debka_notion (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
debka_notion) wrote2007-03-15 07:09 pm
debka_notion) wrote2007-03-15 07:09 pm
The Pre-Friday Shacharit Kvetch
I just got the pre-Friday morning class davenen email. So- the usual kvetch, which usually doesn't get written, but my usual audience is in Germany, so...
Ok, fine, they aren't doing P'sukei D'Zimra unless you do it on your own before coming or if you come at 7:45 instead of 8:00 to do so. I worry about the halakhic validity of this, as some folks will probably do neither. Myself, I'll probably show around 7:45 and such. And sure, niggunim and some silence are pretty, but couldn't we do Those before PdZ rather than after? Silent meditation is nice too, and even less problematic, although I'm iffy on the "speak up if you have something to say" thing that they'll be doing during it.
But well- I'm currently still fine with including the imahot in the amidah, although having been given a quick rundown on a list of problems with it, well, I'm sort of thinking about trying to find some other way of including my feminism in my davenen: I'm thinking a trip to the library to play with tekhines might be in my future. Maybe even tonight. So much more interesting than my homework... But, they're promising an alternative list of imahot. I'm wondering what this is going to include, and I'm sort of worried that this is going to involve Bilhah and Zilpah, and well- somehow that feels like it's pushing too far even conceptually, let alone halakhically.
Ok, off to the library. We'll see what happens.
Ok, fine, they aren't doing P'sukei D'Zimra unless you do it on your own before coming or if you come at 7:45 instead of 8:00 to do so. I worry about the halakhic validity of this, as some folks will probably do neither. Myself, I'll probably show around 7:45 and such. And sure, niggunim and some silence are pretty, but couldn't we do Those before PdZ rather than after? Silent meditation is nice too, and even less problematic, although I'm iffy on the "speak up if you have something to say" thing that they'll be doing during it.
But well- I'm currently still fine with including the imahot in the amidah, although having been given a quick rundown on a list of problems with it, well, I'm sort of thinking about trying to find some other way of including my feminism in my davenen: I'm thinking a trip to the library to play with tekhines might be in my future. Maybe even tonight. So much more interesting than my homework... But, they're promising an alternative list of imahot. I'm wondering what this is going to include, and I'm sort of worried that this is going to involve Bilhah and Zilpah, and well- somehow that feels like it's pushing too far even conceptually, let alone halakhically.
Ok, off to the library. We'll see what happens.
no subject
The whole thing strikes me as odd. They don't want to force people who want/need/are indifferent to the standard/traditional pseudo-Ashkenazic davening model, fine. But why force people who like that model to daven something else? If it's because they want them to experience such a thing, that's fine -- but to do it in place of allowing them to daven as they see fit, is coercive and yucky. (I've gone to my share of Reform/Reconstructionist/joint/pseudo/whatever davenings -- on my own terms, and having chosen whether to daven in a different tzibbur first, daven privately first, or try to cram my halakhic requirements into the structure of their davening. The key is that I had the space to choose those things, and was not made to feel unwelcome by having done so.) Moreover, there are so many options within traditional Jewish cultures -- maybe someone should suggest a Karliner shouting service, or a Sephardic-style service (heck, try even try Nusah Sefarad or Edot haMizrah) where the sha"tz chants everything out loud (and/or different people chant the various psalms in pesukei dezimra).
I'll stop before I start ranting, but you get my drift. Good luck anyway (and I'm sure WLSS will need luck to get a minyan as well).
no subject
What's the requirement for number of kaddishes? That one's new to me.
Well, in theory we could go to WLSS, daven shacharit, and then go to class and daven shacharit again, if we don't feel that class davening will fulfill our obligations. But we have to daven there anyways, so that makes it kind of off putting to go, do a full davenen, and then repeat most of it. I too have done some of the non-traditional davening things, and sometimes they're very nice. But being told that that's what I have to do gets irksome, and well, as a matter of opinion, most of my classmates need the experience with a standard traditional service, not with the experimental stuff. It's the traditional stuff that they need to learn to appreciate and feel comfortable with first and foremost, and a number of them clearly don't.
Those are good ideas, and totally within the realm of what we could do. The problem is that no-one knows how to lead them, while making up what you want to do makes it easier to lead. And those would be interesting and well, potentially useful experiences. (Certainly more so than playing music during davenen or journalling.) Somehow I think that a few fieldtrips would be more useful than this. But they want us to bond...
Thanks.
no subject