Our Toronto beit midrash is housed in the Clanton Park shul, which davens a nusach that varies from my own.
[There are different versions - nuschaot - of traditional prayer, most popularly Nusach Ashkenaz, Sfard and Nusach Ari. The variations between them do not touch fundamental biblical obligations, but they do include variant texts of berachot, changes in the order of the introductory “psukei d'zimra” davening and the concluding parts of davening, and a couple of elements which exist in one version and not another.]
I enjoy aspects of using this new nusach. Saying “ויצמח פורקניה ויקרב משיחיה (May His redemption sprout forth, and may His messiah come soon)” in kaddish is a big plus for me, as is the Keter version of kedushah.
But I am having trouble with tachanun. Specifically, I am having trouble with viduy and with the yud-gimel midot harachamim [13 attributes of Divine mercy].
After the morning amidah, everyone immediately launches into viduy – Ashamnu, Bagadnu, Gazalnu – the paragraph of prayer with which we acknowledge our sins and apologize for them. But everyone says it so quickly! I'm used to saying this paragraph on fast days, and in the period leading up to Yom Kippur. I'm used to adding my personal foibles and contemplating each word, thinking through the things that I have done wrong or that I have not done right, but all around me people are klopping ashamnubagadnugazalnu and they're on the next paragraph before I've gotten anywhere. [I'm not the only one; I was in a meeting with a leading Toronto posek last week, and he complained about the same thing.]
Then, after speedreading viduy, they invoke the 13 attributes of Divine mercy that HaShem taught Moshe (Sh'mot 33). I can't keep up with that recitation, either; these represent the most intimate words uttered by HaShem to Moshe, פה אל פה, directly, a formula to be invoked when seeking Divine mercy throughout the generations – and I'm going to treat them like the fine-print legalese at the end of a car commercial?
I know that the people around me, who have been reciting these paragraphs daily for all of their halachic lives, are able to concentrate on them more concisely than I can. But I can't do it. Certainly, I could say the words as quickly as they do – but what would be the point?
So for now, I'll stand silently and wait while they say these tefillot. And I'll look forward to kaddish, and answering Amen to ויצמח פורקניה ויקרב משיחיה.
Showing posts with label Tefillah: Nusach (edition). Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tefillah: Nusach (edition). Show all posts
Monday, August 31, 2009
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
Pray your own way (Derashah Day 7 of Pesach 5769)
Over the past few weeks, several people have sent me a graphic of a three-lane highway through Yam Suf, complete with a truck labelled “Moses Transports” and a road sign indicating “Split sea next 4 miles.” It’s a cute picture, but it has nothing on the midrashic account of how Gd split the sea.
Per the midrash, Gd split the sea into twelve separate corridors, one for each tribe, with nutrition - and more - provided by the walls of water themselves.
That image of a twelve-tunneled sea with tribal lanes is fascinating, but troubling – why does Gd want this? The Jews left Egypt as one nation, ובני ישראל יוצאים ביד רמה, and they are praised for arriving at Sinai as a unified nation, so why divide them into tribes for the trip through the water?
The image is especially troubling when we study the history of those tribal divisions. From the rivalry between Rachel and Leah, to the division between the children of the various matriarchs, to the sale of Yosef by his brothers, the origins of tribe-specific identity hardly bode well for their descendants.
And then, when we examine that future, we find it only gets worse. In the days of the Shoftim, when the Jews were oppressed by Canaanites, the judge and prophetess Devorah found she couldn’t inspire certain tribes to fight on behalf of the others. And then, later on, strife would develop between the Yehudah region in the south, and the other tribes to the north.
On the whole, particularism never worked out well for the Jews as a nation – so why did Gd divide up the tribes in a great demonstration of particularism at their moment of united origin,as they left Egypt and crossed through the Sea?
A mystical idea might help us understand this Divine decision.
R’ Chaim Vital taught, in the name of the Ari ז"ל, that each shevet (tribe) inherits a certain spiritual character from its original progenitor. Reuven with his teshuvah. Yehudah with his leadership. Yosef with his charm as well as his activism. Even Shimon with his violence. Each of Yaakov’s sons charted a path of personal identity and Divine connection, based upon traits inherent to his own soul and passed down to his descendants.
Therefore, each shevet possesses its own means of prayer, its own words and its own structure which enable it to communicate optimally with HaShem. For the most part, including the Amidah, our davening is the same, but each tribe has special quirks in its shared soul, which are reflected in the ideal form of prayer appropriate for that shevet.
Each tribe is therefore charged with a mandate: To be particularistic in its spiritual life and to celebrate that which is unique to its character, inherited through mystical spiritual genetics as well as the language of shared experience and shared commitment.
To return to the Sea, then:
Chazal testify that every Jew who crossed the sea witnessed Gd in a way that even the greatest prophet, even Yechezkel in his vision of the Divine throne room, never experienced. This was a moment of supreme, sublime connection to the Gd who created not only the Jewish nation, but each individual Jew as well.
Lumping the Jewish nation together as a single bloc at that spiritual moment would have obliterated that celebrated heritage which was special to each tribe. Better to provide each tribe with its own passage, highlighting that which was special about each.
Today, we don’t know our individual tribal identities; we daven in the nusach we have received, and we hope that’s sufficient.
But taking the lesson of tribe-specific spirituality a step further, we can find a method of davening that works for our personal natures, as individuals. Whether that means more singing or less, more contemplation or more verbalization, more spontaneous additions or less, there is a path, within the bounds of halachah, for each of us to connect – but we need to put the work into finding it, whether in one shul or another, on a daily basis. Trying sporadically, on a shabbos or a yom tov or a random Monday, is not a promising way to reach the deepest parts of our spiritual identities; we need to be open-minded, we need to be thorough, and we need to be consistent, if we hope to find the path that resonates best for us.
Those unique passages through the Sea promise us that we will be best served when we recognize the character of our personal relationship with Gd, and turn it to our advantage.
This same theme of spiritual particularism shaped the mishkan, the traveling shul the Jews built in the desert.
The mishkan is usually seen as a symbol of unity – it was parked at the center of the Jewish camp, it was built by everyone together, and many of its elements, such as the menorah, the keruvim and the trumpets, were made out of single blocks of metal.
Nonetheless, the mishkan itself – the tent in which the rituals of service to Gd were performed – celebrated particularism. The mishkan tent was formed, in part, of the hide of an animal called a תחש. The sages translated תחש as ססגונא, explaining that this animal is שש בגוונים הרבה, it rejoices in its many colors.
The sasgona, the tachash, does more than just preen; this animal thrills in its diversity.
Yes, the mishkan was a central site to which all Jews could gather for a unified avodah. But each Jew, each tribe, would bring its own individual approach to that central site, would draw on those characteristics that had marked them as unique at the Sea, and through the combination of those disparate elements we would create a sasgona-like whole, many colors reaching Gd together.
-
Notes:
1. The midrash on the twelve tunnels is in Mechilta to Beshalach 4; the midrash on what the Jews experienced at the Sea is in Mechilta to Beshalach 3.
2. That special spiritual character of each shevet is visible in their placement around the mishkan, as well as the portions assigned to each shevet in Israel.
3. The idea that we stick to our inherited nusach because we presume it to be tribally appropriate is halachically important, and greatly debated regarding switching between nusach ashkenaz and sephard.
Per the midrash, Gd split the sea into twelve separate corridors, one for each tribe, with nutrition - and more - provided by the walls of water themselves.
That image of a twelve-tunneled sea with tribal lanes is fascinating, but troubling – why does Gd want this? The Jews left Egypt as one nation, ובני ישראל יוצאים ביד רמה, and they are praised for arriving at Sinai as a unified nation, so why divide them into tribes for the trip through the water?
The image is especially troubling when we study the history of those tribal divisions. From the rivalry between Rachel and Leah, to the division between the children of the various matriarchs, to the sale of Yosef by his brothers, the origins of tribe-specific identity hardly bode well for their descendants.
And then, when we examine that future, we find it only gets worse. In the days of the Shoftim, when the Jews were oppressed by Canaanites, the judge and prophetess Devorah found she couldn’t inspire certain tribes to fight on behalf of the others. And then, later on, strife would develop between the Yehudah region in the south, and the other tribes to the north.
On the whole, particularism never worked out well for the Jews as a nation – so why did Gd divide up the tribes in a great demonstration of particularism at their moment of united origin,as they left Egypt and crossed through the Sea?
A mystical idea might help us understand this Divine decision.
R’ Chaim Vital taught, in the name of the Ari ז"ל, that each shevet (tribe) inherits a certain spiritual character from its original progenitor. Reuven with his teshuvah. Yehudah with his leadership. Yosef with his charm as well as his activism. Even Shimon with his violence. Each of Yaakov’s sons charted a path of personal identity and Divine connection, based upon traits inherent to his own soul and passed down to his descendants.
Therefore, each shevet possesses its own means of prayer, its own words and its own structure which enable it to communicate optimally with HaShem. For the most part, including the Amidah, our davening is the same, but each tribe has special quirks in its shared soul, which are reflected in the ideal form of prayer appropriate for that shevet.
Each tribe is therefore charged with a mandate: To be particularistic in its spiritual life and to celebrate that which is unique to its character, inherited through mystical spiritual genetics as well as the language of shared experience and shared commitment.
To return to the Sea, then:
Chazal testify that every Jew who crossed the sea witnessed Gd in a way that even the greatest prophet, even Yechezkel in his vision of the Divine throne room, never experienced. This was a moment of supreme, sublime connection to the Gd who created not only the Jewish nation, but each individual Jew as well.
Lumping the Jewish nation together as a single bloc at that spiritual moment would have obliterated that celebrated heritage which was special to each tribe. Better to provide each tribe with its own passage, highlighting that which was special about each.
Today, we don’t know our individual tribal identities; we daven in the nusach we have received, and we hope that’s sufficient.
But taking the lesson of tribe-specific spirituality a step further, we can find a method of davening that works for our personal natures, as individuals. Whether that means more singing or less, more contemplation or more verbalization, more spontaneous additions or less, there is a path, within the bounds of halachah, for each of us to connect – but we need to put the work into finding it, whether in one shul or another, on a daily basis. Trying sporadically, on a shabbos or a yom tov or a random Monday, is not a promising way to reach the deepest parts of our spiritual identities; we need to be open-minded, we need to be thorough, and we need to be consistent, if we hope to find the path that resonates best for us.
Those unique passages through the Sea promise us that we will be best served when we recognize the character of our personal relationship with Gd, and turn it to our advantage.
This same theme of spiritual particularism shaped the mishkan, the traveling shul the Jews built in the desert.
The mishkan is usually seen as a symbol of unity – it was parked at the center of the Jewish camp, it was built by everyone together, and many of its elements, such as the menorah, the keruvim and the trumpets, were made out of single blocks of metal.
Nonetheless, the mishkan itself – the tent in which the rituals of service to Gd were performed – celebrated particularism. The mishkan tent was formed, in part, of the hide of an animal called a תחש. The sages translated תחש as ססגונא, explaining that this animal is שש בגוונים הרבה, it rejoices in its many colors.
The sasgona, the tachash, does more than just preen; this animal thrills in its diversity.
Yes, the mishkan was a central site to which all Jews could gather for a unified avodah. But each Jew, each tribe, would bring its own individual approach to that central site, would draw on those characteristics that had marked them as unique at the Sea, and through the combination of those disparate elements we would create a sasgona-like whole, many colors reaching Gd together.
-
Notes:
1. The midrash on the twelve tunnels is in Mechilta to Beshalach 4; the midrash on what the Jews experienced at the Sea is in Mechilta to Beshalach 3.
2. That special spiritual character of each shevet is visible in their placement around the mishkan, as well as the portions assigned to each shevet in Israel.
3. The idea that we stick to our inherited nusach because we presume it to be tribally appropriate is halachically important, and greatly debated regarding switching between nusach ashkenaz and sephard.
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