Tikun articles 
& podcasts

Weekly Davar - Toldos: Prayer Is the Greatest Clarifier

Toldos
(Genesis 25:19 – 28:9)

25th November 2011
28th of Cheshvan, 5772

GOOD AFTERNOON!! If you are in London at Christmas time, please consider signing up for our Light up Life volunteering programme. We have over a 100 different volunteering opportunities, charities that are short staffed during the Christmas week and in real need of your help. You can do as little or as much as you like and the times are very flexible. If you are away, that’s one thing, but if you are going to be around, please take a moment to log in and book yourself some time giving over the holidays. The link is: tikun.co.uk/lightupalife


Torah Portion

This portion chronicles the historic struggle between Jacob and Esau. The fight begins while they are yet in the womb and continues until today. Esau hates Jacob, the Rabbis tell us. Anti Semitism has been one constant in the erratic history of the Jewish Nation.

Jacob is a ‘man of tents’ - a philosopher and thinker. Esau, on the other hand, is a hunter - a man of the world. Esau sells his birthright to Jacob for the price of a bowl of soup. A birthright is esoteric and soup is much more practical.

Isaac wishes to give the birthright to Esau. In the famous story, with Rebecca’s assistance, Jacob tricks Isaac into giving it to him instead. It makes for dramatic and tense reading.


Davar Torah
Prayer Is the Greatest Clarifier

We are told that Isaac and Rebecca did not have children for 20 years. In fact, all of the Jewish forefathers struggled to have children – Abraham and Sara, and Jacob and Rachel. The Rabbis tell us the reason: God wanted them to pray more.

Now there’s a strange thing. God wanted them to pray more? Assuming that God does exist, why on earth would He be so eager for human beings to pray to Him? He has no ego to massage, no self confidence to boost. He wants to feel more powerful? He’s already ALL powerful – how could little specks of dust such as us make Him feel any better about Himself when we pray?

Clearly, as usual, God has us in mind, not Himself. But how does it work?

Let’s talk about the example of children for a moment as I have a personal connection to it. For my first year of marriage, my wife a”h did not conceive. We were both very eager to have children, as is common in the Orthodox world, but it just didn’t happen. So we prayed. We prayed a great deal and with deep feeling.

I can’t speak for my wife, but I can speak for myself – I explained to God why I wanted children. I told Him that I wanted to give more fully and that children were the way I saw of doing that. I said that I wanted to bring up children who were a credit to a Torah way of life, who would be a ‘kiddush Hashem’ a sanctification of His name. I said that I felt I could do a good job of being a father and desperately wanted the opportunity to fulfill that role.

It was only a year of praying, but at the end of that year, when my wife did conceive, I knew exactly why I wanted children, how I intended to invest in them and what I needed to do to make sure I lived up to all that I dreamed of in being a father. Prayer is what gave me that clarity, because if I am asking God for something, I know that I need to understand why I want it and why I’m asking for it. A year of praying, clarified it all for me.

There have been times in my life when I have prayed and over time come to understand that what I am asking for is not important enough to me to warrant my having it – and so I have stopped wanting and stopped praying. There have been times when I have prayed and come to realise that there are changes I need to make in my life before this will be right for me – and I have tried to change accordingly. There have been times when I have prayed and in so doing, come to appreciate why want what I am praying for – and the reasons were not my original ones.

Prayer is not for God, it is for us. It is a process of self clarification that is second to none. It’s not reading meaningless words in a prayerbook. It’s speaking to God and explaining what you want and why you want it. I prayed for one year for children and I believe I am an infinitely better father because of it. Isaac and Rebecca prayed for 20 years. Their understanding, their love and their commitment to their children must have been unimaginable.

Shabbat Shalom
Rabbi Shaul Rosenblatt

Leave a comment

Boxes with an asterisk * next to them are required items

Name *
Email *	(Your email will not be published)
Website
Comment *
Enter the security code into the box below *
Click the speaker to listen to the code (Quicktime required). Click the image to change the code Enter Code: