The mishna that kicks of this perek deals with what happens during the service on a fast day. It is described as an orderly ritual, complete with a set liturgy, kohanim, the sound of the shofar. It makes me think about something that has bothered me since I started leading services years ago, and now that I lead them more consistently has become more acute. How do we, as service leaders, experience the service? This was especially difficult for me on the high holidays as logistical needs often trumped a meaningful davening --- and I can only imagine how much more difficult it is for those of us that were doing these services alone.
Our rituals and ceremonies provide us with symbols that are meant to infuse moments with meaning. When we demystify those, both critically and by simply learning how to do them, and we do them all the time -- how do we keep them meaningful for us?
Thursday, October 18, 2007
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I think about this as well, and it may just be a bit of occupational hazard. However, my experience often is somewhat the opposite: I feel more engaged with prayer when I am the shatz. That may be the performance aspect, which forces a somewhat more attuned setting in my brain, or it may be the out-loudness of leading, which I like. I do agree, however, that marquee services like the high holidays or Purim tend to be useless as a prayer experience to me. I am far too worried about this or that to enjoy them. I guess you could say I enjoy being a shatz, but not so much a gabbi, which is problematic, giving that I am in a job that rhymes with 'gabbi' and pretty much guarantees that I will almost always have 'gabbi' jobs to do at davening. Certainly, over the summer, I get very little good davening done. There is simply too much to do.
I wonder, can we fix this in some way, or do we just get used to it, thus allowing us to eventually enjoy davening even while "working" or maybe (and most depressingly) do we just never really daven well while we are working.
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