Davening Tips for Shlichei Tzibbur Beth El Synagogue Durham, NC November 2011, Heshvan 5772 Table of Contents General Tips on Leading Davening 1 P’sukei d’Zimrah Tips 3 Shacharit Tips 5 Torah Service Tips 7 Musaf Tips 8 Background: Services at Beth El are an important time when our community comes together for study, prayer and friendship. Beth El’s commitment to the framework of the traditional Jewish framework, our participatory musical and intellectual traditions, and the value we place on kavannah are treasured hallmarks of our congregational character. At the same time, rabbinic tradition takes seriously the notion that the length of services should not become a burden to the community and that “if one grasps for too much, one may grasp nothing at all.” Towards the end of 2011, Rabbi Greyber and others received consistent feedback that Beth El Shabbat services were ending too late. After sharing this feedback with our Gabbaim and the Ritual Committee, it was decided to set a goal of completing services in the main sanctuary at 12:15pm. To achieve that goal, we took several complementary steps: 1. In October 2011 the start time for services in the Main Sanctuary was moved to 9:30am and approximate start and end times for each part of our services were established: o 9:30am to 9:50am - P’sukei d’Zimrah starts at 9:30 sharp even if the Shaliach Tzibbur is the only person in the sanctuary. It should conclude between 9:45 and 9:50 o 9:50 to 10:20am - Shacharit o 10:20 to 11:45am - Torah Service o 11:45 to 12:15pm - Rabbi's Drash and Musaf The Gabbai will inform the Shlichei Tzibbur when there are exceptions to this customary schedule. 2. A set of guidelines was developed to enable service leaders to continue to lead services with kavannah while also facilitating service leaders’ ability to make strategic choices about how to finish their part of the service in a timely manner. These guidelines are below. Before the next time you lead at Beth El, please take time to read through them. 3. Resources: In addition to the guidelines below, we've begun building a part of Beth El's website with melodies and instructions for leading Shabbat services. http://betheldurham.org/rituallife/shabbat_tunes.html If you would like to add a melody, please send an audio file to Rabbi Greyber - we'd love your participation in creating a resource that is helpful for our whole community. General Tips on Leading Davening by Rabbi Daniel Greyber Balancing Kevah (the fixed liturgy) & Kavanah (focus/concentration/feeling in prayer) Leading a group of people in prayer is a daunting task. In addition to focus, love and intention, it also requires mastery of the words, the melodies and some skills in how to communicate – directly and indirectly – with the community. When leading the first, second, tenth or twentieth time, prayer leaders may feel awkward and distracted at all the things they must worry about, so much so that they may lose their own ability to focus. During those times, it can be helpful to understand one’s efforts as a korban – a sacrifice, not in the ancient sense, but in the sense of something that one is giving of oneself for the sake of the greater community. If that feeling of awkwardness is there, it will eventually go away when each Shaliach/Shlichat Tzibbur (“Shatz”– prayer leader, literally “Messenger of the Community” –finally feels comfortable enough both to care for technical aspects of leading davening and to focus on the holy task at hand. Below is a discussion of ideas/suggestions to facilitate this transition, and, for more seasoned prayer leaders, to help think through some of the more intimate details of leading the community in prayer. Daven Yourself – this may seem self-evident but, with so many facets of the minyan to take care of, it is important to remember: the most important thing you can do in leading people in prayer is to pray. This is important both for your own spiritual needs and because people will only learn to really daven if that is what you are doing. People have a sense if you are just singing songs or are only going through the motions. Daven! Everything else is commentary. A General Rule of Thumb - Members of the davening community will express themselves only as much as you do. You give them permission to clap their hands if you do. To close their eyes if you do. To chant out loud if you do. To sit in silence if you do. People will not do these things normally. The real world tells us to wear certain clothes, to be professional and rational and efficient. As prayer leaders, we have to communicate that in synagogue we can be real. We can express emotions. We can be happy and joyous or broken and sad. We must communicate this by modeling it with our words and actions. Both the ritual of the davening and you as the leader of the davening will give permission to act in ways that, too often, we are not allowed to in the real world. Push the Niggun – If you are leading a prayer that ends with a niggun (a wordless melody), “pushing” beyond what the community expects can sometimes be helpful. A professor once told a group of rabbinical students that Conservative synagogues like to sing a niggun (a wordless prayer) for 2 minutes and 37 seconds. What I think he meant is that we have developed a Victorian sense of the “proper” amount of time for a prayer to be sung, after which we move on. As the leader, you may need to push the community beyond that moment, or if a niggun is falling flat, it may mean cutting it short. Knowing what to do is an art, not science, but it’s a good thing to be aware that for a niggun to take on a life of its own and for the community to have a chance to soar, the leader must be able to both listen carefully to the pulse of the davening and also wisely guide its prayer, giving it permission to flow. Leading the Davening by Jumping In at the Right Moments – this one is hard to explain but…I have found that there seem to be certain “dead” moments in many niggunim or prayers. People need to hear you “jump in” at those moments of transition and sing what is next so that they will know what direction you’re headed. The Silent Middle – between the initial few words of a prayer and the concluding words of a prayer, there is typically a “silent middle.” This is when people are supposed to daven the middle part to themselves. 1 It can be helpful for the prayer leader to model for the community what is supposed to be happening in this “middle”. Here are some suggestions: • Chant out loud – A general truth in leading the davening is that people will, on the whole, be no louder than you are. By chanting the middle parts of the prayers quickly, out loud (or at least chiming in on a few lines as you go through them yourself) you are giving others permission to join you in chanting the middle part of the prayer. At the very least, you are communicating to them in an indirect way that this is what can be happening at this moment. **A creative idea - Chant out loud in English if you want to teach others that it’s okay to daven in English. • Don’t wait for Silence to begin again – Others will definitely disagree with this but I’m of the opinion that davening needs a certain pace and momentum not to rush individuals along, but so that the community’s prayers continue to feel alive and full. By waiting for everyone to finish I think we break momentum or, inadvertently, we rush people who have paused in their davening; sometimes people feel pressure to finish not only because the community has moved on, but also because the community is waiting for them to finish. We can’t be afraid of silence but we also need not have stale silence in the prayers. I think it is the job of the leader to push people to pray, not faster and louder, but with more kavanah. Loud and fast davening with a lot of body motion does not equal kavanah. Sometimes it is just a mask for doing nothing at all. But as a prayer leader doing those things we are at least seeming like we are davening fervently, something that has value in and of itself. Finally, by not insisting on silence before we begin again, we may not be hurrying the congregation, but rather freeing people to linger behind on a word or phrase without expectation that we’re waiting for them. With some trust, people will re-join the communal prayers when they are ready. A few final tips… • Page calling – keep it to a minimum. There is a tricky balance between being a model by praying and teaching and helping people through the service. Understand that the process of calling out a page is an interruption in the rhythm of the davening. If we tell people what page we’re “on,” then as a model of davening, we are obviously not “on” that page because we’re calling a page, not davening. We need to call pages as a way of keeping the service accessible, but by keeping it to a minimum we can best model what we’re trying to achieve.