Evyatar Banai: "Sadness is the Soul's Default, While Joy is Freedom"

"Working on humility means living with my weaknesses in acceptance and humor, with patience and constant effort, and mainly to stop believing that my life's biggest threat is my weaknesses and that I must erase them quickly before my life falls apart." These words clearly reflect the unique personality of singer Evyatar Banai.

On the eve of Passover, Banai was interviewed by the newspaper "Karov Eilecha," revealing some insights into his inner world, the changes he has gone through over his life, and those he still hopes to undergo.

Banai's songs reflect his ongoing inner conflict – between materialism and spirituality, between the "freedom" of the external world and the true freedom of observing mitzvot. In his early years as a ba'al teshuva, Banai withdrew into himself, but in recent years he has returned to the stage and playlists without losing any of the spiritual progress he has made.

In the interview, Banai was asked about his attitude and understanding of education. In typical fashion, Banai turned the answer back to himself: "I wholeheartedly believe in what appears frequently in the teachings of Rabbi Tzadok HaKohen of Lublin," he said, "that when the father returns to faith and purifies his soul, then even the garments of the child are purified. It echoes into the souls of my children and descendants." When asked if spiritual influences also negatively affect the children, Banai responded: "I don't care. I'm not busy with that. I'm focused on growing, not on beating myself up. Positive measures outweigh negative ones. My internal movements have a good impact on my child; it's wonderful."

Banai shared that the holidays, especially Passover and the Seder night, used to be a major source of stress for him, due to the many laws and his desire to observe each one perfectly and transmit them as tradition to his children, in an attempt to experience something great with them. "Over the years, I have reduced a lot of the religious pressure," he recounts the change in his approach. "On the Seder night, I try to enjoy myself, see the children, and be with them as much as they allow... In the early years I tried to delve into halachic discussions in 'Choshen Mishpat' with five-year-old children... I wanted to embody a role model for them. There was always a dissonance between the desire to reach great heights, seeking what it is and how to experience it, and the simplicity of life... Today I know that 'for in joy shall you go out.' Freedom is joy, and sadness is bondage... Sadness is the soul's default, and it is a prison... The ability to choose between wisdom and learning and the mental state you are automatically drawn into, the ability to observe it, the ability to recognize yourself within the situation, that is freedom."

Banai spoke of his desire for calm and balance in his relationship with his children: "I feel that the home should be a cleaner place, a place where I am without rushing and running to be nourished from the outside. For many years I had a dissonance," he added, "I wanted to be with the children authentically, naturally, and on the other hand not be buddy-buddy. Someone once phrased such a sentence saying his father was not his friend, but his father was his father. It takes time to find that balance. The children have inherited part of the dissonances, and together we progress. Questions like whether to allow my son to go to watch a game of Hapoel Jerusalem or not, or to go with him. What place to give my songs in the children's lives, performances, all kinds of such places that I don't have an answer for. But we are in constant motion, and over the years the edges are mending."

Banai acknowledged that he has indeed progressed a lot in his life and gained many insights, but despite this, he still feels as if he is at the beginning of his journey. "I have a great yearning for a life of partnership and family, a life of sanctity and fidelity, without emotional upheavals and storms," he said. "For many years I thought choosing a life of Torah and mitzvot provided a sort of life insurance. And really, miraculously, it happened! Thank Hashem, it is wonders that I have my children and the Torah. But now I have a kind of journey that is more about managing to bring things into practice... This connection between my authenticity and Torah and mitzvot is complex. Often I return from learning Gemara straight to a rehearsal room, and still experience a dissonance between the simple self I have in the rehearsal room and the commandment sitting with me next to the Gemara and halacha."

Banai was asked how to balance between spreading Torah and the desire not to preach. Banai responded simply: "We don't try to make people repent," and clarified: "I don't feel like being an anarchist, but many times I feel that people come with some agenda that they 'want to do something with this person,' looking at him, talking to him, but not seeing him, just finding someone to influence. There is something external about it. It deters me. That tone constricts me. It feels like someone wants to do something to him – and he doesn't know what or who. It's so pressing and distant, when essentially, close to this person, is everything he needs. Inside him is an internal treasure and all I am supposed to do is to manage to speak to him and awaken him, not to bring him to repentance, but to make him think."

When the interviewer asked whether he returned to religion gently or with a "hammer," Banai replied: "With a hammer of good points. In Shinkin, Rabbi Gisin told tales over tomato pizza. I was after India and after Mitzpe Ramon, shattered from a relationship and feeling like the giant posters in the streets were closing in on me; feeling something here isn't right, isn't bringing me something good. And something in Rabbi Gisin's tales spoke to some inner place that is holy. And that place awakened... It's fun, but it's quite a mark to my identity. Until it shapes and stabilizes, if at all, in my case inside some one identity not constantly experiencing dissonance between my commitment and attachment to who I was, and a life of faith, partnership, and family."

Banai shared how in his childhood he didn't recognize himself as part of any story but learned to discern his family narrative through returning to faith. "I learned the journey of the Banai family: Rachamim Banai, with his son Yaakov and his wife Rachel, and Yaakov's son, Eliyahu, who is twelve, with the neighbor Hanin walking through the desert with camels and donkeys in 1880, to a port city in Persia. For several weeks crossing the desert, from there taking a journey ship to Mumbai, and from Mumbai to Egypt by ship. They have no food, nothing, sitting among the crates for two months. From Egypt to Jaffa, from Jaffa to Jerusalem. This is how the Banai family comes to Jerusalem." Since the discovery of the story, Banai says, he feels Jerusalemite. "When I returned to faith, I looked many times at my Judaism, and it seemed to me like a kind of vacuum. Where am I from, after all, and where am I going... Today I understand that I needed to gather Ruth, the music, and Rabbi Nachman to return to Jerusalem and continue my family's journey. I'm not a vacuum, I'm a branch on a tree with roots.. To impart this speech to someone, to recognize the journey of him and his family and honor that journey, to agree to root it, is part of recognizing Judaism," he said.

Banai shared that he fears his music, which draws him to the externalities. "There's still a desire to succeed and prove and compete, honor and money. I always had the feeling that one day I'd be able to give it up, years pass and it doesn't happen. It doesn't happen also because I understand there's a real, essential point sustaining this thing – the music. It's something that miraculously I know how to do, I'm not a musician, I don't feel like a musician, I don't really know how to play, I don't really know how to sing." So what does he do on stage? "I have some ability to communicate with people, there's a blessing there. I constantly tell Hashem 'enough already' and fear he won't continue, but he continues to add more."

Banai spoke about the process he goes through in writing his songs. "The moment I strike a chord, two hundred thousand people enter my house. The house fills and fills with people watching me in silence. And slowly the house empties out. And if a song comes out, it means I was alone. Something like that... like prayer, it’s the kind of thing that can only occur in intimacy."

Banai talked about the difficulty of enduring the journey over time, sharing the strength he gains from people who have journeyed and reached someplace. About his connection with Rabbi Uri Zohar he says: "A Jewish man of eighty-four, who has been through what he's been through and found what he found, and he is still searching. This ability to be in motion, in faith, progression at age eighty-four, that is astounding dedication."

Banai was asked if he feels closer to Hashem today than in the early years of returning to faith. According to him, "I'm closer to Him in inner work. I merit solitude on a quite consistent basis, and it's very close to myself and probably also to the Master of the world. From Rabbi Gad's classes, I also heard an analogy from navigation," he adds. "In navigation, you know that if, for example, you want to reach the Beit Guvrin caves and have a map - you are missing a very critical piece of information: where you are in relation to the map. I think many times in Avodat Hashem, we’re missing that detail. We march somewhere and skip inner work. A person needs to learn to know themselves."

Banai was asked about his attitude towards sub-sectors within the religious-Charedi community and his place among them. "I feel there is a lack of humility in each of the sectors," he said. "Each sector has arrogance over the neighboring sector, and even I, as one without a sector, have arrogance over all the sectors. It becomes a very arrogant world, as if each one is indeed an incredible find... everyone is broken, and each holds onto his method. If we come with humility, we will gain much more."