Prayer and Religious Consciousness: An Analysis of Jewish Prayer in the Works of Joseph B. Soloveitchik, Yeshayahu Leibowitz, and Abraham Joshua Heschel

Joseph B. Soloveitchik, Yeshayahu Leibowitz, and Abraham Joshua Heschel, three thinkers deeply rooted in the classical Orthodox Jewish tradition, dealt with the issue of prayer in ways that reveal three distinctive religious sensibilities and approaches to Judaism. All three were modern twentieth-century Jewish theologians schooled in Western culture and philosophy and yet deeply committed to and immersed in the traditional Jewish normative tradition. This tradition, the Halakhic tradition, is a culture in the broadest sense of the term, consisting of a distinctive intellectual framework based on biblical and rabbinic concepts, values, and texts and a practical form of life closely regulated by the code of behavior known as Halakhah. One cannot fully appreciate the meaning of prayer and religious consciousness for such thinkers without clarifying certain fundamental patterns of thought and organizing images that characterize the intellectual, normative tradition that informs their thinking.

Integrating Divergent Metaphors and Motifs

The problematic nature of prayer, the theme of this article, exemplifies some of the crucial issues with respect to views of God, nature, history, and so on that distinguish rabbinic civilization from its biblical foundations. The formalization of prayer in the Talmud, which transformed prayer from a spontaneous, unstructured personal expression into a regulated, institutionalized public practice, signifies a major transition from biblical to rabbinic traditions, calling for the Jewish philosopher's careful attention and analysis.

The Prayer Book:
The Institutionalization of Prayer

When prayer is regulated and standardized using fixed linguistic formulas and prescribed times and format, the psychological/religious qualities of inwardness and spontaneity, which are generally considered necessary conditions for experiencing relational passion toward God, become problematic:

R. Eliezer says: If a man makes his prayers a fixed task, it is not a [genuine] supplication. What is meant by a fixed task? —R. Jacob b. Idi said in the name of R. Oshaiah: Anyone whose prayer is like a heavy burden on him ["as the fulfillment of a duty" (Rashi)]. . . . Rabbah and R. Joseph say: Whoever is not able to insert something fresh in it. R. Zera said: I can insert something fresh, but I am afraid to do so for fear I should become confused. ¹

The fixity and regularity of the legally prescribed practice of prayer are hardly conducive to personal intensity and longing to be in the presence of God. In addition, as a Halakhic Jew, one can become conditioned to relate to prayer as the fulfillment of a duty rather than as a living encounter with God (which is the thrust of Rashi's understanding of keva).

The prayer book has become synonymous with the "lip service" phenomenon of prayer where becoming a "prayer expert" means being able to rattle off blocks of liturgy at incredible speeds and where the words of prayer seem to flow automatically, divorced from any sense of religious inspiration and devotion. All three thinkers discussed in this article relate to this Talmudic dilemma with utmost seriousness. They all acknowledge that the regularity and formality of prayer and the sense of duty associated with its performance as a Halakhic norm may become obstacles to developing a religiously meaningful attitude to prayer. Their individual responses, however, are far from similar, reflecting different philosophical approaches to Halakhah, Torah, and God.

Joseph B. Soloveitchik

Prophecy and Communal Prayer

For Rabbi Soloveitchik, as for Maimonides, the biblical tradition provides two pivotal spiritual/philosophical frames of reference: creation and revelation. From a philosophical point of view, the creation story in Genesis represents an orientating moment of religious consciousness that differs significantly from the covenantal relationship between God and the patriarchs (beginning in the Book of Genesis) and between God and the people of Israel (in the Book of Exodus and throughout the T'nach).

In later postbiblical times, these two moments—creation and revelation—served as...