I was wondering if there are any discussions/classes about Jewish meditation on the Global yeshiva?

I do not know what is on thism site, but I would recoment the book "The Jew in the Lotus" by Rodger Kamenetz, published by Harper San Francisco. It's available in soft cover at Barnes and Nobel and at Borders.

It tells the true story of a disparet group of Jews who journety together the visit the Dali Lama and and contains a good discussion of Jeqwish meditation.

I think that meditation has gotten a bad rap by being associated with mysticism and the paranormal.

Tow other interesting books come to mind: Meditation and Kabbalah by R' Arye Kaplan, and Practical Kabbalah by R' Laibl Wolf.

The first one covers primarily the history of meditation in Kabbalah; the other describes how and why.

I've heard of two approaches with meditation.

The first is from Reb Nachman of Breslov. His concept is called Hisbodidus. From what I understand, a person speaks to Hashem in their native language, pouring out their heart. The person should be strengthened by the fact that Hashem understands all languages, and that Hashem is always listening.

The second involves "quieting the mind." I'm not so clear on this one, but basically a person is supposed to stop thinking and eliminate all thoughts. The hypothetical result is that a person's sensory perception is hightened, and a general feeling of peace and tranquility overcomes him. This feeling connects a person to Hashem.

I'll try to take a look at those two books.
Thanks for the response.

You're welcome. I think the concept of meditation in Judaism has not been very widely developed in public domain: too many Jews burned on bonfires because of meditation and other spiritual practices in the Middle Ages. However, the practice has survived, and Kabbalah meditation is one of the examples of Jewish meditation.

Personally, I think it's OK to use a non-Jewish meditation, (see Rambam's Eight Chapters and other works; I think these ideas of his can be extended from healing practices to meditation practices) as long as it does not involve violation of any of the Commadnments, in particular talking to the spirits, or conjuring up the dead, or any other such nonsense. I think Daoist meditation is probably the most similar to Jewish meditation in its ideas: in Daoism, Dao is the name of the "Force that created and rules the world".

Here are three books on amazon.com that I found:

Jewish Meditation : A Practical Guide by R" Aryeh Kaplan

The Handbook of Jewish Meditation Practices: A Guide for Enriching the Sabbath and Other Days of Your Life. by R" David Cooper

Meditation from the Heart of Judaism: Today's Teachers Share Their Practices, Techniques and Faith by Avram Davis

I have the second one; I haven't read the other two yet.

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