From: 	 heb_roots_chr@mail.geocities.com
Sent: 	 Friday, November 14, 1997 12:01 AM
To: 	 Hebraic Heritage Newsgroup
Subject: Jewish Prayer

From:        Sharon Spicka
To:            heb_roots_chr@geocities.com
Subject:       Re: What is prayer?

Dear Mishpachah (family),

Just wanted to share what I am learning about prayer in my classes at 
the Arkansas Institute of Holy Land Studies.  Most of this comes from Marvin
Wilson's book, "Our Father Abraham."  It is the Jewish concept of prayer.

The Mishnah is the oral law which was codified (rendered to writing) in yr.
200, but it was taught by the Rabbis hundreds of years before.  The first tractate of the
Mishna is Berakhot, "blessings."  God was to be thanked for everything, good
news and bad.  A pious Jew has 100 times during the day where he offers
blessings to God.  Jewish prayers tend to be short because the entire working 
day of an observant Jew is punctuated with sentence prayers.  These prayers 
usually begin, "Barukh atah adonai"--"Blessed are you, O LORD."  

The Talmud even has a prayer to thank God you can urinate.  We take these 
functions for granted.  A Jew recites a prayer upon hearing bad news and good 
news, when smelling fragrant plants, and when eating food or drinking wine.  
A Jew offers a prayer in the presence of thunder, lightning,
rainbows and comets.  There is a prayer on seeing strangely formed 
persons, such as giants or dwarfs.  All of life has to be processed with a 
blessing of God. 

Biblical prayer is the ability to praise and give thanks to God many times 
throughout the day.

Prayer means to stay in touch with God throughout the day.   To the Hebrew
mind everything is theological.  In ancient times Jews did not make a 
distinction between sacred and secular.  They see all of life as God's domain.  
Prayer to the ancient Jew meant in everything give thanks.  "Religion" to an 
Old Testament Jew was a way of life.  Some people view a religion as a 
system of ethics, a code of conduct, an ideology, a creed.  To a Hebrew it's 
none of these.  A Hebrew understood his daily life of faith in terms of a journey, 
a pilgrimage, walking on the roadway  of life, fellowshiping with God on the road 
of life.  To them the essence of religion was a relationship, walking with God in 
his path of wisdom and righteousness and his way of service to others.

It was sure freedom for me when I realized that my daily intimacy with 
Jesus is constant prayer.

Sharon Spicka

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>From Eddie:
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         For further information about the Arkansas Institute of Holy
Land Studies, please visit one of the two Web Sites:

Hebraic Heritage Ministries:

         http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/2175/aihls.html

HaY'Did Learning Center:

         http://www.haydid.org/ark.htm

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