Heschel’s Wonder-11/15/2021

Prayer and the Community

We never pray as individuals, set apart from the rest of the world. The liturgy is an order which we can enter only as a part of the Community of Israel. Every act of worship is an act of participating in an eternal service, in the service of all souls of all ages. Every act of adorations is done in union with all of history, and with all beings above and below:

We sanctify Thy Name in the world, as they sanctify

it in the highest heavens . . .

A crown will be bestowed

Upon the Lord our God

By the angels, the multitudes above,

In union with Israel Thy people

Assembled below . . .

(The kaddish in the liturgy for the Sabbath morning)

Quest for God: Studies in Prayer and Symbolism