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The Structure of the Prayer Book The Jew prays three times daily -- morning, afternoon, and night. The origin of this schedule of prayer is shrouded in mystery. The Rabbis of early days said that Abraham ordered the morning prayer, Isaac established the afternoon prayer, and Jacob, the evening prayer. Of course, it would be a very fine contribution on their part, if this could be historically established. The prophet Ezekiel, who lived during the Babylonian exile, is reported to have prayed three times daily. As we know, prayer was instituted as a religious obligation when the second Temple was destroyed in 85 C.E. Since there were no further possibilities of continuing the sacrificial system as outlined in the Torah, prayer took its place. We could possibly relate the morning prayer to the public sacrifice which was offered every morning, and the afternoon prayer to the sacrifice that was brought at that time. However, the Temple on the Mount in Jerusalem was closed in the evenings and no sacrifices were brought during the night. On this assumption, there is no Temple precedent for the evening service. Consequently, the morning and afternoon services are looked upon as an obligation; however, the evening service, the sages believed, was a voluntary act. Nevertheless, because it has been so long established, it is now considered just as obligatory as the others. Another reference for the morning and evening service which is often cited, is the statement in the Sh'ma "and thou shalt speak of them when thou liest down and when thou risest up." However, we again miss one of the services, namely in the afternoon. Be it as it may, regardless of origin, the fact remains that the devout Jew should pray three times daily. The evening prayer is called Maariv, from the word "erev" which means evening. On the other hand, the morning service is called Shacharit, a derivation from the word "shachar," which means morning. The afternoon service, however, is called Mincha, which is the designation of the sacrifice brought in the Temple in the afternoon and does not refer to the time of the day. We shall use these Hebrew terms in discussing the prayers hereafter. "Siddur" is derived from the Hebrew word "seder" which means order or arrangement. This book contains the order of the service. The holiday prayer book has a special designation and is called "machzor." Basically, the framework of the daily, holiday, and semi-holiday services are the same. The latter takes on a somewhat more elaborate form. On all holidays and semi-festival days like Rosh Chodesh (the beginning of the month) and Chol HaMoed (the intermediate days between holidays) as well as on the Sabbath, an additional service called "Musaf" takes place. The origin of this service can be traced to Temple days when additional sacrifices were brought at these particular times. The Sabbath eve also has an introductory service which is called "Kabbalat Shabbat." Yom Kippur has two additional services -- "Kol Nidre" at the commencement of the fast, and "Neila" at its close. Let us turn now to the Maariv service. The axis around which the service rotates is the Sh'ma. The Sh'ma section consists of three paragraphs, two of them taken from the book of Deuteronomy and the last one from the book of Numbers. The Talmudic formula for the Maariv service is that there are to be two blessings before the Sh'ma and two following it. Following this last blessing is the Amida, thus named from the Hebrew word "Amod" meaning to stand, because it is a prayer of silent devotion, recited while standing. It is also designated as Sh'moneh Esrey (18) since the weekday Amida originally contained 18 benedictions. In the Talmud, it is designated as T'fila. After the Amida, we have on the Sabbath, the Kiddush and the Alenu, followed by the Mourner's Kaddish. The Maariv service begins with the Barchu, which is probably one of the oldest formal prayers in our liturgy. This was the call of the priests to their people to service, and the response from the congregation in the Temple was "Praise be to the Lord who is blessed for all eternity." This prayer remained intact through the ages, and is used both in the morning and in the evening service as well as for the introduction to the blessings of the Torah when a man receives an Aliyah. It can be dismissed with these few words, awareness of its antiquity and recognizing it as the call to worship. |
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