Spirituality Blooms Anew as Rabbi Begins Retirement

Rabbi Sheryl Lewart knew it was time to go to rabbinic school around 20 years ago when she found herself reluctant to sell a very expensive table from her 19th century American antiques business because she had too many open volumes of Talmud spread over it.

But she didn’t have to wait for an epiphany to know it was time to retire. She and her husband had decided some years ago that, at 62, she would leave the full-time rabbinate to enjoy the rest of her life — visiting grandchildren in Israel, not only reading but truly absorbing important books, meditating in the garden, experiencing more “human being,” and less “human doing,” Lewart said.

As a breast cancer survivor, Lewart is taking the advice she often dispenses to others, to “live in a state of presence and of awareness, to have a sense of gratitude for this moment, for this day, for this experience, and to not put things off.”

Lewart will become the first female Reconstructionist rabbi to retire from congregational life when she steps down this spring as associate rabbi at Kehillat Israel in Pacific Palisades, one of the largest Reconstructionist congregations in the world, where she has been since 1998.

She celebrated her retirement with 500 people at a dinner at the Skirball Cultural Center on Feb. 21, where guests applauded with tambourines — a symbol of women’s leadership and celebration, based on the biblical Miriam. Comedian Bob Saget hosted, and feminist foremother Gloria Steinem was the keynote speaker.

But even when Lewart retires, she has no doubt she will continue acting as a rabbi — helping people through lifecycle events, offering spiritual counseling, teaching.

Lewart believes that as the first wave of women rabbis begins to retire, they will redefine the next stage of a rabbinic career, just as women have redefined the rabbinate, often making it more personal and approachable, more nurturing and even, some say, more spiritual.

“Women tend to blur boundaries between their professional and private lives. As we enter this last stage of life, that blurring continues to our benefit and to the benefit of everyone around us,” Lewart said.

“Women don’t fear that life ends after retirement, because we will continue to play the role of the rabbi as we move to the next part of our lives, whether that is in lifecycle events, or counseling, or talking to people or serving as role models,” Lewart said. “What does powerful eldering look like? What does it mean to share wisdom or experience with a younger generation, not only with children?”

The rabbinate has been a third career for Lewart — she ran a school for gifted children and an antiques business before attending the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College (RRC) in Philadelphia, where she was ordained in 1994.

She taught at the RRC for four years, then was director of outreach for the movement.

Lewart grew up Conservative in New York and went to rabbinic school thinking she would stay in academics. Even once she moved to the pulpit, she remained focused on adult education.

“I like to think that one of my legacies here has been to help adults take learning seriously, as part of the lifelong journey that we’re all on, to understand that learning is essential to growth and to be becoming the best human beings we can be,” she said.

She founded Kehillat Israel’s Jewish Learning Initiative and ran the synagogue’s adult b’nai mitzvah program.

Her impact on women has been significant.

“I feel that I’ve been involved in empowering women to claim their roles in Judaism seriously,” she said, often guiding them toward reconciling and embracing what they previously saw as a misogynistic tradition.

Rabbi Steven Carr Reuben, senior rabbi at Kehillat Israel, said Lewart’s warmth and depth made congregants, especially women, comfortable coming to her with personal issues. Lewart serves as a spiritual resource for women in and out of her synagogue who are diagnosed with breast cancer. She first fought off breast cancer in 1995 and is currently battling a recurrence.

One of Lewart’s greatest contributions was to bring more spirituality into the congregation, introducing meditation and teaching from a contemplative perspective, Reuben said. Lewart helped found the Institute for Jewish Spirituality, a New York-based organization that for the last 10 years has worked to infuse spirituality in mainstream institutions by running classes and retreats for clergy and lay people.

“But more than her masterful teaching, it is her affect, her own spirit and soul,” Reuben said. “When you talk to her, or when she teaches, there is a sense of spirituality that infuses everything that she does. It’s a kind of energy — and it’s certainly a different energy than I have, which is more frenetic — that is a quieter, spiritual presence that has been both comforting to people and inspiring at the same time.”

The synagogue is still in the search process to replace Lewart, but Reuben said the experience with Lewart has made them focus the search on female Reconstructionist rabbis.

Lewart is currently working on a book of meditations she composed based on verses in the weekly Torah portion. Her first book, “Change Happens: Owning the Jewish Holidays in a Reconstructionist Tradition” (Cherbo Publishing Group, 2009), offered new perspective and practices for Jewish holidays.

And now she has another project coming up.

At a recent interdenominational retreat with the Jewish Spirituality Institute, Lewart and other women rabbis decided to embark on a joint project to contemplate, write about and create rituals for retiring and aging.

“Women are not afraid to turn to each other and say, ‘How do I do this? What have you learned?’ ” Lewart said. “And all of that goes into a rich and fulfilling retirement rabbinate.”