workshops

How do we read text differently with our bodies? In these workshops we will become sacred artists, modeling active, artistic, and just plain fun methods of studying Bible through circus arts. These workshops begin with “traditional” study of a sacred text or a Jewish concept. We will then use the circus arts to process that text. For example we may engage in building human pyramids and in partner acrobatics to embody the relationships between characters in that text. I have, however, taught text through the vehicle of many circus arts, such as juggling, trapeze, tightwire, and more.

Open to all ages, abilities, and fitness levels (I really mean it!!)

The Jewish way has always been to find personal meaning in texts that are handed down from generation to generation. This has been an exclusively cognitive practice and has been for millenia. This method is a response to that mode of study, while maintaining and furthering the intellectual heritage of which we are recipients. The word for Jewish religious institutions of deep study is Yeshiva: the gerund of the verb “to sit” -- sitting. A gerund looks like a verb, but acts as a noun. Seeing this false verb in the noun form emphasizes the very literal immobility of traditional forms of study. . This project opens the opportunity for those who perhaps do not find meaning in the Yeshivah (sitting [noun]) at a Yeshivah (place of religious study [noun]) to return to old modes of meaning-making to find new meaning in ancient and modern texts alike. For those who do love “Yeshiva,” these workshops provide a new tool for understanding texts. 

Options available for workshops to be taught with scholars of text.

For more information contact me here

Photos from Limmud, The Hillel Global Assembly Conference, and a Graduate course taught at the Academy for Jewish Religion
Psst, That man in the red sweater is in his late 70s, You can do this too!