I Thought He Was Dead: A Spiritual Memoir

by Ralph Benmergui

In this wise and funny memoir Ralph Benmergui, one of Canada’s beloved storytellers, shares his path from resident class clown and the son of Moroccan immigrants to gracing TV screens across Canada and into his third, unexpected, act in Hashpa’ Jewish Spiritual Direction. I Thought He Was A Spiritual Memoir is the perfect book for those looking to reinvent themselves at any time of life and Ralph Benmergui is the best possible guide for the journey.

Genres: Memoir

290 pages, Paperback

Published September 28, 2021

About the author

Ralph Benmergui is best known as a TV and radio personality. First at the CBC for over twenty years and then at Jazz FM with his morning show Benmergui in the Morning. Born in Tangiers, Morocco, Ralph and his family arrived in Canada in the late fifties, settling in Toronto. Ralph has had an eclectic career. Stand-up comic, singer in a band, national media, then government communications. Executive Advisor to the President at Sheridan College and along the way seeking out and becoming an ordained Spiritual Director.

Reviews

[Brian Fraser · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ralph Benmergui doesn’t like the way our culture relates to people over 65, like him – and me. He thinks, backed up by the experience of many within his networks of inspiration and influence, that we have been demeaned and dismissed far too often for far too long. This book is his manifesto for living our saging years differently gathered together in a praxis of flourishing that heals the world into a hopeful future. It is a delightful and transformative read.

Benmergui is a prominent figure in Canada. His recognition is rooted primarily in his years as an actor, comedian, and radio/TV host. After than came to an end (the stories of which are told with great honesty and feeling), he became an advisor to colleges and political parties, then a spiritual director in the Jewish Renewal movement, especially as articulated in the work of Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi on growing from aging to saging. That movement is reformulating Judaism with more ecumenical, mystical, and musical approaches to human and earthly flourishing. Throughout his life, he has faced medical and relational challenges that brought him face-to-face with his mortality and frailty. Now, as he says so simply and eloquently, is his time “to reap the rewards that forgiveness and reflection can bring.”

Benmergui, similar to me, has owned the fact this he has a “neurodiverse” brain. It’s a more a more positive way of talking about Attention Deficit Disorder. The advantages, when well managed, are a synthetic crystallizing way of considering how things in all their diversity are interrelated and can come together in a variety of forms of significance. The book is a wonderful journey through the intricate intersections that feed his soul.

I’ll give you a taste of that in the following random quotes that caught my attention:

To live is to be wounded – it is how we tend to the wounds we suffer and inflict that mark the quality of our journey. (61)

We talk ad nauseam of innovation in the new millennium, but we do not allow for it to flourish. We are too timid. Innovation requires courage. My definition is simple: Innovation is subversion looking for respect. (89)

But over the years of my spiritual hunt I’ve found that it is not the answer the satisfies me, it’s refining the question. (98)

Part of the work of becoming an elder is crossing the bridge from ego to eco. How can I become part of the larger landscape of community? How can I become useful as a mentor? (133)

Humility is presence tinged with grace. (136)

… I have come to the proverbial fork in the road and have decided that the way forward is about moving from success to significance. (146)

There is an ebb and flow to my spirituality. When the tide is in, I am awash with feelings of unity and find that the doorway to my compassion opens just enough to let in the beauty and sorrow of this existence. (168)

I’m not saying that jazz has some magical power – though it does – but in the years that I hosted a jazz program, I came to realize a few things about the people who play it. They don’t do it because they are going to get famous, or rich. For most, the crowds are small and the pay is smaller. They do it because they have to. It is in them and it must come out. They have to have a level of musicianship that only finds its parallels in the classical musics of the world. The other part worth noting is that one can grow old in jazz with no need to recreate the adolescent hormone rush that feeds so much pop culture. A seventy-two-year-old pianist can sit in the pocket of this rich and spiritual music and just play. (186)

For me, the central question of faith is not where is God, but where am I? What have I done to make myself available to all this is around me? (190)

It’s hard to know when we’ve crossed [the bridge to saging]. I haven’t encountered any “aha” moments that changed everything. It’s more a bits-and-bytes-style accumulation of seemingly disparate shards of knowing and unknowing. (205)

And above and beyond our personal challenges [as elders], there hovers still a culture that will do little for us beyond pathologizing and caricaturing us. We will have to claim the mantle of wisdom keepers, wrestle it away from the anti-wrinkle hucksters and cruise ship operators. (235)

There is only one cure for the toxic effect that regret can and does have, and that is forgiveness. (255)

Instead of seeing it as self-flagellation, Jewish scholars say that sin is simply the lack of aim. Yes, aim. (261)

… I have come to believe that without a spiritual life we have devolved into a life of arrogance. With our humility gone we have become rapacious and entitled. We have thrown God out. We look for a different type of certainty when facing the unknown. The kind that toxic men offer through law, order, and the power of the mob. (285)

This is not the age of surrender. This is the time to collect our gifts, and to offer them to a world in need of elders and their mentorship. (289)

I hope these “bits-and bytes” will provoke you to buy, read, and pass on this wonderful memoir. Benmergui fills his pages with a delightfully idiosyncratic wisdom for those of us who are saging in our care of God’s creation and for those of all generations who want to engage with us in discerning dialogue about the ways we can collaborate in that significance. Thanks, Ralph. SHALOM!

[Alex Griller · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very highly recommended. Engaging and poignant.

Benmergui, now in “the autumn of life” details his journey from brash young icon of the Canadian entertainment world, to empathetic spiritual mentor.

On the way, life applied some harsh lessons. He learned from them, as we all must.
So entertaining and enjoyable to read, you forget how insightful and intelligent the author is.

[Cindy.Sherban · Rating 3 out of 5]

liked the end more than the start. some repetition, perhaps in the event people are reading only certain chapters. i appreciated reading snippets of various religious traditions/practices.

[Patrick · Rating 5 out of 5]

Benmergui not only looks back in this memoir, but also forward. He provides some valuable thinking about growing older in an ageist time and about things we can do to meet the emotional and spiritual challenges we all face. It is a good read… at times funny, thoughtful and poignant. Reading this book was time well-spent.

[M. Sarki · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not for me. Just could not connect at all even though my age should have afforded a different result. Sorry.