Eyes Remade for Wonder

Lawrence Kushner

Description

A treasury of insight from one of the most creative spiritual thinkers in America.
Whether you are new to Kushner or a devoted fan, this is the place to begin.

At once deeply human and profoundly spiritual, Lawrence Kushner’s books are a treat for the soul. For nourishment and inspiration— Eyes Remade for Wonder opens wide the gates of Jewish mysticism and spirituality, helping us peel back the layers of meaning that animate our lives.

Few writers are more closely identified with the boom of spirituality in America in the past twenty-five years than Lawrence Kushner. With his first book—the now-classic introduction to Jewish mysticism, The Book of Letters—Kushner established himself as one of the most creative religious thinkers in America. He is now read worldwide by people searching to understand the connection between the sacred and the ordinary.

With an inspiring Introduction by Thomas Moore, author of the best-selling books Care of the Soul and The Soul of Sex, Eyes Remade for Wonder offers something unique to both the spiritual seeker and the committed person of faith, and is a collection to be treasured and shared.

Sujets

• Philosophie et théologie
• Cábala
• Lawrence Kushner
• Jewish philosophy
• Kabbalah
• Judaism
• Religion
• Thomas Moore
• Kabbale

Informations

• Publié par: Turner Publishing Company
• Date de parution: 26 mai 2011
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781580234658
• Langue: English

Extrait

PRAISE FOR LAWRENCE KUSHNER S BOOKS
Praise for Honey from the Rock: An Easy Introduction to Jewish Mysticism
A work of love, lyrical beauty, and prophetic insight an astonishingly effective chronicle and means of meditation. -Father Malcolm Boyd, The Christian Century
Praise for The Book of Letters: A Mystical Hebrew Alphabet
A book which is in love with Jewish letters. It gives us a feeling which the Kabbalists always knew-that the letters of the alphabet are not just letters but symbols of our history, of our philosophy, and of the life of the Jewish people. -Isaac Bashevis Singer
Praise for The River of Light: Spirituality, Judaism, Consciousness
Rich, bright, mystical and intellectual in one and a wonderful window for Christian readers into Jewish spirituality that is both rooted in the tradition and transcends it by depth. -Rt. Rev. Krister Stendhal, Former Dean of Harvard Divinity School; Bishop of Stockholm
Praise for The Book of Miracles: A Young Person s Guide to Jewish Spiritual Awareness
Many religion hooks give our young people facts to learn; here is a book which gives them wisdom to remember. -Rabbi Sandy Eisenberg Sasso, author of God s Paintbrush and In God s Name
Praise for God Was in This Place I, i Did Not Know: Finding Self, Spirituality Ultimate Meaning
A rich and intriguing book which, like the ladder of its metaphor, contains both many rungs of meaning as well as insights into the process of Jewish theology. -M. Scott Peck, M.D., author of The Road Less Traveled and other books
Praise for The Book of Words: Talking Spiritual Life, Living Spiritual Talk
It is wonderful! A surprise at every page. His translations and elaborations provoke and stimulate the religious imagination. -Rabbi Neil Gillman, Chair, Dept. of Jewish Philosophy, Jewish Theological Seminary
Praise for Invisible Lines of Connection: Sacred Stories of the Ordinary
A deeply human book and at the same time a compendium of instructions for seeing religious epiphanies and revelations, the ultimate hide-and-seek. -Thomas Moore, author of Care of the Soul and The Soul of Sex

O THER J EWISH L IGHTS BOOKS BY L AWRENCE K USHNER
The Book of Letters: A Mystical Hebrew Alphabet
The Book of Words: Talking Spiritual Life, Living Spiritual Talk
God Was in This Place i, Did Not Know: Finding Self, Spirituality, and Ultimate Meaning
Honey from the Rock: An Introduction to Jewish Mysticism
Invisible Lines of Connection: Sacred Stories of the Ordinary
Jewish Spirituality: A Brief Introduction for Christians
The River of Light: Jewish Mystical Awareness
The Way Into Jewish Mystical Tradition
F OR C HILDREN
Because Nothing Looks Like God with Karen Kushner
The Book of Miracles: A Young Person s Guide to Jewish Spiritual Awareness
How Does God Make Things Happen?
with Karen Kushner
(SkyLight Paths Publishing)
What Does God Look Like?
with Karen Kushner
(SkyLight Paths Publishing)
Where Is God?
with Karen Kushner
(SkyLight Paths Publishing)
Eyes Remade for wonder
A L AWRENCE K USHNER R EADER
I NTRODUCTION BY T HOMAS M OORE
For People of All Faiths, All Backgrounds
JEWISH LIGHTS PUBLISHING WOODSTOCK, VERMONT
Eyes Remade for Wonder: A Lawrence Kushner Reader
2002 Third Printing
2000 Second Printing
1998 First Quality Paperback edition
1998 by Lawrence Kushner
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
For information regarding permission to reprint material from this book, please mail or fax your request in writing to Jewish Lights Publishing, Permissions Department, at the address I fax number listed below.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Kushner, Lawrence. 1943-
Eyes remade for wonder: a Lawrence Kushner reader / by Lawrence Kushner; introduction by Thomas Moore.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 1-58023-014-8 (hc).-ISBN 1-58023-042-3 (pbk.)
1. Spiritual life—Judaism. 2. Judaism—Essence, genius, nature.
1. Title.
BM723.K8676 1998
296.3-dc21 98-3908l
First Edition: Simultaneous Paperback Hardcover Release
ISBN 1-58023-014-8 (Hardcover)
ISBN 1-58023-042-3 (Paperback)
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3
Manufactured in the United States of America
Cover and interior design by Lawrence Kushner
The graphic on the cover is the Hebrew letter Ayin, which also means eye. As Kushner said in The Book of Letters , Close your eyes. Open your mouth. Now try to see. That is the sound of Ayin. (p. 58)
For People of Ail Faiths, All Backgrounds
Published by Jewish Lights Publishing
A Division of LongHill Partners, Inc.
Sunset Farm Offices, Route 4, P.O. Box 237
Woodstock, VT 05091
Tel: [phone] Fax: [phone]
www.jewishlights.com
for the Members of Congregation Beth El of the Sudbury River Valley
Table of Contents
A UTHOR S P REFACE
I NTRODUCTION BY T HOMAS M OORE
1 Amazing Grace
T HE L ETTER A LEPH
B LESSING AS A WAKENING
A G LISTENING T HREAD
A WARENESS
E NTRANCES TO H OLINESS
T HIS I S Y OUR L IFE
I NTO THE S EA ON D RY G ROUND
M Y F ATHER AND T HE T HING
2 Words of Fire
T HE L ETTER L AMMED
T HE L AW IS A W AY
A N O RCHARD OF H OLY W ORDS
L IKE O NES IN A D REAM
F OG
R EFLECTIONS ON THE H OLY L ANGUAGE
O N THE V ISUAL A RRAY OF S ACRED T EXT
R ECITING P SALMS
3 Arguing with Heaven
T HE L ETTER K AF
Y EAST IN THE D OUGH
T HE H ANDS OF G OD
T HE W ILDERNESS OF P REPARATION
G OD IN THE M IDST OF E VIL
B ATS
A H OUSE OF C ARDBOARD
4 Creation s Blueprint
T HE L ETTER K OF
W HEN L IFE I s A S TORY
T HE B LUEPRINT INSIDE C REATION
T HE B ODY OF THE U NIVERSE
N OT Y OU, BUT G OD
W OOL P ANTS
5 Acting like the World Depends on It
T HE L ETTER T SADI
P OLITICS OF R EPAIR
R EPAIRING THE W ORLD
M ESSENGERS OF THE M OST H IGH
R ECONSIDERING R ABBINIC P OWER
T WO J EWISH M OTHERS
S TRANGER ON THE B US
R EWRITING THE P AST
6 A God Who Looks like Nothing
T HE L ETTER H AY
B REATHING THE N AME OF G OD
I I S THE L ORD Y OUR G OD
S ELF -R EFLECTION AT S INAI
I T S A LL G OD
S ILENCING THE I NNER V OICE(S)
H ERSHEY WITH A LMONDS
O PEN M Y L IPS
7 Eyes Remade for Wonder
T HE L ETTER A YIN
T HE A MNESIA OF U NIO M YSTICIA
B EING W HERE Y OU A RE
H IGHER W ORLDS
T HE L IGHT OF C REATION
Y OU A RE H ERE
M EDITATION BEFORE T HE S ONG OF S ONGS
I B ELIEVE IN THE C OMING OF THE M ESSIAH
Epilogue
M ICHAEL S B AR M ITZVAH
W HY I AM A J EW
A T EACHER S B LESSING , B ERAKHOT 17 A
B OOKS BY L AWRENCE K USHNER
C ONTRIBUTIONS TO B OOKS
N OTES

About Jewish Lights
Copyright
Author s preface
I REREAD THE OPENING PAGES OF MY FIRST BOOK , The Book of Letters , and it hit me: Everything I have ever written may be a commentary on this book s first chapter, which is about the letter aleph . This first letter of the Hebrew alphabet is almost, but not utterly, silent. Open your mouth; I wrote in The Book of Letters , and begin to make a sound. Stop. That is the sound of aleph.
That s what seekers of religious truth do. You devotedly, stubbornly, compulsively return again and again to that line between noise and silence, hoping against hope to find a way to say what finally cannot be said. If it could be said straight out, you wouldn t have to try to find a better way to say it. If you couldn t speak it at all, then you d have to resort to such nonverbal modes of communication as art or dance or music. The thing about spiritual truth is that it wants to be spoken. It is too important, too transforming to be left alone in silence. It seems to have speakable content.
The problem is that once you speak or show the words to someone else, then both of you are different. The words have changed both of you. And now you must start all over again. I believe that in one form or another this making of words is the touchstone for all spiritual traditions and of all spiritual renewal: To say what is just at the outermost edge of what can be spoken is to deal with words that are so primary and dazzling that they are infinitely personal and intimate. And just that may be why we have religion. As I wrote in 1991 in God Was in This Place and I , i Did Not Know:
Sooner or later we all lose that childlike ability simply to live each moment without reflection. We ask ourselves the great question. Overwhelmed by the mystery of existence, we are embarrassed to hear ourselves whisper, Who? The question comes in many disguises and according to many timetables. For some, it takes shape only over decades. For others, the world is shattered in an instant. But sooner or later the question comes to every human being.
The Zohar, the master text of Jewish mysticism, says that everything God told us at Mount Sinai-which by definition would be everything that s worth knowing-is all contained in the aleph , the letter hovering just between speaking and silence. It seems to me now that the aleph may be more than the first letter of the alephbeit . It may also be the last one too.
Laying out the selections of this book turned out to be something of a challenge. No two of my books are uniform in graphic presentation, content, or intended audience. (A colleague, Rabbi Ed Feld, once quipped that I seem to be compelled to invent a new literary genre for each book.) Some, like The River of Light , are more academic and have more extensive footnotes. Others, like The Book of Letters or The Book of Words , rely heavily on graphics as much as content for their teaching. Invisible Lines of Connection is all stories. The Book of Miracles was written (and illustrated) for children. Honey from the Rock and God Was in This Place and I, i Did Not Know are mystical theology (each with their own quirky footnoting apparatus). Some are written for a particularly Jew