The Shelah HaKadosh says that Erev Rosh Chodesh Sivan is a special day to daven for your children’s spiritual and material needs. Here is an English Translation of the Shelah’s prayer he composed for this day. You can say the Hebrew version here. Here is the link to the prayer on Artscroll’s Website.

You have been the Eternal, our G-d, before You created the world, and You are the Eternal, our G-d, since you created the world, and You are G-d forever. You created Your world so that Your Divinity should become revealed thorugh Your holy Torah, as our Sages expounded on the first word therein, and for Israel, for they are Your people and Your inheritance whom You have chosen from among all nations. You have given them Your holy Torah and drawn them toward Your great Name. These two commandments are, “Be fruitful and Multiply” and “You shall teach them to your children.” Their purpose is that You did not create the world to be empty, but to be inhabited, and that it is for Your glory that You created, fashioned, and perfected it, so that we, our offspring, and all the descendants of your people Israel will know Your Name and study Your Torah.

Thus I entreat You, O Eternal, supreme King of kings. My eyes are fixed on You until You favor me, and hear my prayer, and provide me with sons and daughters who will also be fruitful and multiply, they and their descendents unto all generations, in order that they and we might all engage in the study of Your holy Torah, to learn and to teach, to observe and to do, and to fulfill with love all the words of Your Torah’s teaching. Enlighten our eyes in Your Torah and attach our heart to Your commandments to love and revere Your Name.

Our Father, compassionate Father, grant us all a long and blessed life. Who is like You, compassionate Father, Who in compassion remembers His creatures for life! Remember us for eternal life, as our Forefather Avraham prayed, “If only Yishmael would live before You,” which the Sages interpreted as “…live in reverence of You.”

For this I have come to appeal and plead before You, that my offspring and their descendants be proper, and that You find no imperfection or disrepute in me or them forever. May they be people of peace, truth, goodness and integrity in the eyes of G-d and man. Help them to become practiced in Torah, accomplished in Scriptures, Mishnah, Talmud, Kabbalah, mitzvos, kindness, and good attributes, and to serve you with an inner love and reverence, not merely outwardly. Provide every one of them with their needs with honor, and give them health, honor and strength, good bearing and appearance, grace and loving-kindness. May love and brotherhood reign among them. Provide them with suitable marriage partners of scholarly and righteous parentage who will also be blessed with all that I have asked for my own descendants, since they will share the same fate.

You, the Eternal, know everything that is concealed, and to You all my heart’s secrets are revealed. For all my intention concerning the above is for the sake of Your great and holy Name and Torah. Therefore, answer me, O Eternal, answer me in the merit of our holy Forefathers Avraham, Yitzchak, and Ya’akov. For the sake of the fathers save the children, so the branches will be like the roots. For the sake of Your servant, David, who is the fourth part of Your Chariot, who sings with Divine inspiration.

A song of ascents. Fortunate is everyone who fears the Eternal, who walks in His ways. When you eat of the toil of your hands, you are fortunate, and good will be yours. Your wife is like a fruitful vine in the inner chambers of your home; your children are like olive shoots around your table. Look! So is blessed the man who fears the Eternal. May the Eternal bless you from Zion, and may you see the good of Jerusalem all the days of your life. May you see your children’s children, peace upon Israel.

Please, O Eternal, Who listens to prayer: May the following verse be fulfilled in me: “‘As for Me,’ says the Eternal, “this My covenant shall remain their very being; My spirit, which rests upon you, and My words which I have put in your mouth, shall not depart from your mouth nor from the mouths of your children, nor from the mouths of your children’s children,” said the Eternal, “from now to all Eternity.” May the words of my mouth and the thoughts of my heart be pleasing before You, Eternal, my Rock and my Redeemer.

By Rebbetzin Tziporah Heller

“Even when you do what you know to be right…, you should feel humility and shame before Hashem.”

(Chouos Halevauos, Gate of Submission to Hashem, ch. 4)

I dumped my pocketbook out on the living room table, sure that the keys would come out of their hiding place, but they didn’t. It’s never good when you forget AMEN (Hebrew acronym for arnak, mafteichos and nayad — wallet, keys and mobile) before you leave the house.

This time it was more than unpleasant. Looking for the keys meant missing the last bus to the community where I was expected to speak. The women who arranged the evening were just beginning their journey toward greater observance, and coming late would potentially enforce some of their hoary old stereotypical images of chareidim.

I looked upward and said, “Hashem, You know where the keys are. If it’s Your will, open my eyes and let me find them.” I then put some money aside for tzedakah, re-examined the table, and found the keys where I must have looked but just not seen them. Hashem literally opened my eyes. I knew that my next response would be crucial.

How are you supposed to respond to an answered prayer?

There are several models. One is to react like an athlete who just broke a record: “Yes, folks, it was a lot of hard work, but I just kept going till I made it to the finish line.” In spiritual terms it might sound like: “I knew that davening would help. It works for me. I really had kavanah. It’s been so much easier since I learned through the sources. It’s just a skill like any other skill; since I mastered it everything is different.”

There are about four unnecessary references to self in this model, and no references to G-d. The subtle transformation of tefillah into what the Gemara calls “iyun tefillah” (Rosh Hashanah 16b) in the negative sense begins with subconsciously removing Hashem from the picture and substituting for it a curious form of self-empowerment. If you ever fall into this trap, try to recall the words spoken at Nachshon Wachsman’s funeral.

Nachshon was nineteen when he was abducted by Arabs on October 11, 1994. From the moment he was kidnapped his parents recognized that their son’s fate was determined by Heaven. Tens of thousands davened for him, including nonreligious mothers who lit Shabbos candles on his behalf.

No one will forget his father’s words to all those who had davened for his safe return: “G-d did listen to your prayers. Sometimes, just as a father would like to always say yes to all his children’s requests, sometimes he must say no, though the child may not understand why. So too our Father in Heaven heard our prayers, and His answer was no.” This response embodied absolute reliance on Hashem as was echoed by the mothers of the three kidnapped boys who unified the entire Jewish people in prayer. The words “regardless of the outcome, I will always have emunah” will never be forgotten.

This mindset leaves you open to make more and more supplications to the only One Who can really help. This is also called iyun tefillah, but it is of course seen as holy rather than at best a first step toward what tefillah is meant to be, or at worst a pathetic capitulation to your ego.

What are the mechanics of tefillah? Why even formulate words when the consequences are determined by Hashem, Who is fully aware of what we need the most?

Ramchal tells us (Derech Hashem, section 4, para. 5) that “In His infinite wisdom, Hashem created the world with rules and with order. One of His rules is that the created beings receive the flow of His goodness by being awakened to draw close to Him. The flow from Above, which descends, is in proportion to the awakening. The L-rd wants to give His creations daily all the goodness that they can receive. It is for this reason that prayer is the way that we draw down His blessing, which is given in accordance with what [His creatures] need, and what their position is in this world.”

Prayer is meant to draw you closer to Hashem. Ego can only take you further away from Him in every sense. When Hashem appeared to Avraham and asked him to leave everything and follow Him to the Land, He made promises. One of them was that He would empower Avraham to be a source of blessing. Avraham was humble enough to receive this gift. You can see this from the way he responded when his own prayers were not answered. He had beseeched Hashem to save at least one of the five metropolises that comprised the territory of Sedom. When his pleas were denied, his response was not anger toward Him, but the words,”I am dust and ashes” (Bereishis 18:32).

Avraham was unique in his humility because there is no doubt that had his request been fulfilled, he would have felt the very same way.

Reprinted with permission – Hamodia 18 Tammuz 5774/ July 16, 2014

Visit Rebbetzin Heller’s site at www.tziporahheller.com

We can pronounce the words. We might even be able to read pretty fast. And we know we to shake, bow and clop. But do we really know how to daven. Are we coming close to where davening can be taking us.

These are some of the questions that Rabbi Zev Cohen asks in his Preparing to Daven shiur. It’s definitely worth your time. Rabbi Cohen also has a whole series called Let’s Learn to Daven.

There’s another great davening improvement initiative taking place at the Weekly Tefilah Focus. Each 5 minute weekly lesson is available in video, audio or text. This week is the first lesson, starting with Ashrei:

“We all want to get to Olam HaBa and be considered a “ben Olam HaBa” while still in this world. The Gemara in Brachos teaches us that one who says Ashrei three times a day is assured to be a ben Olam HaBa. This clearly cannot mean mere recitation. Chazal are telling us that this reward is reserved for one who thinks deeply about what the p’sukim in Ashrei are teaching us, and as a result, strengthens his emunah in Hashem.”

I don’t remember whether anyone told me that it’s hard to pray when I first got involved in Torah.

Over at ShulPolitics.com there’s a new post called Judaism’s Little Secret – It’s Hard to Pray. Give it a read and leave a comment over there if you’re so inclined.

Imagine you’re in a room full of Jewish addicts. And you’re volunteering to lead a group on Tuesday evenings. The group is called “Spirituality.” What would you talk about?

This week I decided to ask them what they would talk about. I tossed out a question that I had heard a rabbi ask at the time the Super Bowl was happening, about creating one’s own super bowl ad. “What message would you want to give to the world in thirty seconds if you had a chance to speak to 100 million people?” I asked. They loved it!

With my arm outstretched into a closed fist (a mike), I walked around holding it in front of each resident of the Jewish Women’s Recovery House, as she spoke. Leslie, twenty-four, had been in the recovery house for almost four months since she got out of jail after her last DUI. She was very eager to respond. “Here’s what I’d say!” she exclaimed enthusiastically. “If you radiate positive energy into the world, that’s what you’ll attract. If you give off negative energy – that’s what you’ll attract!” I told her she had a few more seconds before her thirty seconds would be up, so she elaborated just a little bit more, and just as excitedly.

Next Rosie wanted “the mike.” Rosie, thirty-five, and a registered nurse, had only been in the recovery house for a week and a half after being released from a local psychiatric hospital. “I started reading a book I found by a Rabbi Twerski. Here it is!” she said, picking it up from the couch, right next to her. “It’s called Angels Don’t Leave Footprints: Discovering What’s Right with Yourself. And I only started it, but it says that we are really better than angels because we can change and grow. We each have a piece of G‑d inside of us. It just gets covered up, but there’s always hope that we can come to recognize who we really are.”

Ellen, forty-one, a publicist, had come from a detox facility after getting clean from heroin. She had also not been in the house for a full two weeks yet. Ellen waited patiently for everyone else who wanted to speak to go before her, but when her turn came, she was just as ready to share her message as were all the others. “I’ve learned that G‑d hears us. The answers G‑d gives us in life, they may not be the ones we wanted to get, but who are we to know what’s ultimately good for us? It can sometimes be a very long road until we really accept that.”

Then, I don’t know how or why, but all of a sudden it hit me! “I just realized something! I practically shouted. Your words – the words that each of you just spoke here – they really did reach 100 million people – but they reached even more than 100 million people!” They were all looking at me like I was nuts. “They reached everybody in the whole world!”

“Your words, your messages to the world … they sounded like prayers to me,” and my voice started cracking. “You have so much. You are such enlightened souls from all you’ve been through.”

I had to keep going. “You’ve heard of the butterfly effect, right? In the physical realm, the flapping wings of just one butterfly can create tiny changes in the atmosphere, but those tiny changes can end up eventually altering the path of something like a tornado! In the spiritual realm, our individual prayers travel far and wide – they don’t stay put within these walls – prayers don’t care about walls – they go right through them! A tiny prayer’s vibrations travel all around the world, way faster than the speed of light! So your words, your prayers, really could havereached everybody in the whole world already.”

There was complete stillness, and a glow in the room. “Yeah,” smiled Rosie. “I guess they really could have.”

Did you get the messages that these women sent you last Tuesday night? I’m sure you did, in some way. It could have reached you in a ray of hope you felt in one flash of an instant.

But just in case the flapping of their beautiful fragile wings was imperceptible, now you have this.

Bracha Goetz is the author of twelve Jewish children’s books including Remarkable Park , The Invisible Book and The Happiness Box.

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What would you do if you were one of the world’s greatest magicians? No, not like David Blaine and slight of hand type magic, but real magic. Would you sell your abilities to become wealthy? If you knew God blessed you with these abilities would you use them to do something He didn’t want you to do?

Is there real magic?

The forces of power in the world are created by God and some people have figured out how to tap into them. We often find that which we desperately seek. Many of us are curious, fascinated, or skeptical of strange powers, ESP, psychics, or people into real magic. But some people strongly gravitate towards impure forces, and try in many ways to acquire unusual abilities. Others are merely “blessed” with these abilities.

Everything in life is a test and a challenge. In the areas of normal human behavior we have lots of challenges. Relationships, work, honesty, love, a lifetime of spiritual struggles follows all of us around. Along with life’s struggles comes challenges and difficulties that we don’t relate to as a spiritual task, but rather merely a hurdle from the natural world. We wish we could magically avoid or overcome the hurdle. Is this the fascination with Super Heroes like Superman and Wonder Woman? Do they help us vicariously enjoy the world through the fantasy of extra abilities?

Bilaam, the ancient sorcerer

Bilaam was one man who had special abilities and those talents merely allowed him to do more spiritual damage and become more of an egotist. His self-worth was so large that he thought he deserved the royal treatment. In Numbers Chapter 22 we see a person who appears on the outside to righteous and only want to do what God wants. Yet we see how easily he is lead to do that which we know God doesn’t want. How come? Because it’s all a show. He really doesn’t care about God, even though he recognizes Him as the source of his blessings. He is blinded by honor and gifts.

This is precisely the danger of special abilities. The stronger you are, the more people you have the power to help and to hurt.

As human beings we have incredible abilities that largely go untapped. And all the more so we are able to ask the Almighty for assistance that we lack in many areas. We are able to ask God to save our life, heal the sick, stop a war, and He often answers our prayers.

One request remains as one of the most important and often forgotten. That request is for the ability to use whatever blessings we receive only for the good. Let us not fall into the trap of using our blessings to go away from our Benefactor. What would be more of an insult to Him than that?

Baalei Teshuva often have blessing they were given because of the circumstances of their upbringing. Some want to ignore these blessings. Some are embarrassed about them. Some give them up as if they are tainted.

Nothing is an accident. If you feel like there’s something wrong the way you grew up and therefore there’s something wrong with the blessings you possess, you may be correct. But you may also be very incorrect. It might even be an extreme lack of appreciation to God to ignore or reject the blessings you have.

An alternative to shunning our blessings is to pray for assistance to use the blessings correctly.

God still runs the world

As one sage once put it, “God runs almost everything in the entire world. And the last bit left.He also controls.”

Even with all of his abilities, Bilaam was still unable to curse the Jewish people, as Balak, the king wanted him to. It wasn’t for lack of trying. He did his best, but when he opened his mouth to curse, God put in his words a blessing.

A person can point a gun, but if the Almighty really doesn’t want the victim to die, they’ll survive, or the bullet will jam, or the shooter will miss. There are so many ways for Him to circumvent the plan of the killer. Its part of the plan of life that the Almighty gives us free will and doesn’t force us into doing mitzvos or avoiding transgressions. But that doesn’t mean if He really wants to stop something from happening He can’t. He can and He does, often.

The real thing

Why did Balak choose Bilaam to hire to curse the Jews. Because he recognized their true power lies in their mouths. Prayer is the true power of the servants of God, so Balak looked for someone else who had the power of the mouth to fight them.

Our power is prayer. That’s what helps us the most because with prayer you can tap into the power of the Almighty. With His help, is there anything you can’t accomplish?

Don’t waste your time with minor powers like magic, ESP, and psychic abilities. Develop the power of prayer and you can have the world in the palm of your hand.

I saw this slogan on a bus while walking to work. Often, you don’t find interesting slogans like this on a bus. Where did the quote come from? You might be surprised if I tell you it’s from a TV show. The TV show is called ‘Daybreak’ and recently premiered on. The premise of the show is that the main character is framed for a murder and his family is in danger. Every morning he wakes up and has to repeat the same day and has to find out who framed him for the murder and he has to keep his family safe. Until he solves the mystery, the day will keep repeating itself.Upon further reflection, this quote is a great way to approach tefilla. After almost 5 years of taking classes at various Jewish outreach groups in the city, I made some breakthroughs this year and decided it was time to take some steps towards becoming more observant than in previous years when I had balked at such an idea (perhaps this will be the subject of a future post). One of the things I did was go to Israel for two weeks in July and learn at She’arim, one of the wonderful womens’ seminaries in Jerusalem. It was a transformative two weeks and the only regret I have was that I wished I had stayed a little longer. After coming back from Israel, I started davening twice a day. Before Israel (BI), I prayed for 15-20 minutes in the morning, semi-rushed because I slept in until 8:00, sometimes 8:15 and I needed to be at work at 9:00. After Israel (AI), I find myself getting up at 7:20-7:30, and davening for 30-40 minutes (my mornings are so much calmer now) and also davening Mincha. Read more Every Today is Another Chance to Get Things Right ›

By Chaim Grossferstant

Let me begin by making an admission. I am not a card carrying member of the “alert Hanoch Teller immediately” crowd and am somewhat skeptical of “visionaries” who sense Hashgacha Pratis everywhere. It’s not that I don’t believe that Hashgacha Pratis exists everywhere; it’s just that I think that the maintenance of our free-choice is set up in such a way that we should be mostly oblivious to Hashgacha Pratis most of the time.

But there is a recent news item that really causes a thinking Jew in these perilous times to pause and ponder. Yesterday, the New York Sun reported (page 9) that on Tuesday Irish archaeologists discovered an ancient book of psalms spotted by a construction worker while driving the shovel of his backhoe into a bog. (Parenthetically there are a number of blogs I’d like to drive the shovel of a backhoe into!) What we would call a “Tehillim”, it is a Psalter and has been approximately dated to the years 800–1000 A. C. E. Pat Wallace, director of the National Museum of Ireland described it as “really a miracle find.”

But what makes the find of particular interest to people who are Jewish but not necessarily archeologists is that the book was found open to a page describing, in Latin script, Psalm 83, in which, according to the AP, “G-d hears complaints of other nations’ attempts to wipe out the name of Israel” and that in effect, the Psalter cannot be moved from that page. Because “It could take months of study just to identify the safest way to pry open the pages without damaging or destroying them.”
Read more A Miss is a Mile – Old Tehillim Found Open to Psalm 83 (or perhaps 84) ›

It seems to me that Borchi Nofshi, Psalm 104, which is said on Rosh Chodesh mornings might just be the most overlooked section of our prayers. By the time we finish Hallel, leining and mussaf (if you are davening ashkenaz) you are probably already late for your train/bus/car pool and Borchi Nofshi often gets short shrift.

Add to that the fact that Nissan is probably the most hectic month of the year (in case you are wondering why, you better start your Pesach cleaning NOW!). Therefore, it just might be that the Borchi Nafshi we say tomorrow may not get the proper attention it deserves.

Read more Starting Off on the Right Foot ›

The Abuhav Synagogue in Tzefas, Israel is one of the most beautiful shuls I’ve been in. It is ornately painted and was constructed along the theme of the Pesach song Echad Mi Yodea (Who Knows One?) .

On top of the bima where the shaliach tzibur (prayer leader) stands is a dome, with many paintings upon it. Directly in the sight of the shaliach tzibur is a painting with the title “Makom HaMikdash” (the site of the Holy Temple). The weird thing is that the painting does not depict the Beis HaMikdash at all. Rather, it depicts the mosque that currently sits on top of the temple mount. The explanation is that when the shaliach tzibur looks up he sees that, because of senseless hatred among the Jews, in the place of the Beis HaMikdash now stands a mosque. This should serve to focus the shaliach tzibur, who represents the entire kehillah (congregation), on an all-encompassing love for all Jews.

Share the love.

Dear Rabbi Brody,

Thanks, FR from New Jersey

Dear FR,

The old Novardok Yeshiva remedy for firing up a person with your problem is to say the prayer “Nishmas kol chai” from the Shabbos morning service; you can say it at any time or at any place, and it works wonders. Say each word slowly, loudly, and with fervor, as if you’re counting one-hundred dollar bills. If you don’t understand the Hebrew, say the translation from an English prayer book, then go back and say the Hebrew. Contemplate every word. By the time you’re through, you’ll have thawed out. Normally, when a person says “Nishmas” like he/she should, he/she kindles a bonfire of love for Hashem in their heart.
Read more Remedies for Spiritual Freeze ›