Prescriptive Power 

Facilitated by Faigy Peritzman

Q:

I have a very hard time davening. I know Hashem is there and listening, but somehow, I can’t connect the words to feelings of appreciation for being able to speak to Him. It makes me feel so disconnected that it discourages me from “speaking” to Hashem at other times during the day. How do I resolve this?

Prescriptive Power

Ruchi Koval

The first thing you need to understand is that davening is mostly about building a relationship with Hashem. In any relationship, there needs to be two-way communication. I speak to you; you speak to me.

Okay, so what does that look like in a relationship with Hashem?

We talk to Hashem through davening. Hashem talks to us through Torah, through nature, and through messages from other people.

But davening isn’t just about the siddur. Davening has two parts: scripted communication and unscripted communication. Just like in a relationship with a human being, there are certain things we say because those are the prescriptive expected phrases and they have the power to create a real feeling appropriate for specific occasions. Thank you for coming. Happy anniversary! These scripted phrases grease the wheels of social human interactions.