(Passover and Easter Inspiration)
This time of year, I hear a lot of nostalgic tales—both happy and bitter—of families at Passover seders and in churches on Easter Sunday. My own memories include none of those things. I remember the joy of a prolonged school break, the hopeful spirit of early baseball season, and the freedom of moving around without a jacket.
The only religious element the season recalls are my parents making fun of conspicuous piety, blind observance, and—with extra zest—moral hypocrisy. Religion to them was the opium of the masses. That might make them sound stern and sanctimonious, but they were actually the opposite: big-hearted, highly ethical, and hysterically funny.
With that background, it came as something of a surprise when, after years of immersion in Eastern spiritual traditions, I found myself finding nuggets of beauty and authentic spirituality in Western religious rituals (they’re there if you look deeply and interpret things creatively).
Later, in the course of doing research, including hundreds of interviews for American Veda, my podcast, and other projects, I realized I was hardly alone in looking at Western religion with eyes freshened by the East. It wasn’t just folks like me who were raised secular, but also Christians and Jews raised in religious homes who had either abandoned their heritage or remained faithful but also open to outside exploration.
The stories are plentiful and diverse, and they include clergy members. What I find interesting is why they’re so common, because the reasons point to the vital role of the East-to-West transmission in transforming of American spirituality. The texts and teachers representing the Eastern traditions—along with Perennial Philosophers like Aldous Huxley, Huston Smith, Alan Watts, and Joseph Campbell—shed light on ancient ideas that did not contradict known science or history and, more important, introduced practices that fostered spiritual experience and inside-out personal development.
With those rational, pragmatic standards in mind, people were able to find elements of value in Western traditions they had not seen before. The most dramatic result of this is the extraordinary rise of interest in the mystical branches of Judaism and Christianity, along with, concomitantly, the surfacing and democratizing of long-buried contemplative practices—and the creation of new ones.
There is much more to say about all this, and I’ve already spewed out more than I’d planned to when I started reflecting on this holiday season. I encourage anyone interested in exploring the enormous impact the East—in particular what we call Hinduism—has had on America to sign up for my online course (10 weekly sessions, 90 minutes each, starting April 20). Details and registration here.
Meanwhile, you might want to read between the lines of the routines and rituals you participate in—or even think about—this week. For me, Passover has come to represent spiritual as well as political liberation, i.e., freedom from the bondage of ignorance, attachment, materialism, and other internal Pharaohs that enslave the spirit and keep us from the promised land of Self-realization.
As for Easter, it’s a good time to contemplate what needs to be crucified so the infinite spirit within us can be reborn and embodied. I’ll do that Sunday morning, not in a church but in my living room listening to Bach’s Easter Oratorio. I have no idea what the words mean (and I don’t care to find out) but the music is sublime.
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