Here All Along: Finding Meaning, Spirituality, and a Deeper Connection to Life--in Judaism (After Finally Choosing to Look There)

When describing her relationship to Judaism, Blu Greenberg once wrote, “It has chosen me and I have chosen it back.”

I’m reminded of a story in the Talmud about a man who’s walking outside on a dark night and comes across a man who is blind, also out walking, holding a torch. The first man asks the blind man why he’s carrying a torch when he can’t see its light. The blind man replies that as long as he carries the torch, people can see him and aid him.

I don’t think creating a Jewish identity is about picking which of these views I like better and rejecting the other. I prefer an approach that Avraham Infeld compares to making tsimmes, which is a traditional Jewish stew. Just as he adds new ingredients to his tsimmes, each time he’s learned about a different way of being Jewish—secular Zionism, O

As a rabbi once told me, “Judaism isn’t just taught, it’s caught.” You have to be willing to be surprised by Judaism. You have to give yourself a chance to catch it.

I would often remind myself of what the Israelites said when they accepted the Torah: “We will do, and we will understand.” The doing came first, then the understanding—not the other way around.

This is a four-thousand-year-old tradition that values scholarship and urges us to think for ourselves, and there is a lot of material to sort through.

the feeling that our loved ones are not lost.

I’m also moved by the Kabbalistic idea that people who feel called to convert to Judaism have souls that previously resided in the body of a Jew. I definitely know Jews by choice who, long before they converted, already felt like they had a Jewish soul.

through our individual seeking and grappling, we don’t just discover, but collectively help create, the kind of Judaism that is worth grabbing hold of.