Future Shock and Jewish Life
Expanding our vision of synagogue life as antidote for Future Shock
Rabbi Nicolas Behrmann
Table of Contents
Antidotes for Future Shock – “Jewish” Human Survival
Jewish Issue Oriented Growth Groups
Note to the reader: Please disregard numbered references which were inserted for academic purposes. Unfortunately, through many moves the references list have been lost.
“The Synagogue is the sanctuary of Israel, born of Israel’s longing for God. Throughout our wanderings it has endured as a stronghold of hope and inspiration, teaching us the holiness of life and inspiring in us a love of all humanity” (1) Such is the liturgical expression of the function of the synagogue in our people’s past.
As we look toward the Jewish future, it would be appropriate to view the synagogue in more futuristic terms.
Future Shock
The synagogue in essence is to serve the Jewish people as the absorber of “future shock” by providing an environment for its members to experience a stability which at the same time supports change. Alvin Toffler popularized “future shock” as a means of putting a handle on the ‘phenomena of coping with increasingly rapid technological, social and personal change.
Toffler defines “future shock” as “the distress, both physical and psychological, that arises from an overload of the human organism’s physical adaptive systems and its decision-making process,”(2) or in simpler terms, “Future shock is the human response to overstimulation.”(3]
Toffler’s “future shock” concept may be approached from two perspectives. Firstly, recent studies conducted point to the likelihood of sickness following an individual’s undergoing a great deal of stress due to changes in one’s life. It is now “possible to show in dramatic form that the rate of change in a person’s life – his pace of life – is closely tied to the state of his health.” |1|) Secondly, culture shock is that “profound disorientation suffered by the traveler who has plunged without adequate preparation into an alien culture “(5) in which he is “forced to grapple with unfamiliar and unpredictable events, relationships and objects. His habitual ways of accomplishing things…are no longer appropriate… in this setting fatigue arrives more quickly than usual.”(6)
Toffler’s thesis is that the speeding up of the rate of change in our society is bringing with it increased stress with concomitant illness and fatigue. What culture shock is to the traveler, future shock is to those who stay at home! He describes phenomena known all too well; ‘as results of future shock:
“Thus, despite its extraordinary achievements in art, science, intellectual, moral and political life, the United States is a nation in which tens of thousands of young people flee reality by opting for drug-induced lassitude.: a nation in which millions of their parents retreat into video-induced stupor or alcoholic haze: a nation in which legions of elderly folk vegetate and die in loneliness.: in which the flight from family and occupational responsibility has become an exodus: in which masses tame their raging anxieties with Milltown, or Librium, or Equanil, or a score of other tranquilizers and psychic pacifiers. Such a nation, whether it knows it or not, is suffering from future shock.”(7)
Personal and Seasonal Change
The synagogue is the Jewish institution that is best able to provide support for its people to deal with future shock. The synagogue historically provided the Jewish people with important antidotes to the phenomena of culture shock and the crises of personal and seasonal change.
It is not by coincidence that so much of Jewish celebration and ritual is tied in to times of change. An examination of the Jewish Holy Day calendar will show that the major seasonal changes are marked by the celebration of Rosh Hashanah, Chanukah, Passover, and Shavuot, “Periods of transition are naturally associated also with a certain element of uncertainty. Such a period marked the end, as it were, of one era, and the beginning of a new one. The coming of something new turns men’s thoughts to the future – unknown and mysterious. One could never be certain what the future had in store, and there is in festivals celebrated at periods of transition an undercurrent of anxiety and uncertainty, often disguised under an artificial jollification, partly in the view of throwing off more somber thoughts, and partly in the hope that joy might become a symbol of what the future had in store.”(8)
What is true of the transition periods in nature’s calendar is also true of the transition periods in the life of the individual. We celebrate birth, both child naming and circumcision, the puberty with Bar/Bat Mitzvah and”. Confirmation, sexual fulfillment with marriage and finally observe death and mourning for life’s final transition.
Thus, the synagogue provided the Jews of the past with means of coping with seasonal and personal change. It provided not only a structure and ritual, but company as well for individuals, that they not be totally alone and isolated. The synagogue through these cyclical observances also provided the people with a communal center, a place for familiar contact with others. Through the history of our people, while the locations changed, and while the specific decor differed both in style and wealth of expression, the synagogue essentially remained constant. Each synagogue had the familiar Torah, eternal light and basic Hebrew liturgy.
Antidotes for Future Shock – “Jewish” Human Survival
Alvin Toffler suggests a variety of possible antidotes to “future shock”; many of these already exist within the synagogue. Others are easily brought into the synagogue framework. What is vital is that the synagogue be seen not merely as continuity with the past, but in its important role of providing for the spiritual and psychological needs of our people today and in the future. The synagogue is not only the chief resource for Jewish survival, but also for “Jewish” human survival.
This differentiation between Jewish survival and “Jewish” human survival is necessary , because the reality of modern Israel with its concomitant change in Jewish self-image has mitigated against the developing of the sense of obligation younger Jews feel about Jewish survival – witness the increase of mixed marriage as but one indicator. There is, however, an increased level of concern with human survival on both a personal and planetary basis. We Jews are experts not only in survival, but in meaningful and spiritual survival. We have the tools to teach survival.
The thrust of the synagogue, as we move into the future, will be to teach meaningful human survival in the midst of an increasingly impersonal technological existence. We have the Jewish historical experience as important data, as the rich storehouse of tools for survival. Toffler’s suggested antidotes to future shock allow us not only a revisioning of what the synagogue offers, but also a sense of direction for the synagogue as we move into the Jewish future.
Alvin Toffler suggests eight means of countering the effects of future shock:
- Direct coping
- Personal stability zones
- Situational groupings
- Crisis counseling
- Halfway houses
- Enclaves of the past
- Enclaves of the future
- Global space pageants
Direct coping
The thrust of this method of preventing future shock is moving from unconscious adaptation to conscious awareness of the degree of stimulation and stress we are experiencing. “We can…introvert periodically to examine our own bodily and psychological reactions to change, briefly tuning out the external environment to evaluate our inner environment.”(9)
This direct coping method is what Fritz Peris calls developing a sense of response-ability, the ability to respond to ourselves and our environment. Both the suggestion of the method of direct coping through bodily awareness and the sense of “response-ability” are reflections of the wisdom of the human body to heal itself.
While Judaism recognizes medical science, even forbidding one to live in a town without a physician, there is a strong trust put in the creation which is man. The following is a paraphrasing of a traditional morning prayer:
I am astonished, 0 God, with the complexity with which You have created men and women, whose very physical beings attest to Your comprehensiveness. Even those bodily organs which do not seem spiritual are indeed witnesses to Your wisdom, for were they not to function according to Your natural law, we would be unable to exist. I celebrate Your anticipatorily providing us with self-healing capacity. (10)
One of the problems of modern life is adherence to external mechanical time, which is often at odds with one’s internal “body clock”. One of the fallacies of the workplace is the belief in the consistency of the level at which one is capable of performing. Long before our computer-assisted knowledge of body rhythms, one of our sages wrote:
“Everything has its appointed time…
A time to be born, and a time to die,
to plant…to uproot.
to kill and to heal
to wreck and to build
to weep, to laugh
to mourn…to dance…(11)
Abraham Joshua Heschel refers to the Sabbath as a “sanctuary in (12) time” during which we step outside our regular sense of time into the re-creation and refreshment of Sabbath rest. Might we also see “the (13)Sabbath as a state of being”, as suggested by Alvin Reines; the Shabbat would then be for us a training ground for those moments of direct coping with future shock, during which we enter into our own temporary sanctuaries in time to allow the Divine wisdom of our bodies to guide us to healthy awareness of ourselves.
Personal Stability Zones
We can cut down on change and stimulation by consciously maintaining longer-term relationships with the various elements of our physical environment.(15) We might consciously decide to develop stability zones, “certain enduring relationships that are carefully maintained despite all kinds of ether changes.”(16) A “form of stability zone is the habit pattern that goes with the person wherever he travels, no matter what other changes alter his life, the problem is not to suppress change but to manage it through the development of personal stability zones.(17)
The synagogue is for many just such a personal stability zone, being available as an anchor in the midst of changes. Jewish families caught up in executive mobility often make deliberate choices to become members of a synagogue in the new neighborhood, to meet other Jews and plug into a familiar cultural-spiritual environment. Jewish celebrations are a habit pattern that provide a certain stability for us. The Sabbath Service is for many a coming home each weekend from the stress and tension of the week; for many a child growing up, the Sabbath candles each Friday represent the warmth of home and family unavailable during the week’s hectic ness.
Situation Grouping; (18)
With the complexity of life increasing, we are experiencing the limitations of a unilateral approach to synagogue life. The traditional groupings of Religious School, Youth Group, Men’s Club, Sisterhood, are losing their meanings as we are developing such situational groupings as “singles”, single parents, golden agers, young divorced individuals, young widows and widowers, women seeking new awareness of themselves, middle-aged couples dealing with growing adolescents and dying parents.
Alvin Toffler brings to his reader the thinking of Dr. Hebert Gerjuoy, whose coinage “situational grouping”(19) has real possibilities for the synagogue: “By bringing together people who are sharing, or are about to share, a common adaptive experience, “he argues, “we can help equip them to cope with it.”(20)
Dr. Gerjuoy’s approach is based on the following premises:
“A man required to adapt to a new life situation loses some of his bases for self-esteem. He begins to doubt his own abilities; If we bring him together with others who are moving through the same experience, people he can identify with and respect, we can strengthen him. The members of the group come to share, even if briefly, some sense of identity. They see their problems more objectively: they trade useful ideas and insights: most important, they suggest future alternatives for one another. (21)
This concept of situational groupings has already made major headway within the American synagogue in the Chavurah Movement. Dr. Bernard Reisman, the foremost expert on Chavurot writes, “The Chavurah is a relatively recent development in the collective life of American Jews. The term, best defined as ‘fellowship’ has been used to describe a range of approaches in which relatively small groups of Jews come together regularly for programs which include Jewish study, worship, celebration, and personal association.”(22)
Rabbi Harold Schulweis summarizes the real needs that sire met by the development of such Chavurot or what we might in our context describe as small situational groupings:
“The primary task on the agenda of the synagogue is the humanization and personalization of the temple. To overcome the interpersonal irrelevance of synagogue affiliation is a task prior to believing and ritual behaving. To experience true belonging is an imperative prerequisite for the cultivation of religious and moral sensibilities…I see one of the major functions of the synagogue to be that of shadchan – bringing together separate, lonely, parties into Chavurot… comprised of…families who have agreed to meet together at least once a month b learn together, to celebrate together and hopefully to form some surrogate for the eroded extended family.” (23)
Crisis Counseling (2i+)
Here Toffler writes of crisis being any significant transition and suggests that “it is roughly synonymous with “major life change.” (25) He further suggests that “tomorrow’s crisis counselors will be experts not in such conventional disciplines as psychology or health, but in specific transitions such as relocation, job promotion, divorce or sub cult hopping.” (2^4)
The synagogue has until recently not been a dispenser of psychological services except primarily through whatever counseling was done by the Rabbi. Harold Schulweis strongly suggests a change in the way we see the purpose and functioning of the synagogue:
“The synagogue could become the most important therapeutic institution imaginable. But that requires a very radical change in the understanding of what is in the proper ken of the synagogue. Instead of saying that the synagogue is the place in which we pursue the ritual celebrations of one’s life, rites of passage, festivals, fasts, study and social action; if we can say that there are problems that we have not been attending to, such as existential aloneness, single parenthood, a tremendous increase in divorce, the home which has become a pathogenic institution; and if we can come to understand that it is the synagogue’s function to deal with these new kinds of psychological problems, then loneliness and the rest car be, oddly enough, an opportunity.” (26)
A more affirmative way of expressing this newly-conceived function of the synagogue is to envision the synagogue as a Jewish growth center. Such a Jewish growth center builds on the traditional framework of the Jewish life cycle but adds significantly to the post- Bar/Bat Mitzvah-Confirmation function of the synagogue. It is a conception which is premised on the bringing together of the Jewish heritage as a vast storehouse of human experience, and the more recent learnings about human nature and group process which have evolved in the fields of organizational development, the human potential movement and humanistic psychology.
The essence of the human growth center concept is that we are in a constant process of growth and maturation. Gail Sheehy popularized the new learnings about how this process impacts our lives as adults in her book, Passages: Predictable Crises of Adult Life.(27)
As the title suggests, research shows that there are patterns to adult life that change one’s sense of discomfort from psychopathology to a sense of healthy challenge caused by life itself. Sheehy writes, “A new concept of adulthood, one that embraces the total life cycle, is questioning the old assumptions. If one sees the personality not as an apparatus that is essentially constructed by the time childhood is over, but as always in its essence developing, then life at 25 or 30 or at the gateway to middle age will stimulate its own intrigue, surprise, and exhilaration of discovery.” (28)
A major component of the growth center approach is that other people are a vital ingredient in our growth process. Psychologist Carl Rogers presents a stimulating projection of religion in the future:
“But religion, to the extent that the term.is used, will consist of tentatively held hypotheses which are lived out and corrected in the interpersonal world. Groups, probably much smaller than present- day congregations, will wrestle with the ethical and moral and philosophical questions which are posed by the rapidly changing world. The individual will forge, with the support of the group, the stance he will take in the universe—a stance which he cannot regard as final because more data will continually be coming in.
In the open questioning and honest struggle to face reality which exist in such a group, it is likely that a sense of true community will develop–a community based not on a common creed nor an unchanging ritual but on the personal ties of individuals who have become deeply related to one another as they attempt to comprehend and to face, as living men, the mysteries of existence. The religion of the future will be men’s existential choice of his way of living in an unknown tomorrow, a choice made more bearable because formed in a community of individuals who are like-minded, but like-minded only in their searching.
In line with the thread which runs through all of my remarks, it may well be that out of these many searching groups there may emerge a more unitary view of man, a view which might bind us together. Man as a creature with ability to remember the past and foresee the future, a creature with the capacity for choosing among alternatives, a creature whose deepest urges are for harmonious and loving relationships with his fellows, a creature with the capacity to understand the reasons for his destructive behaviors, man as a person who has at least limited powers to form himself and to shape his future in the way he desires–this might be a crude sketch of the unifying view which could give us hope in a universe we cannot understand.”(28a)
The basis for establishing a Jewish growth center concept as the function of the synagogue is provided by the following theological argument: Our belief is that God is “I WHAT I WILL BE”(29). We are told in the Torah that we should be holy because God is holy.(30) The root meaning of the Hebrew word “holy” is special, distinct, unique, derivate from being set aside or separated. If God’s uniqueness lies in God’s constant state of becoming, then it is incumbent upon each of us to achieve our own sense of personal uniqueness in the universe.
The practical argument is that only by providing an environment in which our congregants can have a real sense of trust and acceptance within which to deal with the real gut issues of their lives can we hope to teach them the relevance of Judaism. As the saying goes, “The sermon is not the thing action is”! the Jewish growth center is based on creating an environment in which Jewish individuals can come together with others to explore their most vital concerns.
The following is a description of what such a Jewish growth center would look like at least on paper:
THE MIDRASHA is a learning environment in which Midrash takes place. Midrash is study, interpretation or the process of discovering meaning in our tradition. The Midrasha expands on the words of Rashi: “Just as when a hammer hits a rock, it breaks into many pieces, so the Torah can be given a multitude of explanations.”(30a)
The Midrasha is our program of adult Jewish education, which begins with the Bar or Bat Mitzvah and continues through one’s life. It is a program for all who wish to explore the various issues that face us as Jews uniquely, as Jews living in a rapidly changing world, and as individuals who wish to explore their life concerns within a Jewish milieu or atmosphere.
The Midrasha approach to Jewish identity recognizes that it is unique to each individual, but that through the Jewish historical experience there are common bonds which unite all Jews. The Jewish historical experience is viewed as the struggle to maintain continuity even while adjusting to an everchanging set of environmental circumstance, a struggle in which the individual is constantly involved. Jewish tradition becomes a valuable tool for providing both data and alternative approaches for contemporary decision making.
The purpose of the Midrash is three-fold:
- To facilitate human growth among the adult members of the synagogue through the use of Jewish historical metaphor, symbols, and literature.
- To provide participants with an awareness of traditional sources and the tools with which to approach the wealth of the Jewish historical experience.
- To create authentic Jewish community based on trust, openness, and a shared desire toward further human growth within the synagogue. (Further growth as Jewish human beings)
The Midrasha incorporates within itself programs which in other settings would fall under the rubrics of: high school, adult education, rabbinical counseling, confirmation, adult Bar/Bat Mitzvah, lecture series, and the like. By bringing all of these programs under one overall heading, the divisions and separations become less, and the sense of community is fostered.
The Midrasha is also premised on the assumption that there is inherent worth in dealing with one’s existence and in searching for authentic Jewish identity within a group setting. In much of what the individual must cope with, a support group of people who are going through or have gone through similar experiences is quite helpful.
Midrash is a process. It is the study of what previous Jews found in their searches within Jewish tradition. It is the life style of those today who seek meaning in the Jewish identity. The Midrasha approach to Jewish survival is that the “survival “needs of individuals families, and groups of Jews must be addressed, and that if they are, “Jewish survival” is assured.
Participants may wish to work towards the achievement of one of the following levels:
- Confirmation, traditionally a high school or post bar/bat mitzvah observance
- Adult Bar/Bat Mitzvah or Confirmation
- -Haver – Instructor, Group Facilitator
- Jewish Paraprofessionals trained in rituals, hospital visitation and the like.
Life Situation Groups
As we are all searching for identity common human growth groups might include:
- Interpersonal communications
- Basic encounter group
- Sexual identity…singles/men/women/LGBT
- Premarital and marital enrichment
- Couples ‘communication workshop
- Family communications and enrichment
- Future life planning: What do I want to do with myself?
- Issues of death and dying, of family members, significant others, self
- Parent (and Step parent)-child, Grandparents-grandchildren communications
- Becoming parents (trained by a gynecologist)
- Divorced singles
- Widows, widowers
- Parents of school children
- Couples or spouses divorcing
- New to the community group
Jewish Issue Oriented Growth Groups
- Jewish Experiential and Experimental Workshops
- On becoming Jewish – Jews by Choice
- Resolving Jewish identity issues
- Biblical psychodrama
- Creative worship
- Jewish history simulation study groups
- Holiness training – life cycle and holiday rituals….
- Bar/Bat Mitzvah as creative response to family crisis
- New Temple members – getting the most out of our Temple
- Enriching Jewish-Non-Jewish Partnership relations
- Hebrew as the language of self-discovery.
- Film Appreciation groups
The conceptual design for the Midrasha would include the development of the appropriate Judaic data and curriculum for the various workshops and the training of specific individuals within the congregation to provide the ongoing leadership for the program and its various activities. (31) Some congregations are holding programs along these lines already, but a full-scale development of a Midrasha program would be a long-term one in order to properly develop its own leadership. (32)
There is a growing body of literature dealing with the application of small group process and humanistic psychology to the synagogue, including Dr. Bernard Reisman‘3 The Chavurah 03), Dov Peretz Elikins Humanizing Jewish Life (3^4-)* Reform Is a Verb, Part Two, “A Manual of Exercises”. (35)
5 Halfway Houses (38)
In criminal justice systems and mental health treatment programs. Halfway Houses serve as gradual release agents. “Instead of taking a man out of the under-stimulating, tightly regimented life of the prison and plunging him violently and without preparation into the open society, he is moved first to an intermediate institution which permits him to work in the community by day, while continuing to return to the institution at night. Gradually, restrictions are lifted until he is fully adjusted to the outside world.”(37)
The conceptualization of such programs and the application within the synagogue would best be stated, “wherever a change of status is contemplated, the possibility of gradualizing it should be considered.” The synagogue would do well to develop programs for receiving new members from other locations and for saying goodbye to members who are moving. The synagogue national bodies would do well to think about developing such transition programs within their regional retreat center programs.
Enclaves of the Past (38)
Toffler writes “No society racing through the turbulence of the next several decades will be able to do without specialized centers in which the rate of change is artificially depressed. To phrase it differently, we shall need enclaves of the past-communities in which turnover, novelty and choice are deliberately limited (39)
The synagogue with its anchor in the Jewish past is by definition our Jewish enclave of the past. The symbols of the synagogue along with the worship liturgy urge us back into the earlier historic experience of our people. The Sabbath is in Abraham Joshua Heschel’s words “a sanctuary in time.” The Sabbath Kiddush reminds us of the creation of the world and the exodus from Egypt.
Certainly, one of the attractive features of the modern Jewish State pf Israel is its function as an “enclave of the past.” Visitors to the ultra-orthodox section of Jerusalem, Masada and countless other historic locations find themselves removed back into a radically different sense of historical time.
Toffler suggests that by developing these enclaves of the past, “living museums as it were, we increase the chances that someone will be there to pick up the pieces in case of massive calamity…might also serve as experiential teaching machines.” (i|0) A word should be said here about history and the past as fantasy. The purpose of such enclaves of the past is to allow the individual to step outside the overstimulating reality environment. This use of history is fantasy at its best, the creative and positive use of’ our imaginative capabilities. We step into Shabbat as a positive fantasy experience, as a retreat from weekday reality; why not take such steps into other Jewish realms.
We need to expand our synagogue’s role as enclave of the past, by using our imagination to allow the physical environments to also be teaching devices. We could learn much from museums which recreate historical environments, giving us the experience of being and feeling what earlier individuals must have felt in such spaces. Films and pictures are reaching devices we are ready to use, but we must think in terms of total environment.
What an exciting project it could be for a group of families to do the research, working together to create a Biblical environment in which they and others could study the ancient Biblical texts. Why must classrooms be drab places, or else psychologically colorful rooms that may make for conducive learning centers, but do not teach their subject material?
Enclaves of the Future (l+l)
“Just as we make it possible for some people to live at the slower pace of the past, we must also make it possible for individuals to experience aspects of their future in advance…we shall also have to create enclaves of the future.” (Il2) The simulation training involved in many skilled professions accomplish this for the trainee—what is suggested here is better preparation for future needs. “Tomorrow, as the technology of experiential simulation advances, we shall be able to go much further. The pre-adapting individual will be able not merely to see and hear, but to touch, taste and smell the environment he is about to enter. He will be able to interact vicariously with the people in his future, and to undergo carefully contrived experiences designed to improve his coping abilities. “(1^3)
Within the contemporary synagogue such an enclave of the future concept comes under the headings of both long-range planning and creative or experimental worship. It might also be argued that Reform Judaism is the research and development arm of contemporary Judaism. What is suggested by Toffler’s enclave of the future is echoed in a statement of1the models for the future committee of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations * “…Life in the post-industrial society is so changeable that flexibility must be built into any new synagogue program or style of synagogue…Each congregation must be structured in such a way that its problems can be solved creatively by its own newly-sensitized and involved members.”
This essay is an attempt to develop the notion of the synagogue as an enclave of the future, as well as of the past. The unilateral picture of the synagogue is now dysfunctional, as a wider spectrum needs to be addressed within its walls and membership. There needs to be a sense of experimentation as well as of continuity.
The synagogue as enclave of the future utilizes technology as an adjunct to its functioning as an enclave of the past. The use of film, slides, recorded contemporary music is a message conveying to the congregants a sense of contemporary and future Jewishness. Judaism can take technology and make it holy just as it took the animal skin and wrote the Torah on it – a transformation of the secular technology of the ancient Israelites.
There is yet another exciting component to this conceptualization of the synagogue. What is lacking within many congregations is the sense of one generation building for another beyond the physical building. The synagogue program is not regenerative. We are living at a time when technology can change that.
We must look to redesigning our educational and synagogue structures so that one group builds for another. The project of one year’s fifth grade study of Israel would be a videotape for the synagogue learning center. A multi-media project for a Friday night service becomes a lesson on Shabbat. This builds up the sense that all can contribute to the synagogue of the future.
Global Space Pageants (l\S)
In grandiose terms, Toffler speaks of global space pageants, but fundamentally, he tells of the positive purposeful use of ritual. “Repetitive behavior, whatever else its functions, helps give meaning to non-repetitive events, by providing the backdrop against which novelty is silhouetted. “(I4.6) . He writes of ritual as a change-buffer, sharing with his reader the anthropologists’ leaning that ceremonies “helped individuals to re-establish equilibrium after some major adaptive event had taken place .” (I4.7 )
Here Toffler brings us back to essential function of the synagogue, that of being the sanctuary of Israel in which we celebrate the meaningful ritual of our lives. The Jewish calendar keeps us in tune with the time clock of the universe, even as our observance of Jewish life cycle events brings us into deeper awareness and appreciation of our own lives, we have added Israel Independence Day and Holocaust Remembrance Day to our calendar, even as we have begun to have adult Bar and Bat Mitzvahs. We are innovating ceremonials to add meaning to contemporary life. This too is the function of the synagogue.
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