blogs/cantor-phil-baron

SILENCE AND THE POWER OF “LISTEN”

Parashat Va'etchanan
Cantor Phil Baron
13 Av, 5777

Imagine thirty Jewish people in a room, all of them rabbis or cantors.  Now imagine that they are completely silent �" for hours at a time.  They eat, pray, and study in total silence. This must be the beginning of a Twilight Zone episode, or the set-up for a Jewish joke, right?

Refraining from conversation doesn't come naturally, particularly to the people who invented the word “kibbitz.” When you attend Shabbat services at most synagogues, davening and schmoozing seem to co-exist naturally.  It's ironic that our central declaration of faith begins with the word “Sh'ma!” So how did these thirty Jewish clergy survive in such a foreign environment?

I was there, and I can assure you that practicing silence is a great way to develop the ability to listen. That was part of the agenda at the retreat I attended as part of the clergy cohort of the Institute for Jewish Spirituality. For five days, our silence began shortly after dinner and continued until after lunch the following day. (The exception to this was our lively prayer services that were sung with great gusto!) It's fascinating to see what happens when our outward focus and natural inclination to interact with others begin to turn inward. You experience a kind of awakening. I started to notice random sounds around me with fresh ears: the clanking of dishes, the hum of cars or airplanes, the chorus of birds just a few feet outside the window (click here to hear them for yourself!).

I consumed my meals with more attention and gratitude. I became aware of the miracle and effort that went into everything I ate. Try an experiment: think of the last meal you consumed, and walk back the ingredients to their source. For instance, the burrito I had for lunch one day at the retreat consisted of:

1 Tortilla (wheat grown in field and harvested… somewhere, then mashed and prepared, packaged and shipped)

Beans (grown… somewhere, and harvested. Soaked, canned and shipped)

Sour cream (thank you, contented cows everywhere! Pasteurized, processed, packaged and shipped)

A slice of avocado (these grow on trees? Amazing)

Lettuce (grown… somewhere. My back aches thinking about the people bending over and picking lettuce all day. And we complain about the cost of produce!)

Salsa (forget about it! Too many ingredients to contemplate…)

Try this with your most recent repast. And then… go a step further. Take the wheat back to the seed, the beans back to the seed, the sour cream back to... uh, well, you know. There is an everyday miracle at the end of each journey back to the Source. This is why Judaism asks us to say a b'racha before eating. It's a way of slowing down enough to appreciate, even for a moment, the sweat, the care, and the Ultimate Love that each mouthful represents.

But to experience this means to Listen. Which brings us to this week's parasha. Va'etchanan is where we read, “Sh'ma, Yisrael…” Hear, listen, pay attention. It's no accident that this is also the parasha where we re-visit the Ten Commandments. Hear, listen, pay attention.

Now imagine if we could carry this idea of listening into our relationships and daily encounters. Might we raise up the quality of our interactions by being more “awake” to family, friends, and even casual acquaintances? I'm pretty sure a human being is more complicated than a tortilla, but by practicing awareness, and appreciating what we put into our bodies, we can begin to cultivate an understanding of the Divine Source of all things.