On the Connection Between Geulah and Tefillah: Overflowing with Song

[**"Geulah" refers to the brachah of redemption, the last brachah after the Shma, just before "Tefillah" which refers to the Amidah, the silent standing prayer**]

On the cusp of saying the Amidah, the pinnacle of our prayer service, we remind ourselves of the Israelites at the Sea, how they sang out their new song together in joy. The rabbis say it is essential to keep these two pieces tightly linked, not to speak or make any kind of break between them --you should remember the redemption at the Sea and then go right into your personal prayer. As I think of this each morning, I pray for my mind and my heart and my mouth to be opened up like the Sea and to pour forth a new Song like its water’s waves. We are so closed up and covered over. We don’t see what the angels see in the first brachah of the Shma – for them it is clear that the world is full of God’s glory. But we are too weighed down by our harried lives to feel this. Once, at the Sea, long ago, human beings did see what angels see clearly, and they, too, sang out in joy. As we stand, getting ready to speak to God each day, we pray to be opened again to such sight, to such awakening, to such fullness of presence, so that our lips, too, may overflow with song. Ilu finu male shirah kayam. If only our mouths were full of song like the sea.

On the Month of Elul

Today is the first day of Elul. There is a tradition that sees Elul as an acronym for the words: Ani L’Dodi v’Dodi li – “I am My Beloved’s (God’s) and My Beloved is mine.” This year the phrase speaks to me of belonging. I am not just a floating atom in the universe. I have roots and attachments. Even if my human roots and attachments shift around, I will always belong because I belong to God. There is a thread in me that connects directly to my Source and it is a thread woven of love. I will always have a place. I am surrounded, embraced by Presence.

On Tefillah (Prayer) and Spaciousness

Sometimes I wake up engrossed in minute thoughts and plans for the new day, all wrapped up in the tasks and concerns that surround me. What tefillah (prayer) does is to expand my world, to make me conscious of the vast universe, of the earth and the sky and the sun that God has created afresh today and of God Himself in all His incomprehensible vastness and then, before Shma, of the angels and their proclamations of God’s glory (look what they occupy themselves with compared to what I am worried about!). Meditation practices talk about breathing space into one’s worries, letting them be, but opening up the space around them so that they seem somehow smaller, less of a big deal. That’s what tefillah does for me. It breathes space into my brain, into my heart. The problem with our problems is that they loom too large. Taken as simply a problem in the world, it’s all manageable, but somehow our concerns seem to take over so that one feels preouccupied and unable to truly think or focus or enjoy anything else until that problem is resolved. Tefillah is a prism that helps enlarge and shift the focus beyond the confines of the self.

Tefillah Thoughts 1

1. Ashrei Yoshvei Veitekha: Happy are those who dwell in Your home, O God. I used to think this referred to the Temple or the Tabernacle or, in today’s world, to the synagogue. But today, looking out at the sun and the trees and the green sky, it occurred to me that it might also mean the world. Happy, fortunate are we who live in God’s home, this world. Happy, fortunate are we if we can appreciate that good fortune, if we can cherish the beauty, see the divinity in the world around us. There is holiness not just in the four walls of a prayer house, but in every step we take outside it. Ashrei Yoshvei Veitekha.

2. Karov Hashem Lekhol Korav, lekhol Asher Yikra’uhu Be’Emet: “God is close to all who call Him, to all those who call to Him in earnest.” It begins with us. As the Sefat Emet is always pointing out, you get what you put in. God is close to those who make the effort to call to Him. How to experience, to feel God’s presence? Call to Him and call to Him in earnest, with a full heart.

This morning I had a broken heart. It felt open and wounded. Nothing calamitous had occurred, but for some reason, after dropping my kids off at the day camp bus stop, I drove home with an emptiness and a loneliness and a sense of loss and endings. My children are leaving me. That is the way of the world. People leave each other. Some of our closest friends in Albany are moving out of town. There is a feeling of loss and grief.

I took the Piasetzner Rebbe’s advice this morning and decided to view such a feeling as “an opening of the soul,” an opportunity to cry out to God. Karov Hashem lekhol Korav. God is close to those who call Him, to those who call to Him be’emet -- in earnest. Usually it is hard to call in earnest; we are closed over to our soul and our feelings, a thousand practical concerns whirring through our minds. So, every once in a while, when the opportunity arises, and you are feeling strongly anyway – happy, sad, angry, irritated – seize the opportunity. That’s the Piasetzner Rebbe’s advice. Trying it this morning, alongside that feeling of loneliness and loss I also felt a sense of Presence.

3. Shma Yisrael Hashem Elokeinu Hashem Ehad: Hear O Israel, Hashem is our God, Hashem is One. I have been struggling with the particularlity of Israel and confused about my connection to both the people of Israel and to all of humanity. I wonder if that’s what it means to say “Hashem Elokeinu” – this God of ours, ours in particular, is also “Hashem Ehad,” the God of Unity, of All, the God who helps us see the unity of the universe and the connections. We begin with a personal feeling about Him, that He is ours, but somehow that needs to lead us next to a sense of wholeness and openness to everything, to the Unity of all.

Parashat Re'eh: Today

Hayom. Today. A mantra in this week’s parsha and throughout the book of Devarim. It is today that I am talking to you, commanding you these things. As Rashi interprets, you should feel as excited about the Torah as you would about a new declaration from the king that all run out to hear.

That is how we should greet each day. We say that God is mehadesh betuvo bekhol yom tamid ma’aseh breishit, that He renews the work of creation each morning with sunlight. All of creation, the grass, the trees, the birds and us are new each day. With what wonder we would look at the world and ourselves if we really felt that. It’d be like having the eyes of a child.

The word hayom literally means “the day.” Today is “the day,“ the most important day. Today the world was created. Today I experience revelation. The Rebbe of Kubrin, when asked: What is the most important thing a person needs to do, answered: Whatever needs to be done right now is the most important thing to do.

This message may seem obvious and simple, but it is such a struggle. We do so much planning and so much delaying of gratification, that after a while, we stop seeing the present as important. The present is always in the service of some other more important time. When does that other more important time finally arrive? How can we be really present to the present?

Summer Musings on Parashat Ekev and the Philiosophy of "Whatevs"

I decided to try adopting my son Medad’s new favorite saying, “whatevs” (translation: “whatever”) as a way of life. I noticed he says it when things don’t go exactly as he had planned or hoped: “whatevs,” meaning, “It doeesn’t matter that much. I’m just going to let it slide. I’m not going to let it bother me.” Essentially: No big deal.

I could use some of this attitude. I frequently wake up in the middle of the night with a worry that in the clarity and optimism of the morning light seems not to really matter all that much, certainly not to be worthy of lost sleep. I’d be happier and healthier if I just said “whatevs” more often.

At the same time I’ve been holding in my head a Rashi that my father pointed out to me this year, the first Rashi of this week’s parsha. Ekev, says Rashi, means that “If you keep even the mitzvot that you would normally trample on with your heels (Hebrew: ekev), then God will take care of you. “ The point is to be careful with a mitzvah kalah, a seemingly trivial mitzvah, just as you are careful with a mitzvah hamurah, a more serious one (to put in Pirkei Avot terms) – in other words, to take what seems to be exactly the opposite attitude of “whatevs” ; here everything matters, even the small stuff.

This careful, sincere attitude seems equally compelling – as my father pointed out to me, often it is indeed the small gestures in a relationship that make an impact, the daily acts of care, and in relation to God, the daily acts of devotion. Judaism, with all its intricacies, is based on this idea – you have to be careful how you act, not take things too lightly.

Both these ideas seem compelling to me; they both seem to hold a piece of the truth; and I’ve been trying to work out how to reconcile them. Here are some attempts (I’m open to others – please comment):

Maybe they each occupy a different realm. In relation to yourself, when things happen to you that you are unhappy or uncomfortable with for some reason, that is the time to say, at least most of the time – “whatevs.” It’s the ego that’s getting in the way here, so letting it slide is a good habit; it’ll gradually help us get out of our tiny individual shells and see the larger picture. On the other hand, in relation to others – people, animals, the earth, God – “whatevs” is a form of laziness and disloyalty, a lack of caring. You should never expect someone else to say “whatevs” in relation to something you do to them or fail to do; you can only do that for yourself; for others, you have to take the more careful, activist approach.

Or maybe the two ideas exist side by side in us and are meant to form some healthy tension. It may not always be easy to tell which side of the balance is called for. It is the old question of knowing which things in life can be changed and which cannot – some we need to dive into with all our attention to every detail, and others we need to simply accept with a shrug: “whatevs.” And maybe some situations and especially relationships require us to somehow maintain a posture of both at the very same moment – deep engagement with a light carefree laugh. It matters both a great deal and very little in the scheme of things. Life is both unbearably light and incredibly weighty at the same time.

Post Tisha B'Av Reflections 2013

#1:
I’ve noticed that when I’m sick or when I’m fasting there is a certain calm clarity that comes over me. My energy level is very low and I expend it only sparingly. It is suddenly clear to me what matters and what doesn’t. The emails can wait. It is right to just sit with my children and watch them eat. Only simple things are really necessary in life. I walk slowly and notice the flowers. It is like the world has suddenly become slow motion. I pray to take this perspective with me into my normal energetic detail-filled life.

#2:
Why fast and mourn on Tisha B’av? Why have Tisha B’av at all? Why not just focus on the light, on the joyous side of life – the Purims and the Hanukkahs? Because this, too, this deep sadness that is a part of our history, this heritage of suffering and pain, this, too is a part of God’s world. I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the Shma statement, and how we say all the time (twice a day) that God is one. What does it mean to be one? It’s all His. You can’t only want the good moods and the laughs. You have to somehow learn to embrace the crying. Not just to survive it. My oldest son Medad fasted the whole day for the first time this year, and that last hour, he said something about how he just wanted it to go fast, to get through it. I understood, but at the same time, I wondered – Shouldn’t we somehow embrace this, too? There is no hour in our lives that is not a part of God’s history, our precious gift. In one of the Tisha B’av kinot, lamentations, alternating lines end with Betzeti Mimitzrayim and Betzeti Miyerushalayim, “When I left Egypt,” and “When I left Jerusalem.” The one was a joyous leaving, the other a sad one, and the poet juxtaposes them to show the contrast, but at the same time, one gets a sense of the similarity, even in the way the two phrases sound. Tisha B’av comes to remind us to embrace all of our history and all of our lives, the ups, the downs, the joys and the irritations. Somehow they are all one.