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Prayer - A Summary In ancient days, Divine worship took place through the medium of sacrifices. The book of Leviticus sets up the sacrificial system in great detail. However, in addition to the sacrifices which were brought to the altar by the priests serving in the Temple, the Levites engaged in singing psalms and furnished musical background on the harp and the lyre. In the Book of Psalms, the Jew shows the highest genius for prayer. However, since the destruction of the Temple, lip service has replaced the worship through animal sacrifice. Support was found for this action in Hosea (Chapter 14:3), "We will render the offering of our lips in place of bullocks." Therefore, when we recite the procedure of sacrifice, or when we study the laws pertaining to the sacrifice it is considered to be equivalent to having brought the offerings. Our liturgy, particularly the silent devotion, is replete with excerpts from the Torah dealing with the necessary sacrifices. At a later date, excerpts from the Talmud were added at the beginning of the service. This section is called Korbanot. In addition, chapters from the psalms which the Levites were supposed to have recited in the Temple were included in the service. Thus the individual acts as Priest, Levite, and supplicant. Records show that during the second Temple pious people would recite the book of Psalms daily. From time to time, additions were made to the prayer book of other psalms and original prayers, and often individual verses from the psalms were put together to create moods of worship and a spirit of prayer. Thus in our prayer book, the Kabbalat Shabbat includes several chapters from the Book of Psalms. In the morning service, the section known as P'suke D'zimrah (the introductory hymns) are chapters from the Psalms and hallelujahs. Some verses are taken from Chronicles, Nehemiah, and the Book of Exodus, thus satisfying the most pious that they have fulfilled their duty of glorifying the God they worshipped. "If our mouths were filled with song as the sea, our tongues with joyful praise as the multitude of its waves, our lips with adoration as the spacious firmament...we would still be unable to thank and bless Thy name sufficiently, oh Lord our God and God of our fathers," is the plaintive cry of the poet. Seeking out God in all his manifestations, establishing our relationship with him as a Father, as King, as a Creator in prayer, the Jew emerges with a new spirit. He feels a kinship to God even as the child to his parents. He develops a sense of servitude even as the subject to his Sovereign, but in it all he finds reason for the Creator of all to be thoughtful even of insignificant man. A Hasidic Rabbi once said that the soul of man comes down from heaven on a long ladder and when it enters into man, the ladder is taken away. Some people find heaven too far away and do nothing about reaching it. Others keep jumping, thinking that they will jump high enough to reach into heaven. Still others rebuild the ladder and, rung by rung, come nearer to the spacious skies. Deeds are the supports of the ladder. With prayer, we fill in the rungs upon which man can climb into the spiritual realms. |
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