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Sep. 12th, 2012 02:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
seekingferretOne of the ways studying Berachos has already impacted my life is the way it has shed new light on my prayers. This is one way in which Berachos makes a great opening to Shas- its subject matter is something that all observant Jews need to know. It's also one of the peculiar difficulties of Berachos- we've all grown up with this knowledge in the background, so it can be hard to focus when we think we already know where the Rabbis are going. Right now, the Talmud is discussing certain basic order of blessing rules which I've known since I was five years old, like saying borei p'ri ha'etz before shehakol. I'm fascinated with a lot of it, but there are parts where I need to struggle past my assumption that I already know this to dig deep into the meat of the why.
However, some of it has already been useful. Specifically I noticed a couple things in my davening.
First, there is a discussion of which parts of Shema require specific enhanced attention. One set of Tannaim hold that it is only the first section that deserves this attention, because the first section begins with the word 'Shema'- "LISTEN". Another set hold that the whole thing requires special attention because of a variety of hocus pocus about how concentrating on the Shema will give you long life and good health. I'm not big on these specific correlative effects between prayers and God answering prayers, but I appreciate the ideal of being able to give special focus to the whole Shema because it is such a central statement of Jewish identity and faith.
What I like about the debate is that it presents me with two goals, one more attainable than the other. First, I can focus on the first section and try my best to get everything I can out of it. But I can hold out focusing on the entire thing with specific focus as an ideal that maybe in the future I'll be able to reach. That mixture of easier and harder objectives for improving my prayer is a great boon, because it gives me something I can work on immediately without letting me feel like when I achieve it I have perfected my prayer.
Another thing I keep getting is, incidental to the main thrust of the Gemara's discussion, great insights into the Psalms. I just read a fascinating little thought about a Psalm that is recited every Sunday morning as the daily Psalm, and it made that routine, weekly repetition have a little more meaning. The line is "Lashem ha'aretz umlo'a"- "The earth is for the Lord, and all of its contents." The Talmud compares that to a line from another psalm "Hashamayim shamayim ladoshem, v'ha'aretz natan livnei adam"- The heavens belong to the Lord, but the Earth he gave to man." This is a contradiction! The Gemara is a very serious about contradictions, which in generally is reshaping the way I look at the Bible. It would have been so very easy to dismiss the difference as having no legal implications. The Psalms are poetry and David's poetic license allows him to switch metaphor from Psalm to Psalm without implicature. But that doesn't fly for the Rabbis. So they have to resolve this contradiction to prove that the divinely inspired Psalms that they accepted into their Torah do not contradict each other. Their answer is thus: When the Jews obey God's laws, he gives the Earth over to them, but when he is wrathful he reminds them that he created the world and it is his to do as he wishes with.
I was reading that Psalm and came across the line and remembered this thought, and it made my prayer a richer experience, because it gave me themes to think about when I recited the line, a reason to pause and look twice and actually think about word choices.
Also, somehow I have hit Daf 42. I slipped a few days due to WorldCon, but have slowly caught up. I will be saying this endlessly for the next seven years if I keep up, but I can't believe I have made it this far on schedule.
However, some of it has already been useful. Specifically I noticed a couple things in my davening.
First, there is a discussion of which parts of Shema require specific enhanced attention. One set of Tannaim hold that it is only the first section that deserves this attention, because the first section begins with the word 'Shema'- "LISTEN". Another set hold that the whole thing requires special attention because of a variety of hocus pocus about how concentrating on the Shema will give you long life and good health. I'm not big on these specific correlative effects between prayers and God answering prayers, but I appreciate the ideal of being able to give special focus to the whole Shema because it is such a central statement of Jewish identity and faith.
What I like about the debate is that it presents me with two goals, one more attainable than the other. First, I can focus on the first section and try my best to get everything I can out of it. But I can hold out focusing on the entire thing with specific focus as an ideal that maybe in the future I'll be able to reach. That mixture of easier and harder objectives for improving my prayer is a great boon, because it gives me something I can work on immediately without letting me feel like when I achieve it I have perfected my prayer.
Another thing I keep getting is, incidental to the main thrust of the Gemara's discussion, great insights into the Psalms. I just read a fascinating little thought about a Psalm that is recited every Sunday morning as the daily Psalm, and it made that routine, weekly repetition have a little more meaning. The line is "Lashem ha'aretz umlo'a"- "The earth is for the Lord, and all of its contents." The Talmud compares that to a line from another psalm "Hashamayim shamayim ladoshem, v'ha'aretz natan livnei adam"- The heavens belong to the Lord, but the Earth he gave to man." This is a contradiction! The Gemara is a very serious about contradictions, which in generally is reshaping the way I look at the Bible. It would have been so very easy to dismiss the difference as having no legal implications. The Psalms are poetry and David's poetic license allows him to switch metaphor from Psalm to Psalm without implicature. But that doesn't fly for the Rabbis. So they have to resolve this contradiction to prove that the divinely inspired Psalms that they accepted into their Torah do not contradict each other. Their answer is thus: When the Jews obey God's laws, he gives the Earth over to them, but when he is wrathful he reminds them that he created the world and it is his to do as he wishes with.
I was reading that Psalm and came across the line and remembered this thought, and it made my prayer a richer experience, because it gave me themes to think about when I recited the line, a reason to pause and look twice and actually think about word choices.
Also, somehow I have hit Daf 42. I slipped a few days due to WorldCon, but have slowly caught up. I will be saying this endlessly for the next seven years if I keep up, but I can't believe I have made it this far on schedule.