by Laura Geller
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Reform Voices of Torah)

In January I went on a spirituality retreat. It was an alumni retreat of the Institute for Jewish Spirituality for a group of clergy from around the country who had been part of a two-year program designed to help us deepen our own spiritual commitments. Over the two years, there were four-week-long retreats interspersed with weekly chevrutah study of Chasidic texts. (Chevrutah study, from the root chet-bet-reish, is the intense one-on-one study of a text that one does with a partner.) My chaver ("friend," or in this case, "partner") was a rabbi in Boston. For two years we'd meet weekly on the phone and study a text for about an hour, sharing the insights of the texts as a window into our own lives.

The retreats themselves were intense. There was powerful davening, provocative study, yoga, meditation, and a lot of silence. We ate most of the meals in silence--an eye-opening experience. When you're not talking, you focus more on the food: how it looks on the plate; what it smells like; how it tastes. Whatever food issues you have come up, like: Will there be seconds? Will I get enough? If I'm already full why am I getting up to get more? You notice, and you pay attention.

So going back to the alumni retreat was a gift. It was a blessing and a spiritual high. It took me three days to clear the clutter out of my mind so I could really meditate. I had time to write in my journal. The experience of prayer became intense; things that were confusing became clear. I even had a few epiphanies. And then I came home.

I listened to my voice mail from the office on the way home. Then I stopped at the market to buy food for supper. As soon as I got home, I checked my e-mail. I was stunned at how quickly the high faded away and life got back to normal, with only an occasional echo of clarity.

That's what this week's Torah portion is about. Last week we were at Mount Sinai--a spiritual trip so powerful that every one of us had an out-of-body experience where we saw the thunder and heard the lightning. Last week we each had an experience of God, hearing God speak to us. Tradition differs as to what exactly was transmitted, but whatever we heard, it was powerful enough to change our lives and the life of our community, forever.

And yet, look at where we are now. Mishpatim is one of the longest portions in Torah, with over fifty different mitzvot, including laws related to murder, kidnapping, personal injury, property damage, returning lost property, helping the poor, and alleviating the suffering of animals. After the spiritual high of Mount Sinai, all the details of daily life intervene. It seems as though these two parashiyot and the experiences they record belong to two different universes.

But Jewish tradition teaches us that it is in fact the same universe. We need the spiritual high of Mount Sinai, but we need to remember that revelation exists to enable us to live more fully in the real world.

Jewish spirituality is not only in silent retreats and meditation, but also (and more important) in grappling in the real world of offices, kitchens, malls, and even bedrooms--the real world where people interact with each other.

That's why our Torah portion begins: V'eileh hamishpatim asher tasim lifneihem, "And these are the rules that you shall set before them" (Exodus 21:1).

Rashi asks why the portion starts with "V'eileh, "And these"? His answer? Because these apparently more prosaic laws are linked to the Ten Commandments; they all come from God at Mount Sinai.

Rabbi Bunim of Pshischa goes one step further and asks: What does "before them" mean? He explains, it means that these mundane laws of how people should treat each other, of how to organize a civil society, about behavior between one person and another, are so important that you set them before the laws governing your relationship with God (see Torah Gems, vol. 2, comp. Aharon Yaakov Greenberg [Tel Aviv: Yavneh Publishing House, 1998], p. 146).

This is the world of Jewish spirituality. This is what Mount Sinai is about: creating a world where people are responsible for each other, taking responsibility for our actions, being careful about what we say about each other. Jewish spirituality is about empathy and about creating a society based on a vision of justice and caring.

At the very end of the portion, after all the details, all the laws, God calls Moses: Aleih eilai haharah veh'yeih sham, "Come up to Me on the mountain and be there." God continues: "and I will give you the stone tablets with the teachings and commandments which I have inscribed to instruct them" (Exodus 24:12).

Menachem Mendl of Kotzk raised a question about this verse: "This seems redundant. If Moses went up to the mountain, of course he would be there" (cited in Torah Gems, vol. 2, p. 165). So why does Torah add: "And be there?"

It is there to remind us what we already learned at Mount Sinai: whatever we do, in the sublime and in the mundane dimensions of our life, we need to be there, to bring our whole self into the experience, to be present, and to pay attention. Only then can we hold onto the moments of insight and clarity and translate them into concrete daily life.

This is Jewish spirituality.

Rabbi Laura Geller is the senior rabbi at Temple Emanuel of Beverly Hills in Beverly Hills, California.

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