Wandering in the Desert

I'm living in a straw bale and mud plaster dome on Kibbutz Lotan in the Aravah valley in southern Israel. It's now the third week of the course, which includes permaculture, sustainable design, organic gardening and green building techniques.

I started this blog when I was at Koinonia Farm in Georgia. In a lot of ways this place is a counterpart to that one: an intentional collective community founded on a counter-cultural religious understanding and revived in part through a greater interest in permaculture, sustainability and environmental care. Here though, the religious tradition in question is Reform Judaism, a branch of Judaism which is widespread in the States, but not recognized by the state of Israel.

They are not all that similar, beyond these broad ways that I've mentioned. Here there are around fifty families, and as a Kibbutz, Lotan is aware of itself within a wider movement, and is surrounded by other Kibbutzim in this area who share the community's concerns and support it. For me, though, the two largest factors separating Kibbutz Lotan from Koinonia Farm are the facts that Judaism is the dominant religion here, and that we're in one of the most arid deserts in the world.

There's a long tradition of going to deserts to experience spiritual transformation. I can see why, in a way. Being in such a harsh and barren landscape makes all life stand out in stark relief, making each tree, each flower, each person seem like a small miracle, totally dependent on the grace of G-d. It is impossible to ignore the fragility of life in such a place, as all things seem caught between the possibility of life and the inevitability of death. Mostly, though, things just don't grow here. The ground is bare, just rock, with the occasional Rose of Jericho (or resurrection plant) curled into a tight ball and apparently dead sprouting from the clay-heavy soil. Personally, it's hard to bare such desolation. I was born to live in green places, places full of trees and running water.

And so I turn my attention mostly to the community: both the multinational community that has gathered to experience this course, and the community on the Kibbutz, for whom this landscape is home. Here, being Jewish is more than just an assuption: it is a requirement for membership. But this place is not my home in the world, and as much as I love living in community with Jews (and I do love it), I know that mine is a life to be spent in the wilderness. I am a child of the Diaspora, and I will continue to represent my people among the nations I dwell with as best as I am able. This wandering in the (metaphorical) desert is a part of my identity, and I carry it with me even here. Some deserts lie within.