 "Photo: Nicholas Persac")
University students and Baton Rouge residents brought their blankets to the Parade Grounds on Sunday to practice yoga as a means of reducing stress during the 10 days preceding the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur, which begins Friday at dusk.
The gathering called "Yoga and Yom Kippur" was the second part of the Spirituality Series hosted by the University's chapter of Hillel, a national Jewish organization.
Yom Kippur is the tenth day on the Jewish calendar. In Judaism, it is a day of fasting and self-denial in which people are granted atonement from God after the previous 10 days of asking forgiveness from God and from the people around them.
According to the Hillel student guide for the event, Yom Kippur does not grant atonement to people until they have rectified problems by asking for forgiveness from any people whom they have offended or injured.
Moshe Cohen, graduate student and Hillel interim program coordinator, compared the time preceding Yom Kippur to opening up old wounds because people are forced to confront others they have had disagreements with to repair the relationships.
"Just thinking about it is a very stressful activity," Cohen said. "That stress builds up. It builds up in you internally, and it builds up in your body."
Cohen said he and the other members of Hillel hadn't seen yoga used specifically in conjunction with Yom Kippur but tried it to diffuse some of the stress that comes with the holiday.
"Because it's only day four of the 10 days, we want to release all that energy from our bodies and put our bodies in a really relaxed place so that when we actually get into the mending of our relationships, we're not worried about these little things," he said.
Tina Ufford, who led the group in the yoga poses, said the poses chosen for the gathering were symbolic of the principles involved in Yom Kippur and were chosen from the practice of Ophanim, which uses characters from the Hebrew alphabet as models for yoga poses.
Ufford said the first pose mimicked the tenth letter of the Hebrew alphabet "Yud," which is the final letter of the Hebrew word that means "here I am."
The crouched pose minimized the appearance of the body and represented the 25-hour period of fasting and self-denial during Yom Kippur.
"What you feel in the absence of these things is going to make you focus on yourself," Ufford said.
Ufford is not Jewish and represents the interfaith aspect of the Spirituality Series.
Jacob Valentine, biology senior and the organizer of the Spirituality Series, said people from all faiths are invited to the events.
The third and final part of the series is called "Your Inner Voice." The group will meet in Free Speech Alley on Oct. 21 at 4:30 p.m.
---- Contact David McCoy at dmccoy@lsureveille.com
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