Cantor's Corner by Eric Miller

As an admitted tech-junkie and eco-conscious citizen, a recent development in automotive technology has me very excited. Several new family cars by Honda and Toyota (the Civic EX and Prius, respectively), have managed to squeeze upwards of seventy miles to the gallon from a regular gasoline engine! How have they accomplished this miraculous feat, at a time when the average MPG of cars in our country is at its lowest in decades? Besides being lightweight and aerodynamic, they utilize a type of “hybrid” engine that runs partly on electricity and partly on gasoline. So why haven’t we seen Civics and Priuses trailing mile-long extension cords on the way to work every morning? Because their engines get their electrical charge not from plugging their batteries into the wall, but through an ingenious process known as regenerative braking. How does it work? Normally, a car engine’s energy is used to propel the vehicle forward. But when the brakes are applied in a car with this new hybrid engine, this energy is instead transferred to recharge the battery, which is then able to assist the gasoline engine during acceleration, when the most gasoline is expended.

OK, so by now you’re probably saying, “Hey Eric, if I wanted a lecture on advances in internal combustion engine technology I’d pick up the latest issue of Popular Science. Nu? What’s the Jewish connection?” Hang on, I’m taking the long way there…

I’m writing this article (thanks to my trusty laptop – no offense, Lee) on my flight home from Malibu, California, where I just spent a week attending the first session of a brand-new program called the Spirituality Institute for Cantors. During several retreats, ongoing small-group study sessions and private exercises over the course of the next two years, cantors from all movements will be trained (as rabbis are in a parallel program) in

various meditative, mindful, and contemplative practices that are extant (although usually latent) in Jewish tradition, and the (often mystical) philosophies that ground them. The goal being to create Jewish professionals who are more adept at facilitating their own spiritual pursuits and those of their congregants. At the first retreat, the focus was not on any exotic form of Jewish meditation (although there are such traditions that go back at least 1,000 years), but rather on focused breathing, a technique common to many spiritual traditions as a way to engender mindfulness, or what Jewish tradition would call kavannah.

In the Torah, Jews from Abraham to Moses responded to the call of the Divine with one single word, “hineni.” More than simply saying, “here I am,” “hineni” implies the willingness to be present to our lives at every moment. Mindfulness practice can bring us to a deeper awareness of what is true, not just during prayer or meditation, but in any activity in which we are able to direct our attention fully. Of course, Judaism has developed other tools to help foster this type of awareness. Saying a blessing before we eat, for example; and, of course, Shabbat. You can think of Shabbat as a “hybrid engine.” By providing one day a week to cease from doing and focus our awareness on the celebration of creation’s ceaseless miracles, Shabbat can “drive” the rest of the week; transferring energy back to us and our ability to be mindful of our lives at every moment. But whether it is Shabbat, or Yoga, or simply doing the dishes, the goal is simply to experience what is, without all the extra interference of our minds’ anxieties, desires or projections.

I pray for strength for all of our journeys, and hope my experience with the Spirituality Institute will enable an awakening more and more to the reality that the Psalmist expressed nearly 3,000 years ago: This is the moment that The Eternal has made – let us rejoice in it!