Finding His Jewish Soul
Arguing about Alan
Alan Lew was never the only “Jewish Buddhist” – and his commitment to incorporating mysticism and spiritual practices into Judaism was not a decision he came to in a vacuum. It was the result of several years of soul searching, introspection, and a commitment to explore life's ephemeral and abstract components.In 1967, Lew found himself recently married, unemployed, and, perhaps, a bit directionless. He was also about to become a father. Before the year was out, he and his wife Betty would have their first, and only, child together. Throughout his college career, Lew had felt pressure to pursue a high paying career, “[M]y parents" he would later explain, "had always wanted me to be a doctor” [1]. With an admittedly limited aptitude for science, Lew instead applied and was accepted to law school. But, parental expectations, combined with the need to now provide for his new family, weighed heavily upon Lew. He dropped out of law and began working for newspaper in Yonkers. When writing, he felt alive. Determined to pursue his newfound passion, Lew, Betty, and Steve moved to Iowa City so that he could pursue an Masters of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from the Iowa Writer's Workshop in 1970.
Although the recent owner of an Masters in Fine Arts from his time in Iowa, Lew felt no closer to having a direction in life. At the behest of friends he had met in graduate school, he, Betty, and son Steve moved to California, settling just north of San Francisco. Life in California was hard for Lew - finding steady work as a writer proved elusive and his relationship with Betty was becoming increasingly tenuous. Both struggled with depression and the tension in their marriage mounted. "[A]n acute sense of dislocation” [2] permeated Lew's life during his stay in Northern California in the 1970s, as he saw it, "American social life was in chaos, revolution was in the air, my marriage was collapsing, and the San Andreas Fault ran right through my backyard”[3].
Eventually Lew and Betty separated. But, the anxiety and uncertainty that continued to plague Lew did not abate. It was during this time, and in this frame of mind, that he began exploring various religious traditions at the behest of Norman Fischer, a friend from Iowa who had also moved to San Francisco, in an effort to find meaning and steady the disquiet in his soul. By 1977, he had found comfort in the meditative practices of Zen Buddhism. But, as he was about to become a lay priest, he had second thoughts. At the time, he was finalizing a divorce with Betty and contemplating the role that Jewish ritual had played in his life thus far. Determined to discover and understand his "Jewish soul," Lew enrolled in rabbinical school, traveling from California to upstate New York. When he returned to the Golden State in 1991 after completing his training and ordination, Lew had become the Zen Rabbi.
This is the narrative that Lew recorded in two books he co-wrote with his second wife, Sherril Jaffe Lew. It reveals that, at least for Lew, his turn away from Judaism, embrace of Buddhism, and subsequent decision to become a rabbi, was in part, a rejection of his parents' expectations, an attempt to cope with the personal and social upheaval of the 1970s, and product of the social circles within which he enmeshed himself in California.
[1] Alan Lew and Sherril Jaffe, This is Real and You are Completely Unprepared: The Days of Awe as a Journey of Transformation (New York: Little, Brown, and Company, 2003), 185.
[2] Alan Lew and Sherril Jaffe, This is Real and You are Completely Unprepared: The Days of Awe as a Journey of Transformation (New York: Little, Brown, and Company, 2003), 22.
[3] Alan Lew and Sherril Jaffe, This is Real and You are Completely Unprepared: The Days of Awe as a Journey of Transformation (New York: Little, Brown, and Company, 2003), 22.
