Tefillah 010

24:
We have already mentioned that originally all the extra passages of study that have been included in our descriptions were intended for private worship, to be studied at home before leaving for the synagogue. It was, of course, inevitable that when people started reciting in the synagogue the early morning blessings [Birkhot ha-Shaĥar] and the Torah blessings [Birkhot ha-Torah] with their concommitant study that all these selected passages for 'further study' were transferred into the synagogue as well. Traditionally, after we have studied texts from the classical sources of the sages (Mishnah, Talmud, Midrash etc) we recite a special Kaddish if there is a minyan present. Thus it should come as no great surprise that both Siddur Sim Shalom and Siddur Va'ani Tefillati have appended Kaddish de-Rabbanan to these items of 'compulsory study'.

25:
There are several versions of Kaddish that punctuate our public liturgy. The most frequently encountered are called 'Half-Kaddish' [Ĥatzi Kaddish], 'Full Kaddish' [Kaddish Titkabbal], 'Rabbinic Kaddish [Kaddish de-Rabbanan] and 'Mourner's Kaddish' [Kaddish Yatom]. This is not an appropriate juncture at which we might go into the history and development of Kaddish. So let us make do, for now, with a short observation concerning Kaddish de-Rabbanan, with an assurance that we shall fully discuss Kaddish other appropriate points in our discussions.

26:
There seems to be little doubt that the most 'original' format of Kaddish was Kaddish de-Rabbanan. In the great Yeshivot of Babylon it became the custom to recite after each lecture a special commendation for the sage who had delivered such a brilliant exposition. (We may guess that this was done also when the exposition was not so brilliant.) The commendation took the form of a prayer that the day when God will establish His rule over the whole world come as soon as possible and that, in the mean time, He bless those who occupy themselves with Torah study with all good things.

The text of the relevant paragraph of Kaddish de-Rabbanan is rendered in English in Siddur Sim Shalom as follows [page 71]:

The above rendition is hardly a translation, but then this is to a large extent true of all the English renditions of Hebrew texts in Siddur Sim Shalom. A translation – purely for the sake of comparison – might read as follows:

You will note that the text has an awkward syntax, the first sentence not really being concluded. This is probably because the passage is, in fact, an agglommeration of more than one version that was current. The 'place' to which the text refers is the Yeshivah or any other place where the study has taken place. (In the land of Israel it is customary to have 'in this holy place', and this is the text in siddur Va'ani Tefillati.) The 'you' to which the prayer refers ('May both they and you') is the congregation. In earlier times it was quite common to include in the text of Kaddish explicit reference to great Torah luminaries, though not always at this point in the Kaddish. (For example, the Jews of the Yemen in their Kaddish asked God to 'establish His sovereignty [over the world] during your lifetime and in your days [fellow worshippers], during the lifetime of our Rabbi and Teacher Moshe son of Maimon, and during the lifetime of the whole House of Israel…')

27:
After Kaddish de-Rabbanan siddur Sim Shalom introduces several pages [72-80] of selected psalms, one for each day of the week upon which a festival might fall. I find this rather strange. The recitation of these psalms derives from the list given in the Mishnah [Tamid 7:4] of the psalms that the Levitical choir and orchestra used to perform in the Bet Mikdash after the offering of the the daily sacrifice. The idea is that our services have now replaced the daily sacrifices in the Temple, so we should include these psalms in our services just as they were included in the Bet Mikdash. This being the case, it seems rather strange to introduce these psalms before the service has even begun! The general custom is to recite the appropriate psalm either after the morning service (and before the Reading of the Torah) or at the end of the whole service, including the Additional service, Musaf. (The latter is the custom followed in siddur Va'ani Tefillati.) The special psalm for Shabbat is Psalm 92 – because of its introductory heading: 'A psalm, a song for the Sabbath day' [siddur Sim Shalom, page 72].

To be continued.

Michael Epstein writes:

Mention is made repeatedly about the siddur Sim Shalom. I have only davened from the ArtScroll and Metsudah siddurim. Would the Sim Shalom be the siddur of choice for Conservative worship or are there others that would be closer to the Orthodox Siddurim?

I respond:

I have never visited the United States so I cannot write with any great confidence, but my impression is that Siddur Sim Shalom is the prayer-book used most prevalently by Conservative congregations in the USA. (That does not mean, of course, that others are not used as well.) At any rate, siddur Sim Shalom was commissioned and published by the Rabbincal Assembly and the USCJ, which is the umbrella organisation of Conservative synagogues in America.

Each person, of course, must use the prayer book with which he or she is most comfortable, that most reflects their desired mode of communing with Heaven. That being the case I would not expect many Conservative Jews to find the ArtScroll siddur appropriate for their devotions, because it is clearly addressing an orthodox worshipper. (Personally, I find several of the explanations given in that siddur to be quite disturbing.) The Metzudah siddur is designed for use in congregations which follow the customs and traditions of Ĥabad [Lubavitch ĥasidim].

I am at a loss to understand why any Conservative worshipper would seek out a prayer-book 'closer to the Orthodox siddurim'. Why should this be? If the presumption is that an orthodox prayer-book is somehow more 'accurate' or 'halakhically acceptable' this is a great misconception. There is nothing halakhically untoward in either siddur Sim Shalom or siddur Va'ani Tefillati – unless halakhah is (incorrectly) understood to imply sacrosanctity to one particular form of prayers [nusaĥ].

A 'gut YomTov' – Ĥag Samé'aĥ – to everybody, as we approach the festival of Shavu'ot