About the
OrHaGon Trail
Our Story
Our Goal
Our Inspiration
Our Ethos
Our Influences
The Or Ha Gon Trail exists to foster an authentically Jewish, and quintessentially Oregonian space, experience, and community. We host a "Hippie-Heimish" Shabbat table most weeks of the year (and holidays too!) along The Or Ha Gon Trail.
We create spaces that are warm and welcoming; an invitation for all folks to join in the Holy, uplifting spirit of Shabbat.
We cultivate Shabbat & Holiday experiences that are authentic & traditional, but also authentic to the modern setting, and the culture and practices that come naturally to the community we are building. We believe this channeling of ancient Jewish traditions, in a pluralistic and non dogmatic iteration, is exactly the medicine needed in these post-post-modern times.
Consider us the "homestead-grown" chicken soup for the soul.
Our goal is to be part of the tapestry of the living culture of Judaism, rooted in both the Hasidic tradition as well as the fine tradition of Jewish rebels, heretics, and visionaries. We are cultivating a culture of ritual without dogma; of ecstasy and inclusivity, of intention and connection. The coming together of the travelers culture with the homesteader culture is a key aspect that defines the reality on the ground in our beautiful home region; the Oregon Country. The focus of our organization, and the heart of our group, is on cultivating jewish community gatherings in Southern Oregon.
However, we also collaborate to bring the experience to North and Eastern Oregon and beyond. We are seeking to cultivate Hebrew Israelite culture and literacy. We are also operating in a region with low Hebrew literacy, and we are comprised of a community that is not exclusively Jewish; yet we seek to be explicitly and authentically Jewish, and to strike the balance of accessibility and a depth of authenticity. We believe that positivity, health, and ecstasy are universally understood, and we hope to cultivate a space of Jewish culture, where non Jews also feel uplifted and called to share their positive experiences.
Maintaining a high standard of health and wellness is an essential aspect of nurturing the light of the garden, and an essential aspect of being true to our Oregon roots which we have planted. We believe that the efforts and intentions we put into creating healthy meals and environments directly contributes, and essentially enables the cultivation and maintaining of a Holy, nurturing, and uplifting collective space and experience. We are excited to cultivate a consistent Shabbat happenings, and an awareness around the gift and the treasure that is Shabbat. When Travelers meeting each other at rest stops and farmers markets speak of wonderful Shabbat experiences, and musicians and spiritual seekers from many diverse paths make time to participate in Jewish traditional ritual, we know for sure that we are doing valuable work.
For more than 2000 years, Jewish Prayers and prayer ritual has been focused on Jerusalem. Since the time of Solomon and the dedication of the first temple, Jerusalem and the Temple have been a central focus as a gateway and interface between the divine realms and the world of earthly experience. Kings David and Solomon are accredited with adding a blessing for Jerusalem to the “Grace After Meals,” which was originally instituted by Moses. Following the destruction of Solomon’s Temple, during the Babylonian Exile, the Prophet Daniel prayed facing Jerusalem every day, 3 times a day. The prophet Ezra composed a text to serve as a central focus-engine for daily prayer ritual; one of the 18 pillars of this text is a prayer for repatriation of Jewish people to the sacred land of our ancestors, and one of the pillars is a prayer for the divine light to return to, and emanate from, Jerusalem & Mount Zion. During the time of the Maccabees, this was a popular meditation and prayer, and these prayers were found in multiple variations with minute differences being used by various communities around Israel in the days of the second temple time period, as documented in the Dead Sea scrolls/Apocrypha. About Nineteen hundred or so years ago, in the wake of the destruction of the Second Temple in Jerusalem, the High Court in Israel set a standard for the daily practice and prayer rituals for the jewish nation that no longer included temple service. Since that time, for the last 1900 years, every day, multiple times a day, thousands to millions of Jewish people have prayed for the return of Jewish sovereignty and right to worship in Israel and Jerusalem. How do we relate to Zionism in a post-diaspora era? We have returned to our national homeland, but we have not yet rebuilt the Zion of our prophecies. We have found sovereignty to be costly on our conscience, and not always energetically harmonic with temple building- with courting the light of Zion. (Incidentally, King David also experienced this problem.) We have not stopped praying for a free and fragrant Jerusalem; a house of prayer for all nations on mount Zion.
The Shabbat table is not a place to solve the tragic absurdities of the world we humans have come to know. We believe that obsessively overshadowing rituals with politics is an unfortunate epidemic infecting many Jewish communities. Both "right wing" and "left wing" gathering spaces seem to be too often drowning out the holy prayers of our ancestors with their own agendas; treating a shtender that is designed to be prayed from as a soap box. This is not the vision of The Or Ha Gon Trail. We are here to sing really good music together, breathe some deep mystical breaths, and eat some really good Hummus.
The Or Ha Gon Trail is cultivating inclusive spaces that are open to all who come in good faith to contribute to the joy of celebrating jewish traditions. The Gift of shabbat was given not only to Jews, but also to all those who live and celebrate with jews. We are privileged to live along side with allies and friends from many different nations. Non Jews are welcome to join in our gatherings and prayers, we don't take Gender into account in any of our practices; everyone can say kiddush and light candles, Etc. We are grateful, as Jews, to have an intact tradition and lineage that we can draw from, and call upon to help us express a relating to the infinite.
Moshe Rabbenu
The Merry Pranksters
Rav Yisrael Ba'al Shem Tov
Rabbi Doctor Aryeh Kaplan
Miriam Bat Yocheved
Mel Brooks
Aharon Bielski
The Alter Rebbe
Nachman of Breslov
Rabbi Moshe Chaim Luzzatto
Emma Goldman
Bob Marley
Peter Tosh
Phil Lesh
Rabbi Ely Allen
Baruch Spinoza
Doc Watson
Hannah Szenes
Rabbi Menachem Mendel Shneerson OBM
Reb Shlomo Carlebach
Reb Zalman Shachter-Shalomi
John Kahn
Robert Zimmerman
Robert Hunter
Rebbi Akiva
Baba Sali
Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel
Ram Dass
Bill Graham
Meyer Lansky
Golda Meir
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Leonard Cohen
Kurt Vonnegut
Tomer Yosef
Big Momma Thorton
George Clinton
Michael Pollan
Sarah Blustain
Matthew Paul Miller
Sandy Kofax