Rambam Yomi: Tefillah uBirkat Cohanim (1-5)

Tefiallah uBirkat Cohanim (1)

From the Shema, we learn that you have to ‘Serve H” your Gd’ (Shemot 23:25). A commandment to pray every day. It could have just been once over your lifetime, but then we wouldn't have much tradition. And then it would be harder to get a minyan. This isn't one of those 'my hearing is up to par today,' I can't serve H.' You have to do it no matter what. This is an 'I am tired and I now have to wake up to serve the Creator before I go to work' kind of serving H' thingies. 

The Shema continues and also shows what it means to pray. And ‘You shall serve Him with all your hearts’ (Devarim 11:13). Serving with your heart is considered prayer. That means that you have to put a little effort into it. Maybe get in some of that pain of the breakup last week. Pain is a great source for prayer. Put in some of that stuff about how you cannot figure out how to work your lawnmower. That works really well into the request part of it.

Because it is not a time bound commandment, everybody has to do it, including women. We include women in some things and this is one of them. We don't even really include them. Truth is that women can do this by themselves. To note, labor is another great source of prayer. Hone the pain.

There are three aspects to Tefilah/prayer- Praise, Request and Thanks. Praise and thanks is based more on the good stuff that happens to you. People will look at you funny if you thank H' for the nail that got hammered into your foot. But then you can thank Gd that you are alive. That is always a good way to go on the negative, if you want to make it positive.

1:4- Till the exile of Nebuchadnezar, it was once a day. But then Ezra sees that people are forgetting stuff, so they make a set form of prayer. People were forgetting how to use their heart. They started liking the exile. Whenever good happens, they start to forget the pain, and Gd.

They came up with the 18 brachot for the silent prayer. A few could have been enough. We praise You, we thank You, We need a lot of help from You. Ezra and his people made it 18 so that we would never forget that we are spending a lot of time on this. 18 is also the numerology of the Hebrew word 'life.' 

1:5-8- They also came up with the two times a day, according to the daily sacrifices. Mariv, the evening prayer, was at first not obligatory, but the nation accepted it. Again making it harder on everybody. The two times a day was too easy. They noticed that people had 15 minutes of free time at night, so they made the Mariv obligatory.

There was the musaf added on Shabbat and holidays, along with that sacrifice. And then they added Ni’eelah, for Yom Kippur. With the no television or internet on Shabbat, there was more time found for prayer. Then add in no eating on Yom Kippur, add in a fifth one. The rabbis didn't want too much talking. 

Lesson: If you don't want to interact with people, pray.

1:9-10- You can always add a voluntary prayer. You can do those all day long. If you add a prayer service, you have to make it unique, because that shows it is a voluntary prayer. In the middle part of the prayers of request, you have to add in special stuff. You've got to ask for an XBox in there. Even if it isn't that unique, as long as you want the XBox, it is still voluntary. Ezra never made the XBox prayer a required on of the 18 blessings. You can also pray for a toy plane. Barbie always makes for a great prayer. Basially, any gifts you want on Chanukah make for a good volunteer prayer. 

 

Tefillah uBirkat Cohanim (2)

Raban Gamliel and his court added in an extra blessing. Making it the 19 benedictions, killing the whole numerology Chai/life thing, and thus not making it a good Bar Mitzvah gift. Even so, we still call it the ’18,' just to make it confusing and a good quiz question.

If you don’t have time, there is a quick blessing to say. It is called 'Haveynenu' and for some reason, my rabbis never told me about this one. Maybe the reform movement does have something going for it. 

You can say the quick one if you are pressured. I always felt pressured as a kid in Jewish day school, to say all the blessings. There was also a lot of pressure to be silent for a very long time, during the silent prayer. 

When a special request has to be added, you can’t say the shorter prayer of ‘Haveyneynu.’ The request would then make the short prayer longer, killing the beauty of finishing very fast. To note: This is the only prayer I don't know. All my years of Yeshiva and Jewish Day School, they never gave me the option of this shorter prayer. The only law left out of my education.

2:5-19- Look in the siddur. It will explain these laws. It is much easier to read it in the siddur the way it is written, rather than learning all of this from the Rambam and my commentary. Commentary by definition is brilliant.

But 'Haveyneynu' is not there. It is even left out of the siddur (prayer book, you heretic who memorized the short prayer).

We need the abridged version. You can find the abbreviated egalitarian versions, but we need a version that shortens the whole of davening to three words. If we were able to shorten the prayers to less than a minute, shules would be packed. People would feel good. People would have more time to make mistakes, which they could then end up asking for forgiveness for. More guilt equals more showing up to shule. Egalitarian stuff would lose out right away. The rabbis have found ways to abbreviate every statement in the Gemara; there has to be a way to make this faster. Acronomyze the whole of prayers. They did it for Pesach.

There is something about the Jubilee year. That is the only other thing that is not in my siddur, which makes it interesting to learn about the Jubilee year. There is something about stuff that is not in my siddur and the shortened prayer which makes it a jubilee.

L (that is my acronym for 'lesson'- sweet as I know): Just look at the siddur. It is all right there, except for the good stuff which makes it all so much faster.

 

Tefillah uBirkat Cohanim (3)

There are times to daven (pray, you nonYiddish speaking apikores) that were instituted by the rabbis. Not all institutions get to make halachas. The rabbis are the one institution that get to make up Jewish law. The other people who come up with Jewish law are called cult leaders, or Biblical critics.

The daily afternoon offering was from 9 and a half daylight hours. However, since we were able to sacrifice the afternoon offering at 6 and a half hours, if there was a Pesach that fell out on Shabbat, we can daven mincha from 6 and half hours.

If you pray beofre the right times, you did not fulfill the commandment. Even so, there are earlier times to daven the morning prayer (you heretic who doesn't call it Shacharit) when you are in a bind. A bind can mean really tired. It can also mean financial constraints when you owe a friend a lot of money and you don't want to pay them back for a while.

If you missed the service, you can do a make up prayer/Tashlumin. However, you can only make it up at the following service time. You can't start pilling up points and do 10 prayers in a row. Who would do that anyways? I space out in the middle of my first Amida/Silent Prayer/Shemona Esrei/Eighteen Benedictions (there are more names for this). You do the prayer of the correct time, and then the Tashlumin. You always go with the thing in its right time first. At least this way you will get one thing right. That is a step up from your messed up life.

There are a few different laws for Musaf. Maybe you want to learn that in the Rambam. How about opening a Rambam for an idea. Just saying. Maybe if you learned it there, you would understand something about your religion. 

It is called the Rambam for a reason. Because it is the Rambam.

Tefillah uBirkat Cohanim (4)
5 things stop somebody from being able to pray: Unclean hands, privates showing, cleanliness of the place of prayer, things that are bothersome, concentration. Other things that can stop somebody from being able to pray, could be a big hat on a woman in shule (because that draws a lot of attention), a Chazan going on too long with the repetition, a sneeze without a tissue, somebody moving their plastic chair back while I am in the middle of the Amidah (silent prayer, you heretic who reads out loud, while moving your lips).
4:2-6- You've got to make sure you have clean hands. 4 miles forward, one back. That was walking one mile back. That was the commitment they had. They were not running to the nearest rock to rub their hands. Does the rock really clean the hands? And if it is close to the ground, who knows what has touched it already.
Shacharit, you also clean your face and feet. So, you can have a dirty face for Mincha and Maariv. Maybe you can't, but that is what I learned from it. Is it that hard to keep clean? When you are walking four miles to find clean water, it is.
Somebody who has a seminal emission cannot pray until he dunks in a mikveh or something. According to Ezra...they made this decree because they didn't want people to constantly be with their wives. The Nidah period was not enough. They had to add on some more lonely days. People don't remember what it is like to be single enough. Thus, the rabbis try to do whatever they can to bring back that memory.
But that was too much for the people. Hence, we don't make people go to the mikveh before they pray. So, we do have a say in the creation of laws sometimes. We tried getting out of prayer too, but that didn't work.
4:7-14- You also have to cover the chest for prayer, not just the ‘privates.’ It is hard to concentrate, especially when there is a hairy chest.
You have to make sure there is nothing disgusting in the area you are praying. This could include a place where they are pickling in brine- that smells bad, especially with fish. It also includes excrement and all the stuff considered disgusting by the laws dealing with 'Shema.' Disgusting is disgusting. However, there are different sensibilities in different cultures. For instance, it is not disgusting share wine at a Shabbat table, but you go anywhere else where everybody is drinking from the same cup, it is disgusting. Unless you are in Argentina or Uruguay, where everybody has to share their hot drinks. Those people are disgusting to begin with.
Bothersome stuff is when you have to go to the bathroom. Even sneezing and coughing should be done before davening. I say, that you shouldn’t even say ‘Bless you,’ when somebody sneezes. You should say ‘Get out of here.’ They sneeze. That is bothersome. 'Bless you' is a prayer and should wait until we get rid of them. Once they are gone, we should say 'Bless them.'
Again, farting is a distraction. Basically, anything that is a distraction is bothersome. This also includes a little short pee.
4:15-19- Got to have proper intent (that is called kavanah, you heretic who should repeat  the previous paragraph, because you weren’t concentrating).
You have to prepare yourself as though you are standing in front of H.’ This means, not to be drunk. This means that you have to not be bothered or preoccupied with other thoughts, such as if people are going to kill you, why Merv is wrong about his pick for the NBA championship, or the joke about the rabbi and priest, even though it is a good one.
You should be davening with thoughts of Torah. But easy thoughts. Not crazy puzzling sugias (Talmudic passages, you nonAramaic reading Am HaAretz). You come in thinking about a goring ox, you are going to be too scared to daven.
If you are worried that people or animals will attack, there is a quick prayer you say about how it is tough to be Jewish, livelihood, needs, and to ask H’ to do what is good in His eyes. Does H’ have eyes? We already know he doesn’t. Basically, you shouldn’t be stopping for a whole prayer when a gang is attacking you in a dark alley. You can ask them to stop attacking for a good half a minute, but it is rude to ask them to keep quiet for 3 or so minutes. When you get out, you can say the full 19 blessings of the 18 blessing prayer.
Don’t try to do musaf by heart. Don’t be one of those showoffs. The daily stuff you can do by heart. You feel cool without a siddur, but we all know it too. You are showing us that you are really don't have enough arm strength to hold the siddur in the air, because you are a weak soul.

Tefillah uBirkat Cohanim (5)
You’ve got to Daven in Certain ways. Put a little effort into it:
-Standing. But you can sit if it is going to be hard to stand. If you are old or something sitting would probably be acceptable. If you just got out of surgery and the doctor said not to stand, you don't have to bring this up to the rabbi. We all like to think we have good questions, but your rabbi doesn't care if you are standing or not.
-Towards the Holy of Holies. Hard to know exactly where it is all the time, so outside of Israel, we pray towards Israel. In Israel, we pray towards Jerusalem and so on. In the Beit Haikdash, towards the Holy of Holies. You can say that you are praying towards India, because Gd is everywhere. Beautiful thought, but if you do that, you are a heretic.
-Correct body stance. Feet together, looking a little down and right hand on left hand in a penitent position. Choreograph this. It takes some people years to get this down. The penitent stance is a good one. It gives off an aura of righteousness. A little sway is also good to add to the mix. It adds a bit of character to your penitence. Be giving though. Do not start claiming to much space with your pacing and sway. Your eyes closed, helps with an even more penitent look. Even so, you should watch who you are swaying into.
-Decent clothing. Put in a little effort. You still can’t find a girl. Fine. At least try to look good when davening.
Also, no carrying stuff that is going to take away your concentration. If you are moving a big log, you should place it first. If you can't bow, you are going to have problems.
-A regular place for davening is crucial. You shouldn't be changing your spot every day. You settle into your spot, you know the angles, where to bow, how to not fall.
And pray on a flat low surface. It can work higher, if it is a big floor (at least 4 amot- forearm lenghts, you heretic who measures with a ruler), or if there is a fence. You can say it in a tree if you are a professional pruner and it will be on your mind if you get down. Again, you should not be closing your eyes when praying in a tree, unless your whole prayer is about not falling.
-Soft voice. No screaming this thing. If you need to say it out loud then not near other people. Do I have to tell you that loud is disturbing?
-Bowing at the five spots. And then a little left bow and right bow. You've got to get down the choreography if you are going to be frum. This is not the hokey pokey. And there is nobody announcing when to put your right hand in. You have to know when to take it out yourself. We've got to keep the voices low. So, even if they tell you what to do, you won't hear it.
-Then the full prostration. Which we do at the supplication prayer. But you can’t do this on stone floors, unless in the Beit Mikdash. If you just start laying down and going to sleep at shule, it is rude. Plain and simple, rude.