Prayer is for Everyone

From the tiled floor synagogues of ancient Palestine, to the cramped ghetto quarters of the Middle Ages; from the beautiful synagogues of Moorish Spain, to the drafty wooden shuls of the shtetl; from the breathtakingly beautiful synsagogues of Europe, to the one room shuls of New York's Lower East Side; wherever Jews have been, whatever our situation, we have prayed. The siddur has been one of the most widely owned, and most often read of any Jewish book. And through most of that time we have never seen the need to have a "professional religious person" to lead us in prayer. The rabbi we see in most synagogues today standing on the bima is a very recent development. Through most of our history we have allowed anyone with knowledge of the service, and who could read or chant the prayers, to lead.

In keeping with that spirit we are beginning a series on the prayer service. Wherever you are, in a large busy congregation where the rabbi really needs an occassional "day of rest," to a small community where a rabbi might get out to see you once a month, if you are lucky, we hope you can learn the siddur and start a group that can lead your own services.

For most of our examples we will be using Shaarei Tefillah, Gates of Prayer (Gates of Prayer, CCAR c1975), a Reform prayerbook, because it presents most of the service in English and easy to read. We are assuming that most people do not have a working knowledge of Hebrew.

The basic service is divided into the following sections:

The Preliminary Blessings

The Call to Worship

The Shema and its Blessings
The Avot or Tefilah
Torah Service

The Concluding Prayers

Before next month get a copy of the siddur, preferably one with a good amount of English, and locate the sections of the service listed above. Read through the Weekday Morning Service until you are familiar with its content. In the first lesson we will be looking at the first two sections of the service, The Preliminary Blessings, and the Call to Worship.

Remember, if you have any questions email us! We will post all questions and answers in the next article. Also, since this is a learning series as each article appears we will simply add it to the preceeding lesson.

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