![\"photo](\"http:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/11\/nov-25-spirituality.25.Rabbi-Jeff-Roth-headshot.jpg\")
\u201cI was already a rabbi when I started studying Asian meditation,\u201d he explained. \u201cEverything I learned, I learned through a Jewish lens. I never took on a practice without altering it slightly.\u201d<\/p>\n
When asked if anyone has objected to his synthesis of Jewish spirituality with Asian contemplative techniques, the rabbi said, \u201cWhat I integrate is the truth of the nature of mind and no one has any objection to that. I ask questions like, What is the influence of conceptual thinking on the mind? What are the effects of different thoughts?\u201d<\/p>\n
Roth teaches a type of meditation that involves experiencing the mind and body with a healing, nonjudgmental awareness. It is rooted in the mindfulness movement first brought to North America in the 1970s, which has steadily grown in popularity, even finding a significant place in new medical treatments and corporate environments. And Jews have played a large role in the movement, demonstrated by leading teachers like Jack Kornfield, Joseph Goldstein, Sharon Salzberg, Jon Kabat-Zinn and others.<\/p>\n
Drawn to the mystical teachings of Judaism as a young rabbi, Roth said they remained \u201cintellectual\u201d for him until he began practising meditation. \u201cIn the quiet, in the silence, I became a mystic,\u201d he said. \u201cIt became a direct experiential realization.\u201d<\/p>\n
Among his students now are many rabbis. \u201cI teach rabbis they need to come to the silence, the witnessing, to have a deeper spiritual experience,\u201d said Roth, referring to the practice of \u201cjust witnessing\u201d that characterizes mindfulness meditation. By just witnessing thoughts, feelings and sensations, say its exponents, mindfulness meditation calms the body and mind and allows deeper, non-conceptual awareness of experience. \u201cFrom a Jewish perspective, \u2018just witnessing\u2019 is not enough, however,\u201d he said. \u201cYou need to be the compassionate witness.\u201d<\/p>\n
Roth said he draws his central inspirations from the teachings of the Chassidic masters, especially the Baal Shem Tov \u2013 Rabbi Israel ben Eliezer, 1698-1760, founder of the Chassidic movement.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Baal Shem Tov said \u2018everything is God and nothing but God,\u2019\u201d Roth explained. \u201cThe whole thing to do is to align ourselves with the truth of being, which in the Torah is expressed as \u2018ein od milvado<\/em>\u2019 (\u2018there is nothing else besides God\u2019).\u201d<\/p>\n A turning point in Roth\u2019s development came in 1981 when he received teachings from Reb Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, the founder of the Jewish Renewal movement, which became the scaffolding of his theology of contemplation.<\/p>\n \u201cReb Zalman taught me about the four worlds, or levels of manifestation, that occur within the Holy One of Being,\u201d said Roth. The contemplation of how the four levels of manifestation happen in our minds and bodies can guide our mindful exploration of experience, he said. \u201cThe four worlds have become a central metaphor in my teaching. I have been working out that teaching for the last 35 years.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re trying to understand the fundamental forces that alienate us in our experience of life, in order that we might live more from a place of awakened heart, which is connected to all experience and allows us to manifest with more love and compassion in our daily lives,\u201d said Roth. \u201cI want to emphasize that acting with love and compassion \u2013 that\u2019s where we\u2019re going with the whole thing.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"book](\"http:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/11\/nov-25-spirituality.25.Rabbi-Jeff-Roth-Book-Cover-2.5.jpg\")
Roth\u2019s latest iteration of that \u201cworking out\u201d can be seen in his recent book, Me, Myself and God: A Jewish Theology of Mindfulness<\/em> (Jewish Lights, 2016), from which he will be presenting practices and Torah teachings at the Dec. 4 session.<\/p>\n