Deuteronomy Cycle Four Va'etchanon 3:23 to 7:11

Va'etchanon

What is prayer and how do we do it? This (if we look at the long dialogues in Talmud) is the big question in Va'etchanon. It is seemingly simple. After all, we go to temple and therefore we pray. But some Talmudic rabbis didn’t even pray in temple. In Tiberias where there were 13 temples during the days of the Sanhedrin, two rabbis would pray at the pillars where they studied (Birachot 30a). So, what this means is that first, temple is not a free ride to God. We need to do the work. And second, prayer comes from within not outside of us.

Let’s not get confused though. The prayer, born deep in our hearts as it is, isn’t there to cycle around in our hearts forever and never see the light of day. Prayer, in other words, is almost always not about our personal needs and struggles. It has more to do with the propelling of our light, an offering, out of ourselves and back to the source, the God- center from which it comes. This is hard to understand… that prayer at its finest vibration, isn’t really about me and my needs. And it might seem even stranger, but prayer uses that same personal supplication to ignite it, to give it the force to travel beyond self. In other words, our ability to find humility and grace and bow before God in our personal time of need creates the wholeness necessary to bring our light to God and to the community. The power of our supplication feeds into the power of the high-vibration prayer. Soon, a cycle is created and we become the prayer itself. 

This is Moses. He leads the people through the wilderness. He raises them up. One can say that all of the work that Moses does until he is standing before God in tachanun is a parallel to our standing prayers (weekday and Shabbat). If you look at the first four blessings (Avot, Gevurot, Kedushah, and Da’at) we can see this one long prayer in action. Moses is helping to satisfy the covenant made with the fathers and therefore helping to assure our continuation (by leading the Israelites to the Promised Land). He is performing miracles (like the parting of the Reed Sea). He is praising God like an angel (by being the messenger between God and the people) and showing through his behavior how to have intimacy with God. There are 19 (weekday) blessings and it is easy to see how his actions reflect all of them. His human body is in perpetual prayer, a place of the prophet, a place where many of us yearn to be. Then, we arrive at the most awesome tachanun, the one we would all like to emulate, the epitome of the beautiful supplication. This is because of the words but also because of the powerful restraint and focus that Moses demonstrates leading up to the supplication itself. Here is a man who has dedicated his life to the community and now, just when he can’t anymore, when he is almost realizing that the dedication itself has been his salvation and enlightenment, he enters into a personal prayer to God for that same enlightenment. The kinetic energy, that yearning, that love, that craving, is propelled from his heart through the opening of intimacy. He is so close, so very close, that he can’t see that he already has that which he is pleading for. He has already entered the Promised Land. What we see therefore is that the heightened most glorious goal of the supplication itself isn’t satisfaction of the need being asked…but added ignition for the one prayer between God and the people….manifested here by the Sh’ma. 

This is a lot to say and it is supported by rabbis of Talmud as well as the Sfas Emet.

In Berakot (30a) Rav Hana and Rav Hisda discuss how long to wait between recitations of the Amidah (if one errs and wants to repeat the first) . One said, long enough to focus with a supplicant frame of mind. One said, long enough to fall into an interceding frame of mind. Here, the rabbis connect the supplication of Moses to the Amidah. They also (both considered) suggest that tachanun can be both a supplication and a beginning/continuing point of prayer. 

We also read (in Birachot 30a) that while we are engaged in prayer if we are outside of Israel we want to turn mentally…turn our hearts…towards Israel. If we are in Israel, we turn towards Jerusalem. If we are in Jerusalem we turn towards the sanctuary. If we are in the sanctuary we face the Holy of Holies. If we are in the Holy of Holies we mentally face behind the mercy-seat. And….this is important…if we are behind the mercy seat we imagine ourselves in front of it…. This way all of Israel will turn their hearts towards the same place…. Prayer, therefore, is about all of us bringing the light from our heart to the same holy place, the unseen, the only-to-be-imagined. Also, the action of Moses to take part in tachunan at that moment in Deuteronomy 3:23 is similar to his imagining himself in front of the mercy seat. 

Finally, the Sfas Emet points out a teaching in Sifre: “These words…shall be upon they heart” (are there because) when you place the words upon your heart you will come to know the One who spoke and caused the world to be. The Sfas Emet further says…by placing the words on your heart always and longing to come to the love of God, the spirit of holiness that dwells within you will be revealed to you. Here we can see the placing of words upon the heart as the personal prayer (the supplication) and the revelation of the spirit of holiness as the process of the awesome hard-to-to reach beautiful prayer of Moses before and after. 

How do we apply this to today? Be good to yourself. Begin prayer by deep self-introspection. Then, when you feel ready, allow your prayer to include the person next to you, and then the next person and soon the whole congregation, the town, the state, the country, the world. If your mind wanders back to yourself, like Moses, realize that a personal supplication in the middle is there not to be satisfied but to light up that which you have already begun. Let yourself go to your personal place of need. It will only bring strength to the Sh’ma. Bring the prayer outside of temple. Speak in prayers to your children, people who you see, animals, trees. Include the world. Know that the vibration you share will be seen and received differently by everyone, each according to his heart. Know you can do this. Know who you are.