In the paths explored here, spirit and body are not separate at all. Nor is spirituality a special feeling, or a trance, or a vision, although such phenomena may accompany some spiritual practices. Rather, because Being is omnipresent, the experience of spirituality is nothing more or less than a deep, rich experience of ordinary reality. Realization is simply waking up. And the body, because it is always present "here and now," is both the best vehicle for doing so, on the one hand, and on the other, how holiness expresses itself in the world.

Jews are sometimes called the "people of the book." But as many scholars have observed, they are equally the people of the body. Consider the core practices of mainstream Jewish religion. Traditional observance of the Sabbath and holidays involves not beliefs or "spiritual feelings," but taking and refraining from certain physical actions. Jewish dietary laws are about foods, not sentiments; Jewish ethics is about action, not intention. Even Jewish prayer—built around the kneeling (barchu), listening (shema), and standing (amidah) prayers—is built not upon some abstract soul or spirit, but upon the body. This body-centricity of the Jewish tradition is well known in academic and scholarly circles, but ironically, forgotten in many religious ones.

This groundbreaking book is the first comprehensive treatment of the body in Jewish spiritual practice and an essential guide to the sacred. It integrates the insights of mystical and traditional Judaism, Buddhist and mindfulness meditation practices, and a cosmopolitan, contemporary sensibility in a work that is at once spiritual and secular, innovative and wise. God in Your Body is essential reading for anyone interested in integrating the body into spiritual practice, and also a valuable resource for scholars interested in Jewish traditions about the body. With meditation practices, physical exercises, visualizations, and sacred text, the book shows how to experience the presence of the Divine in, and through, the body. And it shows how, by cultivating an embodied spiritual practice, it is possible to transform everyday activities — eating, walking, breathing, even going to the bathroom — into moments of deep spiritual realization, uniting sacred and sensual, mystical and mundane.


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