Throughout our trip in Israel we have had opportunities to pray together as a community, to experience how some of our fellows teach prayer to their students/congregants, and to attend services at synagogues in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. Each prayer opportunity has come down to: How do we connect to pray individually and help each individual we teach connect with prayer, connect with the Jewish people through prayer and connect to God?
Our first service together was spent at the Leonardo Basel Hotel in Tel Aviv. That evening a group of fellows and mentors led a very moving Kabbalat Shabbat and Minchah service for us. At this service they decided to use instruments for Kabbalat Shabbat but not for minchah. The service was full of joyous singing as it was our first Shabbat together and our first Shabbat together in Israel. For me personally, all the emotions I have felt building up to this trip and since we arrived came flooding out during this service and I am grateful for my colleagues who created the kavannah - the intention, mood and focus.
Once again music was a key component this erev Shabbat when several of us had the opportunity to pray at Kol HaNeshamah for Kabbalat Shabbat and Minchah. This seems appropriate as the translation of this congregation's name is Voice of the Soul. On one level this service allowed me to connect with memories as this was the congregation I belonged to when I was a first year student at Hebrew Union College.
On a second level this service allowed me to connect with other Jews as I was greeted by Israeli friends I hadn't seen in a long time, including a classmate from my time at Hebrew Union College who lives in Jerusalem.
On a third level this service allowed me to connect with Jews around the world as each Shabbat there are guests from around the world and this Shabbat was no exception.
On a fourth level this service allowed me to connect with the prayers themselves as Rabbi Levi Weiman-Kelman led us in deep breathing before some of the prayers, led us in guided meditation reflecting on the past week before other prayers, and led the congregation in different paces of singing the prayers to add to the kavannah.
On a fifth level this service allowed me to connect with God as the beautiful singing of the congregation, especially when in harmony or in rounds, was able to carry all of our prayers Higher.
On a second level this service allowed me to connect with other Jews as I was greeted by Israeli friends I hadn't seen in a long time, including a classmate from my time at Hebrew Union College who lives in Jerusalem.
On a third level this service allowed me to connect with Jews around the world as each Shabbat there are guests from around the world and this Shabbat was no exception.
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| Rabbi Levi Weiman-Kelman |
On a fifth level this service allowed me to connect with God as the beautiful singing of the congregation, especially when in harmony or in rounds, was able to carry all of our prayers Higher.
The service that moved me the most and got me to think about applying techniques to my school's prayer experiences was the study session and then havdallah with Bet T'fillah Israeli led by Esteban Gottfried and Company. During our study session and havdallah we were introduced to their siddur, whose design in some ways reminded me of Mishkan Tefillah, the Reform Movement's new siddur. Their siddur is designed with the right hand page being the traditional prayers and the left hand page being a collection of songs and poems whose themes match the traditional prayers yet are part of the popular culture or cultural history of Israel, e.g. Arik Einstein's Ani V'atah for Aleinu. Through our experience with them it was clear to me how they were able to attract hundreds of Israelis to the pier in Tel Aviv during the summer to welcome Shabbat. The experience was so powerful that many of us felt moved to share through song our gratitudes that Shabbat and our hopes for the upcoming week.
Afterwards, a few of us were discussing how could we create a service like this for our teens and how would we know which songs would connect them with this same deep meaning. I shared with my colleagues how twice this year with our seventh graders at Temple Beth El of Northern Westchester, thanks to our wonderful seventh grade coordinator, we gave our students a rubric of the service with an explanation of each prayer and asked them to find songs on their MP3 players that had the same themes. Then we had a service of playing these songs. The experience must have connected with our students because several parents shared with me how their teen came home and shared this with them and some even shared it with extended family.
My thought of how to take it to the next level is to do this a few more times to gather more ideas and create a siddur for our teen tefillah experiences each week at religious school. Even better would be for several of us to do this activity with our teens and create a siddur we all can use. What a great way to allow prosumer learning.
This trip has given us many wonderful gifts. In the case of prayer, this trip has given me many more tools in my tool box to bring our students closer to prayer, each other, Jews around the world, and God. What an awe-inspiring gift this is.
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