Rabbi Fern Feldman

My Offerings

I offer individual and group classes, and spiritual direction, in person, or by phone or Skype. I am also available to lead Shabbatons, workshops, services, life cycle and ritual events.

My work is eclectic and varied. I have a strong connection with traditional liturgy, nusach (chanted prayer melodies), Torah, and rabbinic text (most especially chassidut and Kabbalah). But I also explore and experiment a lot. I often combine text study with singing and visualization or hands-on practices. I guide people through experiences, and when I lead services or life cycle events for people who are not familiar with what we are doing, I invite people’s participation in a way that allows them to stay in their right brains. I craft what I am doing with a mind to the needs and desires of the people I am working with. For example, at times I may focus primarily on academic aspects, and at other times on more intuitive dimensions.

My teaching has included the following topics: Biblical and prayer book Hebrew, Torah and Hebrew Bible, Chassidic text and teachings, Kabbalah, feminist and queer perspectives in Judaism,  Jewish ethics, liturgy, developing an individual prayer practice, and synagogue skills, such as trope (chanting Torah) and nusach (chanting prayers) .

My Research

Prayer and meditation

I have studied kabbalah seriously for about over 20 years. The complexity and the dynamics of it intrigue me, and inspire me to find imagery that speaks to those of us who do not fit the binary gender and sexuality paradigms that much of kabbalah perpetuates. I have a strong motivation to bring out the queernesses in it, and the non-dualities, both for the sake of those of us who feel in whatever way not gender-normative, queer, or complicated, but also for the sake of the kabbalah itself, which will survive and flourish much better if it is explored more fully and creatively.

On Prayer

Ark in a Synagogue in Corfu

…No matter how much we develop scientifically plausible theories, we come back to the basic question of human consciousness, which boils down to “can we trust our experience?” If not, then we have no reason to believe there is anything beyond the individual self. We have no reason, even, to believe that logic correlates with reality. If, however, we choose to trust our experience, everything else follows. In Jewish tradition, we are not asked to believe anything we haven’t experienced. We said “na’aseh v’nishmah—we will do and we will hear” when we received the Torah, partly because of this recognition that Judaism is about experience, and embodiment, not just theory. As a friend of mine says, “I don’t believe in G-d, I experience G-d”. As with any spiritual practice, Judaism, and prayer, look ridiculous from the outside. It is only on the inside that they make sense. So with davenning (prayer), there is no point in deciding if we “believe’ in it or not until we do it.