A Breslov Teaching for the Winter Solstice

The winter solstice in the northern hemisphere took place early this morning, the moment on the earth’s elliptical journey when the lengthening of the night ground to a halt and the pendulum began its swing in the other direction towards longer days and shorter nights.  It takes the planet a while to catch up to the greater hours of sunlight; the coldest days generally follow the solstice.  But the days will get steadily longer now, especially in the evenings, which always feels to me like a great comfort.  And soon spring will arrive.

The Bratzlavers have a lovely teaching about this.  Rabbi Nachman of Breslov taught that sometimes God seems hidden (Likkutei Mohoran 56).  Even worse, sometimes that hiddenness itself is hidden; we don’t even know to look for God.  You might think that a person would want to avoid this situation at all cost, but Rabbi Nachman says that precisely at that point of the most hiddenness, very great Torah is concealed. If we can experience a moment of awareness at that most spiritually distant place, we can find God’s own secret Torah – a high place indeed.

Nathan of Breslov, R. Nachman’s devoted disciple, connected this teaching to the mystical practice of getting up at midnight to study and pray (Likkutei Halachot, Halachot Rosh Hodesh 3:7).  In those dark hours, equidistant from dusk and dawn, he taught, very great insight is waiting for us.  But after the flash of awareness, it is still dark!  There are still hours to go before the dawn.  That’s okay, Reb Nathan tells us.  We can work on teshuvah, integrating what we discovered, until the sun rises and we can bask in the full awareness of a new day.

The reason I love this teaching is that so often we think that the spiritual path – and the psychological path – ought to be a linear one.  If we are attentive and reflective during terrible times of grief or fear or doubt, sometimes we do indeed come across great spiritual insights.  We can have moments of great clarity and connection. But then, the moment passes, and we are still in those states of suffering.  That can feel like a fresh betrayal.  We want to see our progress, to heal, to “become enlightened.” 

But that’s not what the natural world teaches us.  After midnight come the darkest hours.  After the solstice, the world is still deep in winter.  Still, something has shifted.  Change is afoot.  The same is true within.  Something is shifting; with attention, we can tend to that small almost invisible inner spark, integrating the insight until it has become a part of us that is joyful and full of light.

So hold on tight.   We have a lot of work to do, inside and out.  But we are moving steadily towards spring.