Day 2

Spirituality is a frequently used term, but one that is rather difficult to describe. I would like to share a definition which I have used professionally for many years, although our journey should begin by stating what Jewish spirituality is not. It is not withdrawing from society, eating the bare minimum, and spending the entire day in meditation; the Torah does not advocate these. We are permitted to eat meat and drink wine judiciously; we are required to marry and have families. In short, we are to lead normal lives, but all the activities of normal living should be within the scope of spirituality. Let us perhaps define a more elementary term: humanity. You may say that this has been adequately described in science where we learned that the human being is Homo sapiens, a classification which is universally accepted. And, indeed, in Latin, this appella- tion sounds both sophisticated and innocent, but to understand it, we need to translate it. Homo refers to a genus, a family of animals of which man is a member, and he shares this genus with others, such as monkeys, gorillas and baboons. Man is distinct from the other members of his group by being a species of Homo which is sapiens, a term that essentially refers to intellect. Homo sapiens thus means “an ape with intellect.”

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