Torah yoga: Exercise with a Jewish twist

By Sarah Dunlap Bulletin Contributing Writer

Published on January 02, 2009

With legs folded in front of them and fingers pressed together on outstretched palms, six women and two men sat in a circle with their eyes gently closed, taking care to inhale through their noses then exhale the same way. A typical yoga practice, said Amy Reed, who conducted the exercise.

In most of her classes, students chant "om" three times in this position. Today the participants sang "shalom," harmonizing on the last syllable, then holding it.

Two flags - one Israeli, one American - stood to the left of the circle, and down the hall at the Lander Grinspoon Academy on Prospect Street in Northampton, another class learned intermediate Hebrew.

A bit earlier, Judi Wisch, a religious educator who was leading the group along with Reed, had opened the session: "Welcome to yoga with a Jewish twist."

"I thought it was Torah with a yoga twist," responded Cleo Gorman of Northampton, one of the participants who sat to her right.

Chuckling, Wisch agreed that it could be either.

The group was gathered for the third session of Torah Yoga, a class that explores Jewish concepts through classic yoga poses and prayer. Wisch had begun by leading the participants in a morning prayer, drawing passages from the Old Testament and themes from the Jewish calendar. Reed, a Belchertown yoga instructor, would take over 20 minutes later, guiding the group through poses meant to amplify the concepts Wisch had laid out.

Feeling the spiritual

Torah yoga, according to Hadassah Magazine, a publication of the charitable Zionist organization, was first officially practiced by Rabbi Myriam Klotz, director of yoga and movement practice at The Institute for Jewish Spirituality in New York, and a Torah scholar, Diane Bloomfield, who wrote a book on the subject in 2004. Titled simply "Torah Yoga," the book explains that while yoga is often linked with Hinduism, the meditative spiritual exercise can be applied to teachings across the theological gamut.

"With yoga, I discovered that the wisdom of Torah was also inside me," writes Bloomfield, who moved from the United States to Jerusalem in 1984. "I experienced Torah teachings as a reality that I could know and feel within myself, within my body. ... Every yoga posture was a gateway to greater Torah consciousness."

Working independently, the book indicates, Klotz developed Torat haGuf, or "Torah of the body," a similar practice.

Rachel Valitt, an Amherst resident and member of the local Hadassah chapter, organized the program at the Lander Grinspoon Academy, a Jewish day school located next door to Congregation B'nai Israel. She says that Torah yoga adds a physical, meditative dimension to traditional Jewish study. Many American Buddhists, she says, converted from Judaism, possibly seeking spirituality they did not find in their own traditions.

But now Torah yoga is popping up in Jewish communities under a variety of labels, sometimes called Shalom or Rosh Hodesh (New Moon) yoga. In this area, she says, Congregation B'nai Israel, a conservative temple, and Beit Ahavah also in Northampton, which is reform, have both integrated meditation, and sometimes yoga, into their religious study. This past October, Rabbi Riqi Kosovske, who officiates at Beit Ahavah, included a short period of yoga in her services on Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement.

She called this practice invigorating on a day in which observers attend synagogue and fast. "You're sitting there all day, fasting and thinking," she said. "The yoga energizes people for the meaning of the holiday."

The classes at Lander Grinspoon are not affiliated with a synagogue and are open to participants of any faith, Valitt says.

Nourishing the roots

On that November morning in Northampton, Wisch sat before her class and began reciting: "Baruch Atah Adonai Eloheinu Melech ha'olam." The opening to most Hebrew prayers, it translates, approximately, as "Blessed are you, Adonai, Our God, Sovereign of the World."

She then encouraged participants to complete the phrase.

"Who brings old friends together," said one group member.

"Who makes my body work," added another.

"Who gives me the energy to have such a fun life," said a third.

The class was occurring during the Hebrew month of Heshvan, which is devoid of holy days. It follows the hectic Tishrei, a period that contains five Shabbats and is flush with holidays, including Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, and Yom Kippur, explained Wisch. She believes that Heshvan is an "empty" time to cultivate the goals set at the beginning of the new year. And this was that Sunday's theme.

"Through our yoga practice, we concentrate on watering those intentions that we set last month," Wisch told the group. "Those roots are just starting to spread, and we want to make sure they grow to the best of their ability." So, at Wisch's instruction, the group discussed resolutions and their importance.

Wisch and Reed collaborate to plan the classes, with Wisch identifying a relevant theme and Reed coming up with corresponding exercises.

Fittingly, the yoga centered on roots and nourishment that day.

Reed urged members of the group to turn their bodies "into an expression of [their] deepest intentions."

At one point, she directed each participant to stretch his or her arms to the ceiling while a partner gripped the individual, "rooting" that person to the floor in a tree-like position. "Draw in the Mayim," Reed told the class, using the Hebrew word for water.

"What do you feel?" she asked Ron Ackerman of Northampton as he reached his arms above his head.

"I feel rooted," he replied.

An "aha' moment

Valitt, 41, had the idea for the program before she ever heard the phrase Torah yoga.

As a leader in her local Hadassah chapter, it is Valitt's responsibility to attract younger members to the group, which many associate with "older ladies," she said.

First, she considered bringing a music program to Cooley Dickinson Hospital in Northampton, something she thought might interest women of various ages.

It didn't.

Then, studying yoga privately with Reed, she had a better idea.

Valitt pondered the Indian tenets embedded in the movements, which stress the values of mindfulness and of the "divine within us."

Then she had "an aha moment."

"That's Judaism," she recalls thinking to herself.

"A very important theme or concept in Judaism is to take care of the body, and that the body is sacred," she said. "We're always mindful of being in the present moment and bringing this divine energy into the world. [Torah Yoga] embodies the Jewish teaching so you experience Judaism in your body."

And so, she approached the yoga instructor with her idea. According to Reed, it was an easy sell.

"Although I'm not Jewish I've always been interested in the teachings of Judaism," said Reed. The yoga, she says, makes the instruction more concrete.

"It's actually really fun for me to figure out how to take the Torah and weave it in," she added.

Valitt eventually brought the concept to life by pairing Reed with Wisch, who is known in the local Jewish community thanks in part to her involvement with the Pioneer Valley Jewish Film Festival. Wisch, who lives in Northampton, works with the PJ Library, a project of the Harold Grinspoon Foundation, which aims to enhance Jewish life in western Massachusetts "and beyond." Funded chiefly by grants from the Grinspoon Foundation and Hadassah that amounted to $1,260, classes began in September. There is a $7 fee to attend.

The opening session happened in the same month as Rosh Hashanah.

"The first one was about turning and returning; preparing for Rosh Hashanah, and readjusting," Wisch said. "During that month, we're trying to refocus on our intentions to live life at its highest level." And so, for the remainder of the hour-and-a-half period, Reed led the class in exercises that incorporated literal turning.

Shifting to relaxation

Amelia Ender, the Jewish chaplain at Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley, conducts weekly Torah Yoga sessions on Friday afternoons at the school's interfaith chapel. Like Valitt, she believes that the practice adds a meaningful dimension to religious study.

In the Abbey Interfaith Sanctuary at Mount Holyoke, crosses sit adjacent to pagan altars, and an empty Torah cabinet faces Buddhist decorations in a room with multicolored banners hanging from the ceiling. It is here that Ender has led her weekly class for the past few years. Between three and 10 students usually attend, she says, depending on the academic calendar.

With the lights dimmed, and students sitting with folded legs and relaxed arms, Ender began describing an Old Testament story in which ordinary men turn out to be angels sent from God. The lesson, she explained in a soft voice, urges followers to broaden their perception and to see what is not always visually clear.

Ender spoke Hebrew words, then translated: "I place my sense of the divine in front, or in relationship to me, always.

"Create space for divine to be welcome or invited at all times," she instructed. Then the meditation began. The three students lay on the floor. The remaining lights went off. Ender lit a beeswax candle and told them:

"Settle into yourself. Let the week go, and your mental chatter go like candle wax."

She calls the weekly classes an effective way for students to shift from the work week to Shabbat, the Jewish day of rest, which begins at sundown on Friday.

Ana Schreck, a Mount Holyoke senior and regular participant, says she attends Torah yoga as a way to relax on Fridays.

As a Jew who is not active in the on-campus religious community, Schreck says that Ender's sessions help keep her in touch with her cultural background.

Last month at Lander Grinspoon Academy, Ackerman had similar thoughts.

It was his first time attending Torah yoga; he had learned about it from an advertisement at Congregation B'nai Israel. The connection between Jewish traditions and yoga, in which he previously dabbled, had great appeal.

"Trying yoga in the past has been trying to enter a foreign culture," he said. "This familiarized it."

As the class ended, Cleo Gorman rolled up her yoga mat and remarked on Reed's "spirit and energy," using a Hebrew word that translates roughly to "wind of God."

"I love your ruach," she told her, then left the room.