Jewish Yoga: Experiencing Flexible, Sacred, and Jewish Bodies

ABSTRACT: This article delineates and explores three distinctive, although frequently overlapping forms of "Jewish yoga": Judaicized yoga, Hebrew yoga, and Torah yoga. Each of these is an evolving system of mental, spiritual, and physical experiences based both on yogic practices and on a variety of Jewish teachings as interpreted by different Jewish yoga teachers. To contextualize the development and spread of all types of Jewish yoga, I begin by briefly discussing the Jewish Renewal Movement and hatha yoga in North America today. Then, one example of a Judaicized yoga class is explored through interviews and participant observation with a small group of dedicated students in western Canada. These students work to extend the meaning of the female religious body beyond the halachically observant to one that is "flexible," sacred, and Jewish. Finally, conceptualizations of Hebrew and Torah yoga are outlined by drawing on the perspectives of key practitioners and their writings.