continue, in fact finish, my telling you about my sabbatical.
When we flew away from Santa Fe on that little plan over the mountains,
we landed in Denver and then boarded a plan for New York. Here, you had
ended a week of unimaginable cold and we expected to see ice and need all
our sweaters. But the temperature had changed, and we were greeted with
warm-ish New York air, and little snow or ice. No battling the elements
then, just adjustment to being home. So what was sabbatical at home like?
Well, for one, I had time, both to think and to do: I had been so moved
by the daily prayerbook that Zalman Schachter Shalomi had written in English
My God, the breath You have given me is fresh. You create it, You form
it, You breathe it into me. And You keep me breathing. At some time, You
will
I also prayed at home on a Shabbat morning, using our siddur and the
one by Zalman, and again found great renewal in it: His morning blessings
Barikh ata Yah, I offer You thanks, Cosmic Majesty, and worship You
for making my soul bright, when I wrestle and dance with You
and
Barikh ata Yah, I offer You thanks, Cosmic Majesty, and worship You
for taking my weariness and giving me energy.
In addition to prayer, I used some time for re-ordering, especially
in my study at home. I do most of my work in a small study, which was beginning
to hem me in with unsteady stacks of books and papers, and I felt in
danger of being overwhelmed. So I took down all my books, which took two
full days itself, and then took down four shelves, immediately opening
up what feels like many feet of more open space. Then I re-arranged the
books, putting the shelves in the basement and putting there those books
that I don't use daily or perhaps even weekly, while putting frequently
used ones closer at hand, and arranging them more clearly. My former work
as a librarian comes in handy at times like this, and I feel so much better
-- able to work well -- in this "new" space, another gift of sabbatical
time. A minister friend of mine used her sabbatical to rearrange her study,
but she also took everything out and painted and sanded and re-stocked.
That was three-month sabbatical! My own changes feel right and I am so
glad I took that time.
I also fulfilled a promise I had made, which felt a bit like a joke
when I made it: When I was leaving Kolot in December, and talking about
going to
The other big thing that happened during my sabbatical back home was
our wedding, a glorious evening about which I and we have spoken and
So let me just say here again that this sabbatical was a great gift
from you to me. I am very grateful to everyone who helped make it possible
by
When we sing V'shamru at the beginning of kiddush on Shabbat mornings,
we quote this Biblical passage about God's original Sahbbat, during
In hope,
Rabbi Ellen Lippmann
between sunrise and the mountains. Several mornings I took part in
Shakharit (early morning) services in a room that let us see the sun come
up as we prayed! The expanse of sky is what moved me initially, though,
and all through my time in the west. When the plan landed in Denver, my
first thought (truly) was "how beautiful for spacious skies."
several choices of kinds of prayer, especially in the morning, and
I chose Renewal services, as that was why I had come (other choices were
often a traditional davened service and an alternative, like a yoga or
meditation service). The Renewal services were led by different people
each day, and always featured good music and interesting prayer. They also
sometimes included moving our bodies into the shape of the letters of a
prayer, like Yotzer - the prayer about God's creation that we say in the
mornings, or a brief discussion about a prayer in which the English questions
and answers were all chanted in the way of Hebrew prayer.
the service for everyone. We used a small prayerbook he has written
for daily prayer, in English so that people who are not familiar enough
with Hebrew to really pray in it can find a way in. He urged us to focus
on one blessing of the Amidah that spoke to us particularly that morning,
and to add our own words. Afterward, he asked us to get into pairs and
speak about that experience, and to read aloud to each other one of two
psalms included in the service at that point. My prayer-pair partner was
Rabbi Arthur Waskow, and I could not have had a better partner. For as
some of you know, I have found it very difficult to prayer this year, in
large part because of the state of the world and the pain of the unending
violence in Israel. So I wept as I spoke to Arthur about my experience
of focusing on a particular blessing spoken aloud in English, and he read
to me a psalm that spoke of tears and renewed hope. It was an extraordinary
experience, the tears and the direct prayer leading to the possibility
of hope. Since then, I have prayed most mornings using that small siddur,
and have ordered some with the hope that we can try again to have a morning
minyan one day a week at Kolot Chayeinu. I also hope we will sometimes
reflect on our prayer together in this paired way.
joys, and about greater focus on the Shekhina, the feminine in-dwelling
presence of God. Here, the question was about the Shekhina's absence, and
our need for that feminine presence (however we understand it, which is
not always as synonymous with female presence), and the world's need for
those qualities to balance what people were seeing as masculine qualities,
again not necessarily synonymous with male presence. So there was lot of
emphasis on the feminine, the Divine feminine, if you will, that I am still
thinking about and sorting out. Next week, I will write about the very
masculine experience of the monastery I went to for retreat, and the contrast
that was so intriguing.
new (to me) version of one of the seven blessings of the wedding service,
which we sang to a couple that had been married at the conference before
I got there and were being feted at several dinners there. Eyal has agreed
to sing it at our Tu BeShevat celebration. Also, the openness was striking
there: It was the first time in a rabbinic conference that I could speak
about Kathryn's and my then upcoming wedding, or could get praise for beginning
a congregation, for instance, rather than suspicion or concern! How lovely!
1:30, and the ordination began at 2! The large conference room was
beautifully decorated with banners depicting each of the twelve tribes
and with an artistic tallit draped over bars that hung from the ceiling.
Rabbi Shefa Gold had written a special chant which she taught everyone,
and we then sang it as the four women to be ordained entered the room.
They were surrounded by their families, friends and teachers, and the rest
of us made an outer circle. There were prayers of greeting and words from
teachers, and then each woman gave a d'var Torah on the portion of the
week. Each was beautiful, learned, well-crafted, and affecting, in vastly
different ways. After their words, they were blessed by "Reb Zalman" and
by other teachers, and then all rabbis in the room were asked to come up
and to make a widening chain of "hands-on" and to recite a blessing of
ordination. Here I had just arrived and I was ordaining new rabbis! It
is an example of the openness and accessibility of the group. Yet I confess
that, while the ceremony was beautiful and moving, I missed a bit of the
"pomp and circumstance" or, perhaps the awe, that marked my own ordination.
In this, as in many sessions to follow, I recognized that there was so
much to learn and absorb here, yet also knew that this could not be my
only steady diet.
we will be able to bring Renewal rabbis and leaders of song to Kolot,
perhaps for a Shabaton sometime, to get from them the fuller feeling of
the experience. And I hope we will be led in prayer by our own Kolot member,
Eyal Levinson, who is a Renewal rabbinic student. I agreed to be a mentor
to a beginning student from Brooklyn, Eddie Ehrlich, and I hope we will
hear from him as well. There is so much to learn from what the Renewal
movement does, and while we already are influenced by them (think of our
chanting and singing especially), we have more we can learn. I certainly
hope to return to Ohalah, to learn more and to become part of that extraordinary
"hevra." I found rabbis I already knew, people I got to know better, and
people I met for the first time. I learned from the many presenters and
leaders of song, prayer, after-dinner Torah talk, and blessings. And I
found that even in our broken world there are places and ways where I too
can talk to God directly. That's really why I went.
be back, and to look forward to seeing you.
of Christ in the Desert, a Benedictine monastery located in the Chama
River canyon about an hour and a half northwest of Santa Fe, at the end
of a 13-mile dirt road, which I quickly learned, becomes a mud road in
the midday sun, even in winter. The drive is gorgeous, one desert landscape
leading to another as mesas of brown and yellow and pink and red rise beside
the road. The monastery itself, which Kathryn and I had found by accident
last year when we tried to find Georgia O'Keeffe's home and studio, sits
on one of the most beautiful places on earth, between stunning cliffs and
the river. It is a collection of simple adobe buildings that keep the focus
on the land and the sky and the water.
nuns who also live there) pray seven times a day; I attended about
three times each day of my stay. Much of their prayer is chanted psalms,
Gregorian chant, English translations. I was a quiet observer, enjoying
listening, figuring out the written form of the chant, and taking in the
warm (wood-stove heated) spirit of the place. The services are mostly brief,
completely ordered except for a brief place where there is room for prayers
for people who are sick or traveling or doing good or happy things; my
first day, they welcomed us guests with a special prayer.
are silent, guests and monks; the nuns eat separately. We were served
by the monks at the main midday meal, and served ourselves breakfast and
dinner. During the main meal, as I had been told to expect, one of the
monks read aloud. But while I had been told to expect a history of the
order or perhaps a martyrology, here they were reading the biography of
a Vietnamese priest who was imprisoned by the Communists in Cambodia for
thirteen years. And my other expectations were also quickly shattered.
Where I expected to see mostly older white men, this monastery comprises
men old and young, Black, white, Asian, and Hispanic. And I quickly learned
that while living in relative isolation out in the desert, their minds
are not isolated: they have a wonderful library, they rent films, they
have visitors in from elsewhere in the area, and they engage with their
guests.
around the guest quarters, and the gift shop is the place to gather
to talk. Two custodians, a man from Lebanon and a woman from New Hampshire,
are curious and knowledgeable, and lively discussions rise around the stove
in the shop, which is also where one can make tea or coffee, and where
I did my required work stints. So I met a man from Bensonhurst who now
lives in upstate New York and was at the monastery for a month's retreat,
and a young couple with doctorates in biology who live in Santa Fe and
brought binoculars that allowed us to see the astonishing array of stars
even more clearly -- "Look!" she said to me. "The Pleiades are dancing
tonight!"
once a year, and who showed me two beautiful places I would never have
found on my own, one a peninsula sticking into the river and one, a vast
plan surrounded by mesas and mountains, which he dubbed "The Plains of
Heaven." He asked me, "What is your prayer about now?" and I told him about
the Ohalah conference, and about the Shekhina, and my thinking about the
joining of different divine energies into a unified whole, symbolized in
the coming together of rock and water. I had been especially moved by the
poem by the late Enid Dame, "Stone Shekhina," which I shared with him.
Because this fellow seeker seemed comforted by all this, I also told him
about our own Noah Chasek-Macfoy's bar mitzvah speech, in which he spoke
of his theology: God as running river, passing over and around the boulders
in its path, rather than being stopped by them; a boulder was a sign that
it was time to change direction, said Noah, for God and for us. Shabbat
morning, I had taken my tallit and siddur into the chapel and prayed the
morning service until it was time for the monks' next prayer. But this
conversation in the afternoon, and the glory of the Plains of Heaven, were
prayer for sure.
desert wanderings, feeling as I did there God's vast creation and one's
own insignificance. I prayed beside the river on a freezing morning, and
walked long distances on the road, and read Torah in the warm sunshine
on a Friday afternoon, and lit the beeswax candles I bought in the gift
shop to welcome Shabbat, and ate the monks' homemade bread instead of challah.
And all of it felt like prayer, more answers to my unspoken questions.
Jesus was baptized. So all the prayer, including prayers before and
after meals, were intensely about Christmas. I would like to go at another,
"regular" time, though I love it there in winter. There is little electricity
used there, so we were given battery-powered lanterns and I had brought
battery-powered lamps. There was something wonderful and mysterious about
rising before dawn to walk to the chapel for prayer, carrying a lantern
like a talisman in the dark, or returning after dark the same way and getting
into bed at 7:30 at night for the warmth and the small lamp's glow for
reading. In addition to prayers and poetry and Torah and commentaries and
Hassidic stories (some borrowed from the monastery library), I was reading
several more novels by Louise Erdrich, including Love Medicine and The
Beet Queen. She is a master at telling a tale, and her stories seemed the
perfect complement to the dark cold that turned astonishingly to warm sun,
each day.
community remembering those who are ill or joyful. The glory of God's
creation, seen in eagles and hawks, sun rising over mesa, stars dancing:
holy, holy, holy, the whole earth is full of God's glory. And the hope
that retreat, occasional or lifelong, somehow lends strength to the needs
of the world.
complete with tin ceilings, cement tubs and beds ready for a healing
wrap. On the way there, we came down from a mountainous road of snow and
pine forest to the Valle Caldera, which was featured in the Times Travel
section just after our return. It is astounding: what is left after an
ancient volcanic eruption many times the size of that at Mt. Saint Helen's
- an enormous light green plain that is stunning to see. We stopped to
try to grasp its size and color and understand its origin in vast destruction.
decided to make the walk to the site of the ceremonial cave -- a religious
gathering place, of course! We had been told that getting there would require
climbing up a series of wooden ladders, but in spite of our (especially
my) fear of heights, we decided to go and try the climb. When we got there
and saw how steep the ladders were (and a set of crutches lying at the
ready), we were daunted, but up we went. We made it up the first ladder
and then Kathryn started up the second until she got dizzy and decided
to come down. I said, "If YOU can' t do it, I surely can't," so down we
went, a more harrowing trip than climbing. We were disappointed and felt
a little foolish. I laughed a little at my inability to reach the holy
there, when it had seemed so easy in the rest of my sabbatical thus far.
But sometimes it takes a hard climb and sometimes it is impossible to reach
the holy, right? Not a bad, albeit humbling lesson.
of the atomic bomb there, and we were quiet when we left, trying to
absorb that enormity -- so similar and so different from that of Valle
Caldera.
much about. We took a road off the main highway that soon turned dirt
and then rose to wind around a mountain, each turn calling us to stop and
gasp at the beauty before us, a different view each time of the high desert
scene - mesas, scrub growth, vast vistas. I was driving, and hugging the
inside lane (fear of heights, remember?), but even I had to lean over a
bit to see and try to take in the beauty. The road eventually comes down
from the mountain and we drove on through miles of "nothing" -- more of
the expanse of desert that is hard to even imagine back here in the crowded
city. Just as we feared we were lost on an endless road, we came to the
turn-off for Ojo Caliente, which literally means "hot eye," but is an idiom
meaning "hot springs" - a similar use is made in Hebrew of the word for
eye.
There is also a hotel and restaurant for those who want to spend days
soaking, which we could well believe. We began with iron and arsenic, which
quickly became Kathryn's favorite, soaking there beneath a deep brown cliff
and the desert sky. I liked the underground grotto of the soda pool, an
eerie dark pool with a bit of light filtering through stained glass windows,
but was even more taken with the iron pool, a large one of rock and ledge
that allowed for changing resting places in the soothing water -- who would
think that hot iron-fed water would be soothing? We did stay for hours,
and could have stayed more, as tensions were washed away, and a deep peace
came over us both. Here, too, I was moved to prayer -- this time, internal,
private words of thanks for this possibility and for the earth and sky
-- as so many of our prayers say, shamayim va-aretz.
Rabbi Lynn Gottlieb's shul in Albuquerque, but as it turned out she
too was away on sabbatical. So we went instead to HaMakom, a small congregation
begun two years ago by Rabbi Malka Drucker, author of a recent book called
White Fire about women religious leaders. At the Ohalah conference I met
a student rabbi who co-leads the service there, and was convinced to try
it. They meet in a room in a senior living center and we almost laughed
when we went in -- it was so similar to Kolot Chayeinu's early days: About
15 people, sitting around a bit table, with a Torah scroll brought from
the rabbi's home, and food set up on the counter! The student rabbi's parents
were there as guests, as were we, so we all crowded in and shared books.
There is a lot of singing and a warm and welcoming feel, and we felt quite
at home. One interesting thing: There, as at many places I have been at
or heard of recently, they read from the Torah but do not read the haftarah.
It certainly helps the service go faster, and I am wondering about it as
a possibility for Kolot. My concern is that we mss hearing the words of
the prophets, a sad loss. I welcome your thoughts on this question.
could see and say good-bye to the mountains and desert before switching
to the jet that brought us home to New York. As I think has been clear
in these letters, I was deeply moved by my time in that landscape and filled
with its beauty and expanse, the expanse above all. I felt as if I were
able to expand there, and wonder if I then constrict when returning to
the tighter space of New York, which is after all where I have realized
so many of my dreams. I have no answer and am not even sure if I am asking
a question, but that expanse -- the blue sky, the night stars, the cliffs
and mesas -- stays with me. I hope it informs my prayer and work here in
new ways.
that I continued my practice of daily, usually morning, prayer with
it, as I had done in Santa Fe. I found that putting on my tallit and praying
out loud at home, facing east, felt odd and sometimes a little silly, but
ultimately moving and grounding - it seemed to keep me centered through
the day, and I missed that when I didn't do it. Once I returned to work,
it has been harder to keep up, but I try to do it on at least some days
during the week. Sometimes I play a CD of prayer music, sometimes chant
myself, sometimes just read aloud from those amazing English words, like
these from the morning blessing thanking God for our souls:
take it away from me, And I will have breathed my last breath in this
body...For each breath still in me, I thank You, My own God, Who is also
my parents' God, Lord of all spirits, Master of all that happens.
each begin with the formula Barikh ata Yah, I offer You thanks, Cosmic
Majesty, and worship You....and two especially held my attention:
the Ohalah (Renewal rabbis) conference, I "joked" that I was going
to have to go to Temple Emanu-El when I returned, for balance. Emanu-El
is the largest Reform synagogue in the world, and retains an older style
of Reform worship, using the prayerbook I grew up with as well as the Ashkenazic
pronunciation of Hebrew and older English usage in prayer (Thee, Thy).
But it seemed it hadn't been a joke. I really was curious to see what a
service at Emanu-El was like, and so Kathryn and I went on a freezing Friday
evening for the 5:15 service, which some of you may know from the radio
(if not, tune in some Friday to 96.3 FM). There were about as many people
there as come to a kabbalat Shabbat service at Kolot, but we were sitting
in a sanctuary designed to seat 2000! Greeters wished us a good Shabbos
and handed us prayerbooks. There were no instructions given except for
the beginning page number. We were expected to follow the book's printed
instructions for standing or sitting or reading aloud, which we did, but
it seemed we might also have just sat quietly throughout the service. The
rabbis at Emanu-El read with a special cadence that I find soothing, so
the thought of sitting and listening in that atmosphere was appealing.
In addition, because they use the prayerbook I grew up with, the words
are still very familiar, and that added to my feeling of comfort. However,
I also found the service cool and distant; the only connection to my life,
say, came from my own reading of the words and at the moment of saying
kaddish, when half of those present rose and I realized that were it not
for the need to say kaddish, the number of those present would be even
smaller than it was. The service ended with the rabbi's pronouncement of
the priestly benediction from the highest place on the bima, said with
arms raised. Kathryn found this very powerful, and suggested I too end
services with that blessing and using that stance, which I tried to imagine
at Kolot Chayeinu. Worship really is a system, as the Tefilla Working Group
has been learning, and obviously Emanu-El's system is quite different from
ours. But the possibility of including the power of that blessing as we
leave our own worship holds some appeal -- Do you agree?
which you have generously celebrated with us.
leading services and Torah study and being on call and taking over
various of my administrative tasks. I was so glad I could take this time
and I was also glad that Kolot Chayeinu is at a place where its rabbi can
be away for a month mid-year -- it means you are "growing up" as a community,
and that feels very important, too. So together we grow, and apart we grow.
which, the text says, Shavat va-yinafash -- God rested and God's soul
was renewed. Not only Shabbat, but the idea of sabbatical comes from that
same source. You have given me a time in which my soul could be renewed.
And there were evenings and there were mornings, thirty three days. Todah
rabah, many thanks.
