“Re'eh”, the title of this week’s Torah portion means “Behold!” and many commentators use this as a starting point for reflection on either sight or perspective. I’ve been doing the same and in the process I remembered a song I once wrote for a school assembly on “The Senses”. It was called “Inner Sight” and though its simple lyrics and melody were geared to suit the Primary School children who sang it, its meanings were layered and intentionally relevant for the listening adults.
I looked up an old audio recording of it and today made a rather crude impromptu video to share it with you now, nearly twenty years after that little classroom recording was made.
Now that I am deaf it was hard for me to control this current audio recording, but I hope that it will be free from too much distortion. Visually, my PC skills are limited and do not do justice to Sorelle White’s remarkable photography... but again, I hope that the video will prove an enjoyable way for you to reflect on the message of this simple song.
The Zohar (one of the most respected texts of Jewish mysticism) frequently uses the phrase “Come and See” when it invites us to engage with a contemplative mystery. I think the “sight” we are invited to use here is cerebral but decidedly intuitive and not necessarily intellectual.
Sometimes we approach the Divine through our rational intellect and academic study: The Talmudic or Philosophical approach can assist us in our reflections in both ethics and in spirituality.
At other times we access the world of the spirit through a different form of mental activity which involves intuition and possibly a form of revelation. Perhaps this is the kind of “mystical theology” we find in the poetry of such works as the Zohar. It is also the technique we employ when reflecting on scripture in Hegyon ha-Lev (Lectio Divina) where the contemplative is using the intuitive and receptive areas of the brain (or Lev) to allow some kind of access to the Torah “which is written on our hearts.”
This is what I had in mind when I wrote this children’s song in 1991.
May we value both the intellectual and the intuitive efforts of the human mind and use our inner sight to open our minds to whatever it may be that God is trying to say to each one of us individually or to show us through our inner vision right now in this present moment.
Here is the full text of the children’s song: Inner Light
1:Open your eyes and you will seeA world above full of mystery.The sun so bright shining over a tree.The stars of night glistening over the sea
Chorus:See without looking and feel for the light.The wonder is seeing what’s hidden from sight.
2:Open your eyes and you will seeA world outside full of mysteryThe way your friends reflect your smileTheir helpful hands leading all the while.
Chorus:See without looking and feel for the light.The wonder is seeing what’s hidden from sight.
3:Open your eyes and you will seeA world inside full of mysteryOpen the doors, begin to seeImagine it all as you’d like it to be
Chorus:See without looking and feel for the light.The wonder is seeing what’s hidden from sight.
N R Davies
August 5 2010
