Getting High on the Holidays        

As we enter Elul, the last month of the Jewish calendar year, we are requested to critique our behavior for the previous eleven months in preparation for the process of repentance and forgiveness.  The theme of forgiveness, at this time each year, is probably based on a Midrashic legend that tells of Moses ascending Mt Sinai, on the first of Elul. He remained there for forty day to plead for forgiveness for the quintessential sin of the Golden Calf. Intense prayer dominates these days beginning with the recitation of Selichot (penitential prayers) during Elul and continues towards the two prayerful days of Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur, the day Moses triumphantly descended the mountain with the tablets of commandments in hand.

As the High Holidays come closer I recall my frustration that I had never been properly taught to davven (pray); it was just never taught in my Hebrew school and my guess is that it's not skillfully taught anywhere. The most instruction I ever had was a siddur placed in my hands with an admonishing finger pointing to the place. I can only assume that we all received the same instruction. It's a shame because prayer is such a natural, instinctive and inherent activity--communing with God--that somehow got lost.  Most of us will make our annual pilgrimage to the synagogue on these days but many of us won't see the inside of a synagogue again, unless invited to a bar/bat Mitzvah, until next year this time. Many of us dutifully show up in the synagogue, where we mechanically go through the rituals and impatiently await the final Shofar blasts. For those who decide to make the best of it, why not learn to make the most of it.

For my own spiritual development, I ultimately needed to master the art of prayer, not only for the high holidays, but for all services including Shabbat as well.  At first I came to realize that Jewish services are not ceremonies, like graduations or inaugurations; this is not a time to sit back and be entertained by the rabbi or the hazzan, but a time to participate as a member of the congregation. A gym is a place to stretch our physical muscles; the synagogue is where we 'work out' our spiritual muscles and build our spiritual practice, our avodah.

Getting high is intimately related to being mindful of God at all times; the closer to God we get the higher we go and the prayer services provide that opportunity. Later in my quest I discovered that the efficacy of Jewish prayer comes from two sources-- silence and singing--something you won't find it in the responsive readings, the sermon or even the Torah reading. The silence is the reconnection to our higher selves and to God. The music sets your heart soaring to new heights. In a manuscript entitled  Bnai Machshavah, Children of Thought, which was buried and later found after World War II, Rabbi Kalonymus Kalman Shapira, the Rebbe of the Warsaw Ghetto wrote, "music is a key to the soul, it opens us to our spiritual feelings and potential". The prayer service is a love song, like all love songs, from all traditions; they're about praise from lover to beloved, God and His people. The words and the melodies may take some time to learn but the effort is well worth the while for the sheer delight of prayer.

I found that getting acquainted with the prayer books--Machzor for the High Holidays and Siddur for all other occasions-- while learning to pray was extremely helpful. With a little scrutiny, I soon realized that the order of Sabbath, holiday and festival services is basically the same. They all contain one or more warm-up Psalms, blessings before and after the Sh’ma followed by the Amidah, the standing prayer which is the essence of all Jewish prayer. What differs is the mussaf (additional) service that follows the Torah service. It's here in the Mussaf that the meaning of the holiday is extensively elaborated; mussaf is the time to really listen up. The Jewish prayer book is not to be viewed as a book of information, of uplifting thoughts or a book to be studied.  It is a handbook for spiritual practice. The three principal motifs throughout prayer, those of praise, petition, and thanksgiving—cherished words of endearment—serve the main purpose of Jewish prayer: korbannot (drawing closer to God).

Getting high on the holidays is opening to the spirit of God. Prayer which functions through the power of the imagination enabled me to express, as I became a more proficient in davvening, all the emotions that I felt in the synagogue—love, joy, humility, connection. It is when we get more emotionally involved with prayer, rather than relying on our rational minds, that we can experience joyous feelings and know we have come closer to God and His blessings.