On being an artist-rabbi: Bringing ‘play’ into Jewish communal practice
Editor’s Note: This article appeared in eJewishPhilanthropy on May 29, 2025.
In a television interview shortly before his death, Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel was asked if he had a message for young people. Watching live with my parents, I was a young person at the time, and Heschel seemed to speak directly to me when he responded: “Build your life as a work of art.”
My rabbinate is an artistic practice. The spiritual community I serve in all its complexity is a creation under continuous construction. Art is not limited solely to what looks or sounds like fine art; and through this lens, our beit midrash, our dialogue project, our delivery of gemilut chesed — all are part of the artwork.
At Or Shalom, where we are knitting together a congregation integrating new younger members with the older members who hold our community’s 40-year traditions, the arts are a great meeting ground. Much of our liturgical music has been composed by members. We’ve created a visual Megilat Esther for projection, sending out verses for illustration in any medium to all who want to participate. We spend at least one Saturday night in the cold months coloring and drinking cocktails. We collect brightly colored plastic recyclables and have an annual mobile making event on the eve of Sukkot; and while some hang the wild array others improvise a soup from the last garden vegetables of the season. Then we read the popular European folktale “Stone Soup” and eat our first meal in the sukkah.
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Rabbi Hannah Dresner recently retired as the spiritual leader of Or Shalom in Vancouver, British Columbia, the oldest existing Jewish Renewal synagogue. Ordained by the ALEPH Alliance for Jewish Renewal, she came into the rabbinate after a university teaching career in visual and performance arts. She is a member of the Institute for Jewish Spirituality’s Hevraya program and a member of the national mentor team of CLI.
