Judaism’s Little Secret – It’s Hard to Pray

The Secret
A big issue, when it comes to Shuls and Jews, is that davening is very difficult. This is not pointed out very often from the pulpit, possibly because it would discourage people from making the necessary efforts to improve.

Why is Davening Difficult

One of the reasons that prayer is difficult is because it is very complex. In Shacharis, the morning prayer service, there are five distinct parts 1) brachos and korbonos, 2) Pesukei D’Zimrei (songs of praise) 3) Shema and its Berachos, 4) Shemoneh Esrai, 5) End of service. Each part requires different applications of our emotional, intellectual and spiritual components. Davening is also difficult because the act of speaking to G-d is a very abstract process. The third major difficulty is keeping focused and maintaining focus, a problem whose existence is evident from the halacha for hundreds of years. This has certainly become worse over the years as our world has become a more distracted place.

Bad Habits are Hard to Break
People learn to daven very early in life when they don’t have the intellectual maturity to understand its depths. As a result the “Shake and Fake” process, as the kids sometimes call it, gets baked into a potentially lifelong bad habit of going through the motions. Years of Shul going in the early years can also effect our approach to davening.

The Problem for Shuls

As we’ve pointed out in previous posts, one of the primary purposes of gathering together at Shul is to pray. If people are not focused on the prayer process, then the Shul will not be aligned around the goal of providing a great prayer environment. The result of this misalignment leads to problems like talking, speed of davening and structure of the prayer service, which we’ve discussed. In non-Observant Shuls, the disconnect from prayer has been described as a leading cause of the Decline of the Great American Non-Orthodox Synogogue.

What We Can We Do

The first step is to educate people to the fact that almost everyone has trouble with concentration during davening, but with effort we can improve over time. Providing shiurim and starting vaadim (groups working on improving) is a great step in the right direction. Sharing experiences that worked among members can encourage the attitude that if my neighbor has improved, then so can I. From a Shul Politics perspective it’s important to keep “providing a great place to daven” high on the Shul’s agenda even if we’re not at the level we would like to be regarding prayer.

18 thoughts on “Judaism’s Little Secret – It’s Hard to Pray”

  1. Teaching davening is also difficult, and probably a large part of the cause. We have two options:

    1- What we actually do: Get children in the habit of davening when they’re young, so that it remains unthinkable to most of our boys and many of our girls to skip it.

    But then this ingrains a habit of saying a string of mysterious syllables. Even once we start learning Hebrew, or even better, learning the poetry and nuance of specific tefillos, on a typical morning many (and I’m guessing the it’s the vast majority) still slip into the habit of our youth.

    2- Not teach children davening faster than you can teach them meaning. Then it is not as ingrained, and I think fewer people would actually daven 22 times a week.

    A partial solution is to raise your kids in an area where Hebrew is their first language, so that the problem of saying words they don’t bother translating is reduced. I can and do rattle off English phrases without paying attention, so it only reduces the problem. More importantly, you can say words, know what they mean, and still not relate to the litany in terms of “I am turning to my Father in Heaven.” But at least more of the surface meaning, if not the vast nuance underneath, will actually cross their minds.

    Davening is hard because we raised boys to associate religiosity with learning, religious experience with intellectual stimulation. This is something I noticed when I present a class on how to learn Mussar, where very little of the material is new, most of it seems like trite truism, and the point is to internalize what you already know — not learn something new.

    Given the number of parashah sheets out during davening and leining, and the number of people (myself included) who confuse chazaras hasha”tz with chazaras hashas (the Chazan’s repetition of the Amidah with reviewing Talmud), this appears to be a large factor. These are people who want to spend time religiously, just get bored doing so praying…

  2. Thank you for addressing this vital issue.

    You wrote:
    This is not pointed out very often from the pulpit, possibly because it would discourage people from making the necessary efforts to improve.

    I would like to think that if the shul rav would address this issue directly, then people could be encouraged to grow.

    What I see most often is a mere acceptance of the status quo. I hear statements like, “Well, that’s what they learned to do in the army.” I’m sure we can do better!

  3. 1. One obstacle is the difficulty of living in the moment, pushing away thoughts extraneous to where we are in the davening. While the sound of cellphone ringtones is an overt indicator of this problem, it’s far more pervasive than that.

    2. We really have to feel we’re worthy of talking directly to HaShem, no matter what we’ve done up to that point.

    3. The organization of siddurim is important. If the prayers are broken down by phrase (as is typical in Koren editions, for example), they are easier to follow and say. If they are in large blocks of type, they are harder. Some typefaces are easier to read than others.

    4. If we’re not inspired at a given moment, we can at least try to follow the meaning of what we’re saying. Then it’s a learning experience, too.

    5. If the shaliach tzibbur goes much faster or slower than our comfort zones, we’re more apt to tune out.

  4. I don’t know if this comment is appropriate, but since I’m advertising a charitable service, maybe it will pass moderation….

    Reb Mark writes: The first step is to educate people to the fact that almost everyone has trouble with concentration during davenig, but with effort we can improve over time. Providing shiurim and starting vaadim (groups working on improving) is a great step in the right direction. Sharing experiences that worked among members can encourage the attitude that if my neighbor has improved, then so can I.

    The AishDas Society has experience setting up ve’adim (which includes sharing experiences), and can provide assistance to a shul that doesn’t know how to get started or needs other pointers.

    Feel free to email.

  5. Great post. Providing shiurim about davening is a good idea, but often people won’t admit that they need to improve their davening. If a shul was to start a chabura/vaad where each week someone goes over a part of davening and brings in commentary , even if it’s “Rav Schwab on Prayer” or R Eliyahu Munk’s “World of Prayer”, it would be cool.

    I have to give my two cents about this line you wrote:
    In non-Observant Shuls, the disconnect from prayer has been described as a leading cause of…”

    I happen to know a few Conservative and Reform Jews who are very serious about their Judaism and I often hear from them how their Shabbos services incorporate a lot of group participation via singing. In fact, in a Reform Sunday school where I often substitute teach (don’t worry, I asked a shilah a long time ago), they have very successfully used singing as an educational tool.

    Of course, in our own davening there are several times on any given Shabbos that we hear niggunim that allow us to join in, but there are so many shuls out there where the davening is just dry, even during Kiddusha.

    For me, part of an enjoyable davening is being able to join in niggunim that help break up, what might seem like the “same thing” every week.

    1. Neil, you’re right about the tunes.

      However, some tunes are very dull and repetitive, so they don’t enhance the experience. Some other tunes don’t fit the words or meter or mood, so they become a strange distraction.

    1. There is an emotional component to davening, certainly in Pesukei D’Zimra and Hallel, but at it’s heart, in Shema and Shemoneh Esrai it’s about focused concentration.

      I want to dedicate a post about the tension between inspiration and concentration and the issues that arise in trying to accommodate Shul members. .

        1. By the way, any shul where there are frequent pleas for decorum has a deeper problem, people not even realizing where they are.

  6. Kaf HaChaim commentary on Orach Chaim, Siman 89, Sif Katan 12:

    …and how good and pleasant is it to be careful to not speak mundane talk [dibur chol] from the time you wake up until after the [morning / shacharit] prayer.

  7. We teach our young to say ‘Modeh Ani’, Mah Tovu’ ‘Shmah’ etc w/o them having any inkling of what they are doing. They don’t know what they are saying nor do they we developed in them the emotional drive to pray. (I will use the English word as the Yiddish brings up rote behavior.) We simply tell them “You are davening to Hashem.” They could be saying words in Chinese; the emotional effect would be the same. They can repeat what they were told as to why they are praying but they have not really absorbed what ‘tefillah’ is really about. Ask your elementary or high school child what is the theme of each of the 3 paragraphs of ‘Shmah’. Ask adults. By the time our youth grow up, they will faithfully run to shul to faithfully say words that they either don’t understand or aren’t concentrating on. Even though I know Hebrew fairly well, I use a linear Siddur.

    The difficulty in arousing emotion is that there is a tension between spontaneous, emotional, personal prayer and institutionalized prayer. Obviously, if prayer is not institutionalized, there would be no unity of prayer. Yet it is the very institutionalizing of prayer that defeats the essence of prayer.

    To enhance ‘kavanah’, one must first realize why one is praying, to whom, and the necessity of why 3 times a day- a more personal reason than our Avot institutionalized the times. Of course, we must educate people that we can also pray to Hashem any other time in our own words as well. This should be a project to be carried out by Jewish educators, by shul Rabbanim and parents. Unfortunately, we are caught up in the fear that anything educationally innovative will be frowned upon.

  8. Kaf HaChaim commentary on Orach Chaim, Siman 1, Sif Katan 36:

    In a time of plague and sickness in the world, it is especially good to recite korbanot every day, because this helps very much [mesugal harbeh] and he [a Jew] should establish in his heart and trust that no evil will befall him, because he is guarded from every evil thing.

  9. Kaf HaChaim commentary on Orach Chaim, Siman 1, Sif Katan 37:

    It is correct to recite Tehillim before prayer, because Tehillim are called zemirot, which is related to the word for pruning, because they [the Tehillim] cut down the accusers…

  10. Rabbi Elchanan Wasserman (born 1875, died 1941) interpreted the Bible verse:
    YOU WILL RUN AWAY EVEN WHEN NOBODY IS CHASING YOU (Vayikra, chapter 26, verse 17) as referring to Jews who speed through reciting their prayers.

    SOURCE: In The Footsteps of the Maggid (page 137) by Rabbi Paysach J. Krohn, 1992, Mesorah Publications, Brooklyn, New York

  11. One of the problems I have is that davening is assumed to be something so basic (i.e., even very young children are davening), that adults have a hard time admitting that they need help. It’s sort of like riding a bike.

    I, a grandmother of age 56, am ashamed to admit I don’t know how to ride a bike; I mean, even five-year-olds pedal away safely and happily. Likewise, I really don’t know all of the halachos of davening: when and how do I do all that bowing, and stepping forward, and stepping backward; what’s the hierarchy of the parts I can skip if I don’t have the time to say everything; and what do I say when I walk into shul on Shabbos, and it happens to be the Torah reading, do I spend the Rabbi’s drasha catching up on my missed tefillos, or do I simply listen and just join in the Mussaf prayer (assuming I don’t just leave to go home and get the Shabbos seudah ready)?

    Davening is considered Judaism 101, or maybe 101A, and asking questions about it is like a 56-year-old grandmother learning how to ride a bike (“Didn’t you learn this stuff in first grade?” “Well no, I wasn’t religious until age 18.” “So didn’t you learn it when you first became a BT?” “Uh no, actually I didn’t….”).

    While it’s OK for people to go to annual courses on Practical Halachos of Getting Ready for Pesach, as it’s a body of knowledge not used ten months a year, I don’t see a lot of courses on the practical basics of davening (which is not the same thing as studying learned commentary on the Siddur, just as learning Masechta Pesachim is not the same as the halacha le’maaseh of preparing for Pesach).

    For example, although my smart daughters-in-law (who went to Bais Yaakov and seminary) would probably be more than happy to show me what to do and when, I would be embarrassed to ask them to teach me the basic halachos of davening: after all, even my little grandchildren know how to daven, why doesn’t Bubbie know?

  12. My problem in learning how to daven was not a reluctance to ask questions. I have no issue with admitting ignorance. But rather no one was willing and able to answer my questions. So I learned how to daven on my own. My primary resources were the books “To Pray As a Jew” by Donin, “Praying With Fire” by Kleinman, the Kitzur Shulchan Aruch, the instructions in the siddur, and regular practice.

  13. P.S.

    “I would be embarrassed to ask them to teach me the basic halachos of davening: after all, even my little grandchildren know how to daven, why doesn’t Bubbie know?”

    I understand this attitude. Most people are reluctant to admit ignorance. That may be one of the problems I’ve had in learning about Judaism. I’ll ask someone a question, and rather than admit he doesn’t know the answer, the person will adopt a superior attitude or invent a false answer.

    But when an older (or more experienced) person says to a younger (or less experienced) person, “I don’t know, but I want to learn”, with sincerity, I think that’s setting a really good example for the younger person to follow.

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