Headline, not footnote
prayer is more natural need
than obligation
This poem came about as the result of pondering how prayer is viewed as an obligation we squeeze in before doing our real day's work. Even people who are involved in spiritual pursuits such as learning or kirruv sometimes rush Tefila. And it's not uncommon to hear learning quickly and superficially referred to as "davening it up," as if rushing was the essence of prayer.
It's interesting, because what you are saying is certainly true for me when it comes to davening the "prescribed" stuff - Shemonah Esrei or Shema (mainly the prayers that I say in Hebrew and only understand superficially). But when I talk to G-d in my own words, which I certainly consider prayer as well, there is no haste involved. If I had more time to myself, I would probably do it for a lot more time.
ReplyDeleteYes. Praying in any words at any time doesn't get the PR it deserves. That was another a nice part of Ushpizin - that the example of the man's prayer that we see is in a forest and in his own words.
ReplyDeleteSomeone dear to me once taught me that we can pray through our diaries - literally speak to G-d that way too.
Prayer is one of theose things that is treated one way on the books, but often differently in life. There's a well known text regarding davening, that states - better a little with kavanah than a lot without kavanah. Along these lines, it is better too, to pray in the language we understand.
The most heartfelt and true prayers are the spontaneous ones, I think, in whatever words they appear. Sometimes words we daven by rote, come to us later with deep meaning.
ReplyDeleteThe language is a problem, but I also have a lot of difficulties with the concepts of our institutionalized prayers. Some of it I do get, but I also can't connect so well with the desperate pleading that I be allowed to make sacrifices or that Hashem raises the dead. Those ideas are so foreign to me that it makes prayer sometimes seem quite distant.
ReplyDeleteThank you both for the comments. I agree with what you said Mirel, and replied more in the above post.
ReplyDeleteShoahana - I appreciate the honesty. I recently linked to a Times article about Techiyat HaMetim, which the author concludes by saying even though many don't believe in it, as Yom Kippur ebbs away they kind of do. Traditonal Jews do believe in life after death - some say that the way the world is, you get the feeling that there's got to be more. That's an on one foot point - there's a lot to read on the topic. Regarding sacrifces - it may seem foreign in detail, but what I think we're taught to yearn for more than the specific mode is the reality of the time of the Bet MaMikdash, which was that people felt G-d's presence in a clear way, via all that went on in and around the B"H"M...
funny, i was just discussin this with someone recently when i put away my siddur and exclaimed how relieved i am to have finished davening.
ReplyDeleteits not a burden but yes its an obligation.
yknow theres a reason why tefillah wasnt left to our own devices, and rather the chochomim gave us the 'text'.
(learning more than the simple meaning of the words-though that too is way helpful n important-will make davening a whole new experience)
may hashem answer the tefillah that weve been askin and beggin for way too long now-to take us outta this golus and bring us to the ultimate and final geula already!
There's little that's more annoying than asking a great question and getting conventional, typical answers that don't do it for you. Sorry Shoshana and everyone else. But me, and now The Sabra, we're trying...
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