Davening: A Guide to Meaningful Jewish Prayer
Experience the living taste of prayer in your heart, the deep and gentle glow of prayer in your soul.
"Many who live their lives as Jews, even many who pray every day, live on a wrapped and refrigerated version of prayer. We go to synagogue dutifully enough. We rise when we should rise, sit when we should sit. We read and sing along with the cantor and answer 'Amen' in all the right places. We may even rattle through the prayers with ease. We sacrifice vitality for shelf-life, and the neshomeh, the Jewish soul, can taste the difference."
―from the Introduction
This fresh approach to prayer is for all who wish to appreciate the power of prayer's poetry and song, jump into its ceremonies and rituals, and join the age-old conversation that Jews have had with God. Reb Zalman, one of the most important Jewish spiritual teachers in contemporary American Judaism, offers you new ways to pray, new channels for communicating with God and new opportunities to open your heart to God’s response.
With rare warmth and authenticity, Reb Zalman shows you:
- How prayer can engage not just spirit, but mind, heart and body
- Meditations that open the door to kavanah, the focus or intention with which we pray
- How to understand the underlying "deep structure" of our prayer services
- How to find and feel at home in a synagogue
- How to sing and lead niggunim, the simple, wordless tunes that Jews sing to get closer to God
- and more
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Book details
- Author
- Zalman Schachter-Shalomi
- Imprint
- Jewish Lights, an imprint of Turner Publishing Company
- Published
- Formats
- Paperback, Hardcover
- Subjects
- Religion › Judaism › Rituals & Practice
- Topics
- Jewish rituals · synagogue worship · prayer and spirituality · Jewish daily life · prayer poetry and song · religious practice
- ISBN-13
- 9781580236270 (Paperback)9781683360223 (Hardcover)
About the authors
RABBI ZALMAN SCHACHTER-SHALOMI was a founder of the Jewish Renewal movement and one of the most prominent Jewish spiritual teachers of the twentieth century. His books include Davening: A Guide to Meaningful Jewish Prayer and Jewish with Feeling.
Schachter-Shalomi was ordained by HaBaD-Lubavitch in 1947, received an MA from Boston University and a Doctor of Hebrew Letters from Hebrew Union College, and served as professor emeritus of Psychology of Religion and Jewish Mysticism at Temple University. Davening won the National Jewish Book Award. He was born in Zholkiev, Poland, and died on July 3, 2014.
JOEL SEGEL is an editor and co-author who has worked on books on spirituality, including Jewish with Feeling: A Guide to Meaningful Jewish Practice and Davening: A Guide to Meaningful Jewish Prayer, both co-authored with Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi.
Segel served as an editor at Shambhala Books and attended the Hebrew University of Jerusalem during seventeen years living and studying in Israel. As co-author of Davening, he shared in the National Jewish Book Award in 2012.
Joel is based in Needham, Massachusetts.