The Neshamah Project

Professor Shaul Magid (Harvard Divinity School) joins me for a conversation about spirituality and the political. We trace his path from the seventies counterculture into the yeshiva and Bratslav worlds of Jerusalem, his relationship with Reb Zalman Schachter-Shalomi — including their final encounter — and why he stands both inside and at the margins of Jewish Renewal. From there: peoplehood and what it's become, his position of counter-Zionism and what it does and doesn't claim, Korach and the friend-enemy trap, survivalism as a spiritual dead end, and ahavat chinam as a practice. We close with the tools he thinks Judaism needs for whatever comes next.

Shaul's forthcoming book, The Scourge of Jewish Nationalism: Rabbi Yoel Teitelbaum's Anti-Zionist Thought, comes out this August from University of California Press. Find his writing at shaulmagid.substack.com and his weekly Thursday-night podcast on Spotify.

In this episode, Rabbi Ben explores the mystery of the red heifer through the teaching of the Or HaChaim. Rather than treating mystery as a problem to solve, the Torah invites us to practice wonder, humility, and openness before realities larger than our understanding. Sometimes mystery is not the absence of truth, but the beginning of a deeper encounter with it.

This week on The Neshamah Project, Rabbi Ben Newman explores three mystical commentaries on Korach—from the Moroccan kabbalists Abir Yaakov and Or HaChayim, and the Degel Machaneh Ephraim—on spiritual gifts, ego, leadership, and holy disagreement.

Rabbi Ben Newman is joined by Rabbi Shoshana Leis for a lively exploration of a Hasidic teaching on ayin and yesh—emptiness and being. Together they reflect on spiritual leadership, ego, creativity, perception, and the possibility of infusing ordinary embodied life with sacred awareness.

In this episode of The Neshamah Project, Rabbi Ben explores a teaching from the Noam Elimelech on the Menorah as a symbol of spiritual integration. At the beginning of the path, we may need many practices, disciplines, and supports. But over time, those many lights are meant to become one light: a life of deeper emunah, wholeness, and achdut. This episode reflects on how modern seekers can move from spiritual collecting toward embodied unity.

In this week’s episode of The Neshamah Project, we explore a teaching from the Noam Elimelech on Nasso about wonder, desire, and sacred participation in the world.

The Torah’s phrase yafli—to make a special vow—is read through the lens of pele, wonder or miracle. The teaching reminds us that miracles are not ours to control, yet we can become vessels through which wonder moves. It also offers a powerful spiritual approach to pleasure: we are not asked to reject the physical world, but to engage it with awareness, gratitude, and holiness. Wine can lead to dullness, or it can become song, blessing, joy, and sacred presence.

The question for contemporary seekers is simple and profound: does our desire numb us, or does it awaken us? When refined, pleasure becomes practice, and longing becomes a path back to the Infinite.

A teaching from R' Elimelekh of Lezhinsk, Noam Elimelekh, on BaMidbar, Numbers 1:1, 2:1 on humility and renewal.

This week on The Neshamah Project, Rabbi Ben Newman explores a visionary teaching from the Meor Einayim, in which Shabbat becomes far more than a day of rest. The Me’or Einayim teaches that Shabbat is a foretaste of the world to come — a glimpse of a future reality in which divine awareness fills everything, even the “lowest” parts of existence.

What if our moments of stopping — Shabbat, silence, meditation, music, stepping away from constant productivity — are not escapes from the world, but rehearsals for the reenchanted world that is slowly emerging? What if rest itself is preparing us to experience reality differently?

Blending Hasidic wisdom, mindfulness, and contemporary reflection, this episode explores how Shabbat offers us practice for a future rooted not in endless striving, but in awareness, delight, connection, and the rediscovery of the sacred hidden within ordinary life.

Ephraim on the spiritual power of letters, language, and perception. Drawing on a story of the Baal Shem Tov transforming a harsh decree into “only a trace of fear,” the episode reflects on how the same letters can spell nega, affliction, or oneg, delight. The teaching invites us to ask: what word is our life spelling right now, and can we rearrange the letters into something more whole, healing, and true?

During the week of Passover, this episode explores the Exodus as an inner journey rather than a distant story. Drawing on Hasidic and mystical teachings, Rabbi Ben guides listeners through reflections and short meditations on constriction, trust, voice, and the possibility of change in real time.

Instead of focusing on ritual alone, this conversation asks: Where are we still in our own narrow places? What does it mean to begin moving toward freedom, even if nothing is fully resolved?

Includes guided practices and journaling prompts for use throughout the holiday.