PERSONAL, BUT ON BEHALF OF OTHERS:

Can a person converse with the Divine? (Rabbi Hillel Goldberg, 11/20/03, jewishworldreview.com)

In Boston, between 1969 and 1972, I heard the following from the late Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik, during one of his noted Saturday night public lectures:

Formal prayer in Judaism is an ethical gesture. The essential Jewish prayer is the "Eighteen Blessings" (Shemoneh Esrei). All the blessings are formulated in the plural. As Jews praise, petition or thank G-d, they do so on behalf of the entire community. For example, one does not ask G-d to heal one's illness and pains; one asks G-d to heal everyone. "Heal us," not "heal me," is the formulation. So it goes for the entire Eighteen Blessings.

If this is a conversation with G-d, it's depersonalized, to an extent. Someone in existential straits, be he ill, depressed, impoverished or insulted, will certainly not feel the same sense of closeness to G-d by praying on behalf of everybody as he will by praying from his own pain. Rabbi Soloveitchik observed: The tremendous obligation that the community imposes on each Jew who prays, in the plural, does not exclude personal conversation with G-d. As follows:

The end of the Eighteen Blessings is not its end. A few lines of prayer have been added on. If the Eighteen Blessings were sufficient, no more prayers would be needed. The additional prayers are in the singular. The individual, qua individual, must also converse with G-d.

Just so, a person's own prayers should not be limited by formal lines added to the Eighteen Blessings. That is why, said Rabbi Soloveitchik, the first added line is Psalms 19:15: "May the expressions of my mouth and the thoughts of my heart find favor before You, L-rd, my Rock and my Redeemer." This is meant to sum up one's own conversation with G-d. We have here a sandwich. The top layer is the concluding line of the Eighteen Blessings. The bottom layer is Psalms 19:15 ("the expressions of my mouth"). I supply the food in between — my own conversation with G-d. When I finish, I ask G-d to accept "the expressions of my mouth."

So, built into the structure of formal prayer is a time for conversation with G-d. Plain, simple talk. Besides my prayer for the community, there is a place for me to talk to G-d. Besides being an ethical gesture, prayer is a gesture of the individual's own heart.

Fine to talk to Him, but it seems like you should do so on behalf of others.

Posted by Orrin Judd at August 1, 2004 6:21 AM