Play holy golf with Rabbi Dave

Now, as a fundraiser for the NCJCC, he is challenging all comers for the closest to the pin, longest drive, and low foursome. In doing so, he wants to share his philosophy on golf, and life… Golf can be more than exercise and strolling around the course. Each shot has its own unique needs and like life, it requires some concentration, focus, and relaxation to launch the golf ball to the place we want it to go… Sometimes it works, sometimes we get another chance on the next shot.

For the Rabbi, golf civilizes the inner caveman, giving us a chance to make contact with a small, inanimate sphere rather than a skull. We get to exercise explosive force without spilling blood and guts. Using shafts and balls to get into holes requires delayed gratification and sophistication. Paradox rules, rather than straightforward brute strength, as we learn that less is more, as we hit down to go up, and as we score low to end on top. It’s the only game in which you don’t look at the target when you shoot. Golf is magic – we try to make the ball disappear as quickly as possible.

Golf offers entrances to the sacred; when we transcend our baser nature and compete with ourselves and others on a higher plane. Holy golf is about purity of contact, focusing on ball meeting club, on self-meeting situation, on body melding with spirit. Realizing everything comes from One Source and that all the powers at your disposal are on loan from on high.

Every player will receive Rabbi Dave’s “Scorecard for the Spirit.” Uncannily, a round of golf with its 18 holes, like the main body of prayers in a weekday Jewish prayer service is known simply as “Eighteen”, referring to the number of blessings in it. Even stranger, a nineteenth blessing was later inserted, turning the final blessing, a prayer for making peace and finding wholeness, into the equivalent of the nineteenth hole. The blessings provide the basis for seeing each hole as a rung on a ladder to greater awareness. No matter the score, you can learn and grow from each round of Holy Golf. The real course, of course, is inside you.

Rabbi Dave invites you to join him for this special golf tournament fundraiser on Sunday, Oct. 3 at noon at the Alta Sierra Country Club located at 11897 Tammy Way in Grass Valley. All levels of golfers are welcome. There will be food, games, and prizes and your donation of $135 will include green fees, golf cart and dinner. To register, please contact Darrell Goodin at 925-963-0595.