Jewish Mysticism...

There is a story told about a hasidic rebbe who came
into synagogue and sat down to pray. The hasidim
noticed that he did not move and they went on with
their prayers. By late afternoon the rebbe still had
not moved from his chair. Finally, the hasidim dared
to interrupt him and ask if something was wrong. "No,"
he said, "nothing is wrong. I opened my mouth to say
'I give thanks before You' and suddenly I began to
think, 'Who is this "I" that is about to give thanks?
Who am "I"? What am "I" '? And I have been meditating
on that all day long."

The story is a very profound one. Who am "I"? What is
the "self"? It is strange; we use the word "I" all the
time, but what do we mean by it?

One way to look at the "I" is in terms of the roles
one fills in life. I am a father; that takes energy
and inner strength. I am a husband; that too takes
time and effort. I am a teacher; it demands vigor and
intensity. I am a scholar; it demands concentration
and stamina. I am a member of several communities,
serving in various official and unofficial capacities.
I am an active Jew, giving time and energy to my
people. I am a friend, searching and supporting. I am
a rabbi, a faculty member, a citizen, a consumer, an
author and editor, a colleague, a student, a son, and
much more. Some of these roles are more important to
me than others. Am "I" those important roles? Am "I"
the sum of all these social roles? The contemporary
literary critic Northrop Frye has commented that the
older we get, the harder it becomes to shed our social
masks. That's true, but are we our social masks?

Let us entertain for a minute the possibility that "I"
am not my social roles, that I am not everything that
I must be to be a functioning, effective human being.
What, then, am "I"? Perhaps, "I" am my personal
history. Perhaps, "I" am my life and everything that
has gone into it. It is true: I am my fears, my loves,
my aspirations, my body, my passions, my guilt, my
spiritual and aesthetic sensitivities. I am the
complex person that I was born, was brought up to be,
and have made myself into. In modern culture, we call
this the "self" or the "person." But is it true? Am
"I" the sum of my feelings, concepts, and actions? Is
my "self" defined by the range of emotions and
thoughts of which I am capable? Freud has shown us
that we all have inner masks by which we talk to our
selves, even lie to our selves; and that we have masks
within the inner masks, unconscious motives and
feelings of which we are unaware. This is true. But am
"I" my conscious feelings and thoughts? Am "I" my
unconscious feelings and thoughts? What, or who, am
"I"?

Let us entertain for a minute the possibility that "I"
am neither the sum of my social roles nor the sum of
my conscious and unconscious feelings and thoughts,
that "I" am neither my social masks nor my personal
masks. What, then, am "I"? To say that "I" am my
"soul" does not help. For, if I mean that I am an
observant Jew, then I am defining myself in a
sociocultural role. If I mean that I strive
personally, I am defining myself in a psychological
role. Even if I say that my soul is divine and, hence,
I am a part of God, what does that mean, aside from
being a theologically acceptable answer? Am "I" a
theological proposition? Am "I" an intellectual second
thought?

Let us start again. If "I" am not the sum of my social
roles or my psychological functions, and if "I" am not
a theologically acceptable hypothesis, what am "I"?
What is the "I" of which I speak when I talk? Who is
the "I" that is capable of returning thanks to God? Or
doing anything? Perhaps, "I" am truly no-thing, utter
void, undefinableness. Not something ethereal, like a
fine spray of water or isolated atoms in interstellar
space; but no-role, no-feeling, no-thought. Not even
the absence of these definitions; just no-thing. At
first, this is very frightening. Nature abhors a
vacuum and the mind abhors lack of definition. The "I"
shies away from lack of location. That's why we have
culture. But, if culture is secondary, what is
primary? If formulation and articulation are
secondary, what is pre- or non-, formulated?

Jewish spirituality teaches that there are three
levels of being: thought, speech, and action. First,
we think; then, we put what we think into words; and
then we act upon what we think and speak. But what
precedes thinking? What is pre-articulate,
pre-conceptual? Whatever enters our consciousness,
even if it is chaotic, has some form; and we give it
more form by thought, speech, and deed. But what is
before consciousnes? What am "I" at this level of
before-thinking, before-words, before-action? ...

After the fear comes joy. But even the joy is
secondary; it is a response. It is an echo, a
realization that "I" am no-thing but God is; that "I"
am because He is; that "I" am nothing but He; that my
no-thing-ness is true but it too is a mask for His
being-ness. Everything I think, speak, and do is
secondary and tertiary. From the innermost point,
"I-He" radiates through what my "I" thinks, speaks,
and does. My psychological functions and my social
roles are clothes, decoration. The "I" behind them is
not mine or "me"; it is He. Perhaps, not even "He" in
the sense of the God described in the words of the
tradition but "He" as the because of my "I". Joy is
allowing oneself to be aware of this. Joy is being
open to this.

David Blumenthal
"Kabbalah: Mystical Ways in Prayer"