Tefillah (Gruss)

Mishna in Brachos says that אין עומדים להתפלל אלא מתוך כובד ראש. A person has to the mindset which a person is supposed to have when he gets up to daven is one of koved rosh. What does koved rosh mean? So Rashi says koved rosh means hachna'ah, a sense of submissiveness, a sense of submission before Hakadosh Baruch Hu. The Gemara says that the source for the din in the Mishna is from the pasuk of עבדו את השם ביראה. So hachna'ah is an expression of yirah. So basically when a person gets up to daven before Hakadosh Baruch Hu, it has to be with a sense of yirah. It's interesting that we know that the Avos embodied different middos. That Avraham Avinu embodied the midda of chesed and vis-a-vis his relationship with Hakadosh Baruch Hu the midda of ahavah, zera Avraham ohavi. Yitzchak embodied the midda of guevura and vis-a-vis his relationship with Hakadosh Baruch Hu the midda of yirah, וישבע בפחד אביו יצחק. Yitzchak Avinu again his relationship with Hakadosh Baruch Hu was characterized primarily by yirah. Chazal also say that the Avos, the three Avos are to be correlated with the gimmel amudim on which the world rests of Torah, Avodah and Gemilus Chasadim. And that Yitzchak Avinu also is the one who represents the amud of Avodah which means not only Avodas Hakorbanos but also Avodas Hatfilla. So again this same connection of tfilla and yirah that Yitzchak Avinu the one of the Avos who represents yirah is also the one who represents the amud ha-avodah, the amud of tfilla. Let's sort of explore what tfilla's about. Let's try to understand a little bit what the essence of yiras shamayim is and im yirtzeh Hashem those two lines of inquiry will converge. The main part of tfilla is bakasha. Not only quantitatively in the weekday shemoneh esrei but that's the ikker of tfilla. It's a little strange at first glance because bakasha seems somewhat self-gratifying. It's like a child goes into a department store and says to his parents I want this and I want this and I want this and points to all the stores. So we come to the Ribbono Shel Olam and say Ribbono Shel Olam we want this, we want wisdom, we want intelligence and we want you to forgive us for everything wrong that we did and we want you to get rid of all our tzaros and you should give us health and you should certainly give us parnassa and preferably even osher. So why is that such a... why does the world rest... why is that one of the pillars on which the world rests when we come to the Ribbono Shel Olam and say Ribbono Shel Olam we want you to gratify every bakasha every request we have. Ella mai the essence of request and the reason why it's such an avodah is that when a person comes to Hakadosh Baruch Hu and says חננו מאיתך דעה בינה והשכל chochma binah vada'at whatever it is so there's a recognition of אתה חונן לאדם דעת ומלמד לאנוש בינה. And what's so crucial and what the essence of tfilla is is not that we're seeking gratification that Hakadosh Baruch Hu should give us what we want but the recognition and the acknowledgment that Ribbono Shel Olam we're dependent upon you for everything. And that's what the essence of tfilla is. The reason bakasha is so crucial and so central is if I don't ask so I think I'm self-sufficient. I think I can take care of myself. I don't have to ask the Ribbono Shel Olam that he should give me intelligence and wisdom and understanding. I can... Apparently I think that I can take care of myself, things will take care of themself. A person davens, a person is mevakesh tzorcho from Hakadosh Baruch Hu, so there's a recognition, there's an acknowledgment of absolute dependence upon Hakadosh Baruch Hu. And that's what the essence of tefillah is, and that's why bakasha is the central component of tefillah because of the recognition and the acknowledgment of the absolute dependence that we have. And it's for that reason that Hakadosh Baruch Hu wants us to ask, because the asking, Hakadosh Baruch Hu wants to respond davka to the asking, because in the asking there's a recognition, there's an acknowledgment of need, of absolute dependence. The Maharal in Nesivos Olam, in Nesiv HaYira says that the essence of yira is that a person understands that his relationship with Hakadosh Baruch Hu, the terms the Maharal uses are that Hakadosh Baruch Hu is the ilah, ayin lamed hey, and that the person is the olul and the kiyum, the very existence of the olul is through, in, and because of the ilah. So ilah in Lashon Hakodesh means cause and olul literally caused or effect. So the essence of yira is that a person understands and the sense of awe that a person has before Hakadosh Baruch Hu is because he understands that Hakadosh Baruch Hu is the cause, the source of his existence and the person is just the olul and the person is just the effect, but Hakadosh Baruch Hu is the source of our existence. We don't exist independently. But when the person has that understanding that Hakadosh Baruch Hu, those are the words of the Maharal, that Hakadosh Baruch Hu is the ilah and the person is simply an olul, he says that's what yira means. That's what it means to have and to feel yira. So now, when Chazal tell us that אין עומדין להתפלל אלא מתוך כובד ראש, that when a person davens, he davens with kovid rosh and again kovid rosh means yira, right? Because the source for the din of kovid rosh is עבדו את ה' ביראה, so a person can only daven with yira. What does it mean to have yira? What does it mean to have yira? To have a sense, as the Maharal goes on to explain, if Hakadosh Baruch Hu is the source of everything, the cause of everything, He sustains everything, our existence is only because of Hakadosh Baruch Hu, through Hakadosh Baruch Hu, so that results a person has a sense of his batlus, a sense of being totally totally batel u'mevutal before Hakadosh Baruch Hu. And that's exactly what we do in tefillah, when we stand before Hakadosh Baruch Hu and we say חננו מאיתך דעה בינה והשכל, Chochmah Binah V'daas, Hashivenu, so we say Ribono Shel Olam we can't move without You, we can't exist without You. And that's exactly how the two lines converge. The essence of tefillah is the bakashas tzorcho, which acknowledges our absolute dependence and that's exactly what a sense of yira is and that's why a person can't daven without yira because yira is the sense of his batlus that a person feels when he recognizes that Hakadosh Baruch Hu is the source of our existence and we don't exist on our own. We can't exist on our own. Nothing can, nothing does. What does it mean to have a sense of his batlus before Hakadosh Baruch Hu? So what it means conceptually is relatively speaking easy to understand. Again what it means conceptually is that we don't exist on our own, that it's not that Hakadosh Baruch Hu pushed a button so many thousands of years ago, but now things can continue to exist on their own, but it means that every second Hakadosh Baruch Hu sustains us, המחדש בטובו בכל יום תמיד מעשה בראשית. So we have no, we exist because of Hakadosh Baruch Hu through Hakadosh Baruch Hu. That's what it means conceptually, intellectually to have a sense of his batlus that literally, that Ein Od Milvado, that nothing else exists separately but only because of Hakadosh Baruch Hu, through Hakadosh Baruch Hu, Ein Od Milvado. That's what it means conceptually, intellectually, to have a sense of his batlus, to have a sense of yira. But what So if someone annoys me, someone annoys me and first of all I get annoyed, I feel annoyed, and then maybe I even lash out at him verbally, say, and then I say something unkind and I put him down. So we understand that that's a lack of middos. We understand that there's something missing in bein adam l'chaveiro, but the emes is that when you dig, when you dig deep, it's a lack of yiras shamayim. A lack of yiras shamayim not only because if a person would stop and think that Hakadosh Baruch Hu was watching what he's doing, he'd be on better behavior, but basically what animates the annoyance and what animates that frustration and what animates the lashing out at someone else, there's an ego there. There's an ego of what you're doing to annoy me, what you're doing to bother me, what you're doing to interfere with me and my plans. That sense of ego is as direct a stirah, is as much the antithesis of this sense of hisbatlus before Hakadosh Baruch Hu that a person is supposed to have. So מי אני ומה אני, right? Who am I and what am I to have a tainah against someone else, which is ego-driven. A person can have tainos, but usually, usually, most of the time, the tainos that we have against each other are not driven by concerns of Torah and l'shem shamayim. Usually, usually, most of the time, they're ego-driven. It's what you're doing to me. A good test for whether or not a person is sort of reacting with moral indignation and righteousness or whether a person is acting again out of personal annoyance and personal frustration is whether or not we react the same way when this person does it to someone else. Whatever the avlah, either real or perceived, is, so do we react as strongly when it's done to someone else? If he annoys someone else, does it bother us as much? So if the answer, and invariably the answer is no, if the answer is no, so it means that what we're feeling is not nothing to do with any kind of moral objection or l'shem shamayim objection, no, but it's ego-driven. If it's ego-driven, so that's a chisaron in yiras shamayim. It's not just a chisaron in middos. It's a chisaron in yiras shamayim. That's why ultimately yiras shamayim, yiras shamayim has to be manifest not only in bein adam l'makom, but in bein adam l'chaveiro also, because hisbatlus should also dictate the way we act bein adam l'chaveiro as well. And when you think about it, when you think about it, real chessed, chessed to the ultimate degree, to the degree to which we're supposed to practice chessed, requires a hisbatlus, requires a hisbatlus. To illustrate the notion of how chessed requires hisbatlus, there is a story, whether it's factually real or apocryphal, I don't know, but it's certainly profoundly true in another sense about a rebbe who's priving the tish at shalosh seudos. And he's, you know, the way the, if you want to just paint the scene in front of your eyes, so it's the way it was before there was electricity and some shtieblach they even now make sure that the lights are off during shalosh seudos time, so it's dark and they've sung zemiros for a while, then the rebbe begins his divrei Torah shalosh seudos. And the chasidim are hanging on every word. And there's a sense of elevation and exhilaration that they feel. And he's darshaning, and then all of a sudden this ignorant, uncouth farmer pushes his way to the front and interrupts the rebbe right in the middle, no excuse me, no nothing, not even speaking in Yiddish, he's speaking in Polish. So the rebbe says, well, it probably doesn't work the way it used to because it's not eating enough. So put some sugar in with the oats. And maybe then the horse will eat more, feel stronger, and be able to work better. The rebbe resumes the divrei Torah. And again, the Chasidim who lost the momentum, so they're trying to regain it, trying to regain that again feeling of exhilaration that they had from every word of the rebbe's divrei Torah. Then, just as they finally regained it, the farmer again, he says, rebbe, I don't think that's going to do the job. He says, I've tried the sugar. That's not going to do the job. So the rebbe says, then if I were you, I would check the horseshoes. Sometimes the horseshoes need to be replaced, and that can make all the difference. The Chasidim are very, very irritated here. Very bekoshi gadol holding back, restraining their anger with this mechutzaf. But so far they're restraining themselves. The rebbe continues the divrei Torah. A third time, again, just as the Chasidim once again have recaptured that feeling, again, he's got questions about his horse. So at this point, the Chasidim lose it, they're ready to rip him limb from limb. Ready to rip him limb from limb. So the rebbe turns to them and he says in Yiddish, knowing that the farmer doesn't understand Yiddish, so that he won't be embarrassed. He says to them, don't you understand what's happening? He says, he's not interested in the horse. He knows that I'm no equestrian expert here. I'm not the world's biggest mumche on horses. If he needs an eitzah on his horse, there are better addresses for him to go to. But he wants to come closer to the Ribono shel Olam. So he wants to develop a relationship with me. So he doesn't know, he can't come over and ask me a kasha on the Tosfos. He can't come over and ask me about a Bartenura on Mishnayos. He can't even come over and ask me about a pasuk Chumash with Rashi. He never even went to cheder. From the time he was three years old, he was out in the field working alongside his father, who was also a farmer. So the only thing he can talk about is horses. So when he wants to connect with me and he wants to come closer to Hakadosh Baruch Hu, so he talks about horses. Talks about horses. So what's the point of the story? The point of the story is that the gadlus of the rebbe is that he was able to see the world from someone else's perspective. He was able to see the world, instead of whereas the Chasidim were reacting and they were seeing the world from their own perspective, the way we generally see the world, the rebbe, his gadlus was that he was able to see the world from this ignorant farmer's perspective. So whereas the Chasidim from their perspective saw this nudnik, a mechutzaf who was interrupting and interfering with Seuda Shlishis Torah, which is the time of ra'ava de-ra'avin, which is the biggest eis ratzon there is, and he's disrupting that, and he saw a neshama which had a teshuka, which was yearning to come closer to Hakadosh Baruch Hu. To be able to do that kind of chessed and to see the world from someone else's perspective needs a hisbatlus. Needs a hisbatlus. The type of hisbatlus that a person who has emestike yiras shamayim, as the Maharal explains, which results in hisbatlus, so it's necessary and it has to manifest itself in the bein adam l'chaveiro as well. Now the fact that chessed is also rooted in a sense of hisbatlus accounts for something else. The Rav used to quote the Rambam in the end of Moreh Nevuchim as well as the Ibn Ezra in Chumash in Sefer Vayikra say that the word chessed, so we translate it as kindness, benevolence, right, that's our dictionary definition of the word chessed, but the Ibn Ezra and the Rambam both say that etymologically, that's not what it means. The Ibn Ezra is commenting on the pasuk in Sefer Vayikra where the Torah says that if a person marries his sister, so that's an incestuous relationship, right? So how does the Torah describe that incestuous relationship? The Torah says chesed hu. It's a chessed. Okay, so Chazal darshen, chesed hu that Hakadosh Baruch Hu once permitted this relationship to be. forward and Olam Chesed Yibaneh. So that's how Chazal comment on the word Chesed in this context. But Ibn Ezra says what's the, what does it mean? And Chazal don't mean this on the level of Pshuto Shel Mikra. So what does it mean on the level of Pshuto Shel Mikra? So he says what the word Chesed really means is extreme. Chesed really means extreme behavior. And extreme behavior it's really etymologically it's really a neutral term. And that Chesed it connotes when a person behaves in an extreme manner. There can be extreme, there can be extreme kindness and extreme sensitivity and extreme benevolence and there can be other extremes. And the Ibn Ezra says that's what the Pshuto Shel Mikra is in the Pasuk of Chesed Hu that this type of incestuous relationship that's something, that's an extreme, that's an extreme. Similarly in Tfilat Yona when Yona is davening to HaKadosh Baruch Hu so he says משמרים הבלי שוא חסדם יעזבו. Chasdom Yaazovu. So there's a big machlokes in the meforshim in Navi what Chasdom Yaazovu means. So according to some Yona is being skeptical about all the people on the boat who cast him overboard and were nodeir all kinds of nedarim so Yona says to HaKadosh Baruch Hu I don't believe they're going to honor these commitments. Chasdom Yaazovu all these kind promises they made to you HaKadosh Baruch Hu they're not going to honor them, they'll abandon them, Chasdom Yaazovu. Okay so that doesn't tie into what we're talking about but other meforshim say no that on the contrary it means the exact opposite that Yona is saying they are genuine and Chasdom means their Avodah Zarah and Chasdom Yaazovu means those who were formerly meshomrim havlei shav, those who formerly until now believed in the futility of Avodah Zarah, Chasdom Yaazovu, they're going to abandon their Avodah Zarah and that Chesed here refers to Avodah Zarah. How does Chesed refer to Avodah Zarah? Again the same point because Chesed basically means something which is extreme. So that's what the Rav zichrono livracha said that real Chesed, real Chesed means extreme behavior. It doesn't just mean when when you know when we see the proverbial old lady crossing the street with three bundles. Okay so that's Chesed. But there's nothing extreme, nothing extreme about that. Nothing extreme about that. The example which the Rav gave, he said this in a hespeid for my paternal grandmother aleha hashalom. And he was describing her Chesed. And the example he gave to illustrate how real Chesed means extreme, I think he even used the term at the time, irrational Chesed, irrational behavior, is that a man once knocked on my grandparents' door on Erev Pesach. I think he actually was even upfront and told them at the time that he had just been released from prison. He had been in prison not for a violent crime but he wasn't coming from Mir, he wasn't coming from Beis HaTalmud, he wasn't necessarily coming with the best references and he knocked on their door and says I have no place for Pesach. So they says, so you'll come in and you'll spend Pesach with us. He then lived with them for the next thirty years until he died. So the Rav said so that's Chesed, it's irrational behavior. There's nothing rational about that. It was irrational he says. You take a person in, you take him in for Pesach, you give him a place for the Seder, that's rational, that's a rational kindness. But you let him stay, that you let him stay for thirty years, that's irrational Chesed. So why is it that Chesed has to manifest itself in extremism? Because since ultimately what we were just explaining that genuine Chesed has to be rooted in hisbatlus, that genuine Chesed is that there should be no ego, right? That that I see the world from someone else's perspective. I don't see it from the way it annoys me and then respond accordingly but I see what it is that he's acting out. I see that if he's a nudnik so maybe I don't know maybe he's looking for a friend and maybe he's not trying to intrude from my perspective, maybe he's intruding on something but maybe it's really extending a hand and trying to generate a friendship. extreme. There's no, there's no such thing as as a moderate hisbatlus. And that's what, and that's why chesed manifests itself in, in this sense of extremism. So that's the inyan when a person stops to, to prepare for davening, to try to have that sense of kovid rosh, the sense of yira, sense of hisbatlus, and a sense of hisbatlus not just which, which should be manifest in our relationship and our interaction with Hakadosh Baruch Hu, but a sense of hisbatlus which should be evident and manifest in our relationships with each other, bein adam l'chavero as well.