Personalized Prayer

Last week I had two packages to send out. One was a bar mitzvah gift for a friend’s son; the other was a thank you gift for a person who gave of his time to help me with something. I didn’t want to just send generic messages, so I spent time composing a personal message on each card.

After I sent the thank you gift I came home and found the card I had written for it. I realized that with the thank you gift was the mazal tov card for the bar mitzvah.

It reminded me of the time shortly after a friend’s bar mitzvah he showed me a set of chumashim he had received as a gift from a classmate. Inside the chumash was a card wishing mazal tov to the friend who had given him the set.

It’s always nice to receive a gift, but a personalized note makes it that much more meaningful.

As educators, whenever my wife and I receive a gift from a student with personalized notes attached, we are more moved by the card (which we often save) than the gift itself (though the gifts are of course appreciated too).

Rav Shimshon Pincus, zt”l, noted that the goal of tefillah is not just to recite the words of the siddur. The goal is to daven in our own words, to open our hearts and express our feelings, worries, and hopes to Hashem.

The problem is that we don’t really feel like we are talking to anyone when we are davening. Rav Pinkus quips that a person only needs a siddur when he’s talking to the wall!

He surely didn’t mean to undermine the value and importance of reciting the holy and ancient words of the siddur. But his point was that tefillah must go beyond the printed word. It must include the unbridled feelings of the heart and soul.

Most women in pre-war Europe were illiterate and didn’t know how to read the siddur. But oh, how they davened. Throughout their day they would constantly speak to Hashem, imploring Him for guidance, insight, direction, hope, blessing, and health. That is the ultimate goal of tefillah – to connect on a personal level with Hashem.

When we just read the words of the siddur, we have unquestionably discharged our obligation to daven and have accomplished a great thing. However, doing so has not achieved the ultimate benefit of prayer. That is only achieved when it is personalized and presented with emotion and feeling, when our true inner self is presented before G-d.

The Chofetz Chaim writes (Likkutei Amarim): “One should not be satisfied with the three Shemoneh Esreis that he prays each day. Rather, on a few occasions during his day, when he is alone at home, he should express prayers and supplications from the depths of his heart. The words of the three prayers are familiar to him, and therefore he doesn’t pay close attention to them. However, when one contemplates his responsibilities, and stresses, and recognizes his vulnerability and helplessness, then his heart will overflow like water before Hashem Yisbarach. Such a prayer is expressed with great intent, humility, and sincerity, and surely will not go unanswered.”

G-d does not need our prayers, yet He cherishes them and hears them. But more profoundly, our prayers elevate us and allow us to live a life of connection with the ultimate Truth!