A Diatribe Against the Sad State of Tefilla

Thank you Jewish Press for sharing with us what could be perhaps the greatest modern diatribe against the current state of communal tefilla that I have seen. I really should thank my goggle alerts for picking up Communicated: Tefilla by Moshe Yosef Werzberger (in the Jewish Press's defense, it is paid promotional content).

The caption to this picture stated: "The Tosfos Yomtov was convinced that the death of 300,000 –600,000 Jews during the Chmielnicki massacres of 1648-49 were because of improper Tefila."

If you want to get riled up either about the present neglect of davening or an abusive generalization of God's guidance of our world, read the whole entire article. To tease you, here are some excerpts:

• The Mishnah Berura in multiple places describes shuls being destroyed or converted into avoda zara because of the public desecration of prayer in shul. (Shuls are not destroyed in a vacuum. Jews suffer greatly when this happens. The yahrtziet of Kristallnacht, which was within 48hrs of Sandy’s New Jersey landfall, was on November 9-10, 1938.
  
• The gas chambers were created by Hashem to create a perfect public prayer service, in order to facilitate teshuva for the avaira of Chilul Tefila Bifarhesia. The gas chamber was in reality a shul with all the components of Tefila kihalacha.
  
• In order to facilitate a Jewish victory Hashem put in the minds of the Arabs to attack The Jews on Yom Kippur. On that day nearly all Jews in the world are fasting even if they are otherwise not yet observant.
  
• We have introduced electronic devices into Hashem’s temples. Their mere presence, as well as their unrestricted use in all modalities, whether silent or audible, whether talking, listening, sending, receiving or surfing, violates our “intimacy “with Hashem.
  
• Hashem sent the Monsey butcher as a mida kineged mida. We distanced Hashem from us by ruining tefiloh with our public disregard for the halachikly proper tefiloh. He distanced Himself from us by having us ingest prayer (heart) altering fowl which interferes with our ability to get close to Hashem.
  
• We are in a state of denial. We keep pointing to the stats. 90,000 at “The” siyum, 2 million art scroll shasim sold, more people learning than ever before. Incredibly we are saying that the reason for the spiritual paper and brick carnage is to elicit great acts of chesed on behalf of Klal Yisroel Jew to Jew and this will make Hashem happy and bring Moshiach! We are stuck looking at the damage of the current devastation as a final act not as part of a continuum of reflective action on the part of Hashem.
  
• By calling it a “smart phone” the yetzer hara tapped into our ego. Who doesn't want to be smart? And look at all the mitzvos I can do with my smart phone. We seduced ourselves to all the benefits of instant contact with anyone in the world at any time. We delude ourselves into thinking that we are in control of our situation and those around us. The smart phone is all the Yetzer Hara wanted it to be. 

Unplug For A Day

Reboot is organizing the National Day of Unplugging March 1st - 2nd. I am a big fan of unplugging, not just for Shabbat but setting more boundaries of when I  am attached to electronic devices and screens.  It inspires in me a memory of William Wordsworth's poetry:

The world is too much with us, late and soon; 

Getting and spending, we last our powers.  

I have previously wrote about this verse, but I think it echoes our need to keep our values at the front of our cognitive and emotional mindset. In order to keep one's tefilla fresh, boundaries and perspective are vital and think that more moments of unplugging will enhance your spiritual focus.

High Holiday Seats at One Shul

Have you been to One Shul - no fees or dues necessary?   I am fascinated that people connect this way to one another to pray.  While I may like the challenge of summarizing my tefilla into 140 characters or less, I think I am just old fashioned and need a seat in IRL shul.  Hoping that wherever you pray, that it goes well for you.

What's Wrong with Texting in Shul?

Are you guilty? Do you touch your phone in shul, check for a message or play a quick level of Angry Birds or Tetris to pass the time during davening?  (I am not talking about those who touch the siddur app in their phone).

Clearly young people today feel more comfortable with technology and social interactions and their own confidence in multitasking, but what exactly is their place in Jewish holy spaces? Previously I have written and shared about technology in the spiritual realm.  But can you pinpoint what's so bad about it?

In my opinion, this is a tell tale sign that the tefilla moment is not engaging and the person is willfully or subconsciously distracted.  We want out students (and fellow daveners) to be in the prayerful moment and to use the time to reflect and transcend, right?  How can you do that, let alone in a room by oneself not to mention it a crowded shul, when the objects (read toys) around pull your focus away?

On a daily basis, I am (unfortunately) often in meetings and it is obvious to me that the people fidgeting on their phones in the meeting don't see the conversation - at that very moment - a priority enough to give fill attention and focus.  I know because when I touch my phone it is because I myself am wandering away.

Isn't that one of the nice aspects of shabbat that we have less mundane distractions?  How do we teach students to overcome the mental and physical distractions that buffer their spiritual space and to teach them to negotiate this challenge during the 'profane' hours of the week?

Two post scripts:

1. You can read the Yeshiva World News article on the topic, Please Turn Off Your Cellphone - I love the interactions!
2. According to the Jewish Virtual Library article Synagogue Customs and Etiquette, one of the "no-no's" is the following:  The synagogue may be one of the last remain sanctuaries to escape cell phones and beepers. They should be turned off before entering.

Quiet Time in the 21st Century

A colleague recommend this article from Rabbi Efrem Goldberg in the OU's Jewish Action Magazine.  The March issue featured a Symposium on the "Orthodox Family in the 21st Century".  I would be interested in reading other denominational symposiums on this topic if any reader happens to come across and writings.  


I recently wrote about technology and tefilla and asked with the great competition for attention with information and technology students today have a hard time reflecting.  Rabbi Goldberg makes several tremendous points that should reverberate for all those who teach tefilla and what is now called "experiencing the absence of presence".  I think this vignette poignantly captures the advantages and challenges before us:

The proliferation of technology in every aspect of our lives brings with it incredible blessings, opportunities and advantages, but at the same time poses new challenges and difficulties. Many of the challenges are obvious and have been addressed somewhat broadly, such as the easy access and addictive nature of inappropriate and graphic material and images on the Web. Responses and strategies have been offered to combat this particular malady, including installing filters and only allowing Internet access in public spaces within the home. 

We would be severely remiss, however, if we didn’t acknowledge some of the other challenges posed by technological progress, many of which are subtle and go unnoticed. 

Research shows that smartphones, with their abundance of apps, access to social networking sites and text messaging, are as addictive as drugs and alcohol. The unrelenting urge to check the incoming message or notification has yielded a new phenomenon called “absent presence.” When people are physically in proximity to one another but their minds and attention are elsewhere, in reality they are absent. Couples sharing a meal together but responding to text messages, men checking their e-mail while donned in tallis and tefillin, parents pushing their children on the swings while talking on their cell phones, are all experiencing absent presence. 

When Moshe Rabbeinu ascends Har Sinai to receive the Torah, Hashem tells him “alei eili ha’harah, v’heyei sham,” “Ascend toward me on the mountain and be there.” If Moshe is told to go to the top of the mountain, why does he need to be instructed to also be there? If you read between the lines, you can almost hear Hashem saying to Moshe, “I know you are responsible for hundreds of thousands. I am aware that they need your attention and that you are currently occupied with countless responsibilities, but when you come on top of that mountain, put it all aside and be there. Be with Me and Me alone.” 

If we are going to experience quality, meaningful time in our relationships, be it with our spouses, our children or with Hashem, we must learn to disconnect. We must rediscover the capacity to be fully present in all that we are doing at any given moment. 

There is one relationship in particular in which the pervasive interruption of technology is most destructive and damaging, and that is the relationship we have with ourselves. Real personal growth and progress occur when we have the time and space to think, contemplate and consider. With the explosion of technology, people are less comfortable being alone and experiencing quiet. The constant pings, beeps and alerts create a running background noise in our lives that precludes and prevents silence. 

“Vayivaseir Ya’akov levado,” Ya’akov wrestled when he was levado, alone, by himself and without noise or interruption. Our lives are being lived at warp speed, driven by an obsession with technology and leaving us with no time, energy or mental space to wrestle with ourselves, thereby stifling growth and advancement. 

The addiction to multimedia gadgets has left an additional casualty in its wake, one that afflicts the younger generation in particular. The ability to daven meaningfully requires the effective use of the imagination and focused vision of the mind’s eye. When we reach out to our Creator praising Him, listing our needs and thanking Him, there is no accompanying music, Youtube video or great app for that. Effective and uplifting davening relies solely on our ability to connect without the help of electronic stimuli and tools. If we and our children are to find meaning in our prayers, we must protect our ability to generate inspiration internally, without the help of gadgets or gimmicks. 

Technology has made the world smaller and opened up avenues of communication and connection that were never dreamt possible. And yet, while communication is easier, the quality of our communication is diminishing. Many teens cannot articulate a thought that is longer than 140 characters, the length of a text message. They speak in acronyms such as lol and ttyl. The cell phone bills reveal only a few minutes used but thousands of text messages sent. 

Even adults are celebrating major milestones such as semachot, birthdays or anniversaries with a text message greeting rather than a warm phone call. An e-mail or text wishing comfort to a friend who is sitting shivah can never replace the even silent companionship of a personal visit. I heard recently that in dating it has become more popular to break up via text messaging rather than in a dignified person-to-person meeting. Facebook has replaced real face time with real friends and Twitter has supplanted the verbal exchange of ideas. 

Technology has given us access to unprecedented amounts of information, but rather than digest it fully, slowly and methodically, we can only read it if it comes in a digest. The trend of reading in snippets, summaries and blogs has infiltrated our Torah learning style as well. Rather than pore over primary sources in all their breadth and depth and subtlety, absorbing their full content, we lean toward seforim and compilations that summarize, condense and present Torah in a manner requiring little thought or exertion on our part. 

We must be deeply grateful for the blessing of technological progress. But at the same time we must be vigilant in setting boundaries, creating protocols and being discerning in the technology we embrace and how we relate to it. 

Rabbi Efrem Goldberg is rabbi of Boca Raton Synagogue in Florida.

The Best Digital Siddur?

The following is a guest post on the Hirhurim - Musings blog by Rabbi Michael J. Broyde titled: Building a Better Siddur: An E-Siddur for the Twenty-First Century.

Considering how many people I see fidgeting on the phones in shul, either using them as a siddur or a distraction from the tefilla, I think Broyde's piece here gives a good review of the maven's needs for today.  My favorite line from the post is the following:

An e-siddur can create a prayer environment much more esthetically pleasing than any printed prayer book ever can be, if only because it can give you the right prayers in the right order every day, with instructions tailored to its owner’s current location and customs, while changing every day with the changes of the Jewish calendar.

Sounds to me like an educator in the classroom.