“How did two of the captives who were rescued from Gaza in 2024 spiritually survive captivity? Noa Argamani shared that she prayed every day, and that she also engaged in mindfulness practices. Andrei Kozlov kept a diary. A gratitude journal. Every day he wrote one line in his journal: ‘Today is a gift.’ The ability to behold every day as a precious gift in the inferno of Hamas captivity is a monumental spiritual achievement.”
This is the beginning of Rabbi Dr. Tal Sessler’s new book, “Torah for Mental Health,” which explores the connection between Jewish teachings and mental health. Sessler, the rabbi of Temple Beth Zion in Los Angeles as well as a spiritual counselor for the Chabad Treatment Center, writes about self-help through a Torah lens in his latest work. He continued in his intro, “Through mindfulness and gratitude, Noa Argamani and Andrei Kozlov maintained their sanity and inner equilibrium. Long before they were physically liberated, they overcame their inner prisons. They constantly rekindled the light of hope and faith in their souls.”
Reflecting on “Torah for Mental Health,” Sessler said that like everyone, he’s had his own share of hardships. “This book is informed by my own struggles with issues of identity, purpose and overall well-being,” he said.
“Torah for Mental Health” includes chapters on reframing your challenges, the gift of altruism and realizing your spiritual potential. The rabbi weaves in Jewish stories to complement each piece.
For instance, the one on spiritual potential starts with Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, who, several months before he died, told a TV interviewer that the meaning of life is to “build a life as if it were a work of art.” Sessler goes into how the great figures of the Torah were spiritually self-made.
“In an age spiritually crippled by rigid determinism and nihilistic defeatism, the Torah demonstrates that personal growth is a timeless and ageless endeavor, and that we can continue to grow in soul and positively impact the world until our dying day,” he writes.
According to Sessler, the Torah is full of wisdom when it comes to mental health.
“The first psychotherapist mentioned in the Bible is God Almighty Himself,” he said. “In Psalm 147, which Jews recite daily as part of the morning service, God is described as a psychotherapist. Specifically, God is described in this psalm as ‘the healer of shattered hearts, who also bandages our sadnesses.’ In other words, in the book of Psalms, King David teaches us that being supportive of other people in their mental and emotional struggles is a godly act and a godly thing to do.”
Many leading biblical figures wrestled with depression, like King Saul and Jacob. “Jacob suffered from what psychologists today call ‘pathological mourning,’” Sessler said. “For 17 inconsolable years, Jacob was drenched in melancholy after he was told that his son Joseph was killed by a wild animal.”
Moses was an empath who felt not only for his family, but also for the entire Jewish people and non-Jews.
“Like Moses, God is the epitome of supreme cosmic empathy in the Torah,” Sessler said. “At the burning bush, God shares with Moses that He too is a supremely empathic being. God tells Moses that He had ‘heard the cry’ of the suffering Hebrews, who are aching under the yoke of slavery. In fact, the entire saga of the Jewish subjugation in Egypt is a sustained tutorial in cosmic empathy. The Torah commands us ‘to know the soul of the stranger,’ to know the soul of the other person who is not like me. What the Torah calls ‘knowing the soul of the stranger” is called by contemporary psychologists ‘mentalizing.’”
Many of the great psychological approaches, Sessler told The Journal, were developed by Jews, including Freud, Beck, Frankl and Seligman. “In fact, when the Nazis burned 20,000 books in Berlin in 1933, they also burned the leading works of psychoanalysis, and they described psychoanalysis as a ‘Jewish science,’” he said. “Rabbi Sacks used to remind us, with his unrivaled sense of humor, that except Jung, all the great psychoanalysts were indeed Jewish. But then again, if you’re not Jewish, who needs psychoanalysis?”
As a rabbi and spiritual counselor, what Sessler would like to see more of in the Jewish community is compassion and less shame, along with more psychological literacy and less uninformed prejudice towards those experiencing mental health struggles.
“When it comes to depression and mental health, there is still a somber ‘knot of silence,’ and a tremendous sense of shame and prejudice.”
“When it comes to depression and mental health, there is still a somber ‘knot of silence,’ and a tremendous sense of shame and prejudice,” he said. “People fear that if the community would find out that they or their loved ones are suffering from an acute mental or emotional condition, then they will be seen as defective, broken and as inherently deficient and flawed. And in that respect, our community, like all of America, still has a very long way to go and to grow, in terms of mental health literacy, acceptance and support.”
Sessler is currently pursuing a psychotherapist license to do his part to help his community — and beyond. If anyone is experiencing mental health issues, he recommends they “lean on a competent and empathic therapist, find a spiritual mentor, find vigor and hope in the tradition and lean on family, friends and community.”
Of course, it’s important not to give up hope, even when things are tough. Turning to the Torah can help. “Psychology and Judaism share a belief in the human capacity to grow and to change for the good,” Sessler said, “Like the rabbinic interpreters of the Torah, leading psychoanalysts also recognize that words carry incalculable meanings. That both the spoken word and the written word reveal so much about the human condition and our quest for truth, healing and growth.”
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