God refused Moses' begging to enter the Land - but God accepted Moses' request to establish contact: Perhaps prayer is 'accepted' only in this sense - we can get what we want from prayer only if what we want is a connection to God. But that is a tremendous gift. Exercise, Love & Prayer: Activities Whose Effect is Inevitable vs those whose effect is NOT guaranteed
Some goals depend only on us, some on others. If we exercise every day,
we are guaranteed (except in exceptional circumstances) to achieve tone
or muscle growth, it is a goal which depends basically on us. However
if we put all our energy into becoming President of the USA or the
richest person in the world or the most muscled person we are not at
all guaranteed of achieving our goal –others are trying to do so
as well, and this goal depends not only on our own effort.
In some sense spiritual development is dependent only on us. In what
category is love - are we guaranteed that we will get what we want? For
example can a couple follow a path which guarantees they will love each
other, or fall in love with each other? Is it within our power to cause
ourselves to fall in love with someone? In what category is prayer? Can
prayer bring us what we pray for? Note that in the context of this
article this means help us directly, personally, and detectably in the
ways that we think we want to be helped, getting us specifically what
we want/asked for. For example, combining the two: can prayer bring us
a life-partner with who we'll have a mutual-love and great life-long
relationship?
Some claim that indeed prayer can bring us that which we pray for (I
have heard rabbis and other religous teachers say this). In this
article I wish to determine what they mean when they say this, whether
it is indeed true based on real-world facts, and what the normative
Jewish attitude (as oppsode to their personal Jewish attitude) is to
this issue.
When trying to establish whether or not prayer works in that way, I
will reject any argument assuming that those who fail in achieving what
they pray for are simply not trying as much as they should, or not
praying as they should, since this type of argument makes any claim
impervious to disproof..
What about in a universe with an all-knowing, all-powerful, and
all-compassionate God: Will prayer and the fulfillment of mitzvot help
us directly, personally, and detectably in the ways that we think we
want to be helped, getting us what we want/asked for?
However, "God is Hidden", as discussed previously (see link on Jewish Philosophy page)" and so we are led to conclude that:
We can NOT get what we ask for
These assumptions therefore imply that even though the ultimate reality
is spiritual and prayer and mitzvoth access this ultimate reality,
prayer and mitzvoth do NOT cause a non-naturalistic effect in the
natural universe. We are NOT necessarily granted things that we are
desirous of in this world as a result of our prayer and doing mitzvoth.
We can NOT attain specific things that we want, in this world, via
praying for them, and by doing mitzvoth for merit.
What DOES Prayer Accomplish?
The Divine Hotline: Try to get an appointment with the President
of the US, try installing a hot-line which the presindent answers
whenever you call. When we pray we are picking up the phone to
call God. We are requesting communication with the creator of all.
And we are perhaps requesting the God fulfil our shopping list.
What is guaranteed is that God will acept our request for
communication. But not necessarily give us the items on the list.
However if we are truly highly developed, having that hot line with
guaranteed communication is not only sufficient, it is actually what
is highest on the list of requests!
Prayer can also perhaps help us with merit in the next world; one can
also acquire merit via praying for the deceased (saying kaddish).
What we want or think we want may be to our detriment spiritually etc,
and what we get as a result of prayer and mitzvoth is good for us
and/or for the world only in the ultimate spiritual sense, and of the
unfolding of God’s plan for the universe and for us specifically,
and therefore need bear no relationship whatsoever to that which we
want or ask for in our prayer.
We could then postulate that (some of) the sages agreed with this view
but wanted to encourage people to pray and do mitzvot and therefore
deliberately fostered the impression that one CAN achieve one’s
own agenda via prayer/mitzvoth. (Just as (some) sages held that a
Biblical 'rebelious child' (ben sorer u’moreh) never existed, but
that the torah included it on order to frighten people away from
behavior patterns that would lead to such a child.)
According to Jewish belief our prayers accomplish many things in the
spiritual realm, things that are necessary for the proper working of
the universe. Effects in the spiritual realm also affect the physical
realm.
However even in terms of the purely material world, within a
naturalistic system of cause and effect, there are beneficial effects
to prayer: during or after praying there may be a feeling of well-being
since one feels that one is discharging one’s religious
obligation, there may be a sense of hopefulness if one believes that
God will answer the prayers by sending us what we requested, and there
are even studies which showed that hospital patients who have pets, or
are made to laugh a lot or pray or who know that others are praying for
them have a slightly higher recovery rate. All this is explicable
within a purely naturalistic system.
But does Judaism believe that prayer help us directly, personally, in
ways that would not exist in a purely naturalistic system, and in the
ways that we think we want to be helped, getting us what we asked for?
And could this be backed up by statistics?
Praying for specific things
When you pray for something specific, a car, or your health, a
shiddach, a good marriage, or the safety of someone else there is no
guarantee of getting what you ask for, in fact it rarely occurs for
most people. (Whether during the Holocaust, or before serious
operations, religious people who pray do not necessarily have
significantly longer lifetimes than atheists). Of course one can claim
that all those who did not receive what they prayed for were not
sincere in their prayer etc, but this is an empty logic. [Empty because
one could make the claim for anything, saying magic/telepathy/prayer
works, and when it doesn’t it is not a disproof but rather it
means you didn’t deserve that it should work.]
Furthermore, if you ask for a specific thing and get it, it may be that
this is a punishment eg getting that terrific job in the WTC beginning
on September 10. That which you requested may be harmful to you in a
physical or spiritual way, or it may block something good which was to
happen… Maybe you were to suffer but it was necessary for your
spiritual growth or for the Jewish people or humanity and your safety
means that this mission cannot be accomplished etc; guaranteeing Yoni
Netanyahu’s safe return from Entebbe might have necessitated the
failure of one of the greatest acts of kiddush hashem in modern times;
so it may be a punishment to the Jewish people or to humanity to have
your prayer for safety answered.…
What Prayer Accomplishes
Many rabbis imply that if one prays for something (health, success,
finding a spouse who one falls in love with etc), there is a greater
likelihood of obtaining it. However this may not be so. Although prayer
accomplishes much in the metaphysical realm, and is mandatory, it is
not (at least in the scientifically measurable sense) a self-serving
physical-reality-affecting mechanism. Instead, in the sense that it
helps us directly, prayer helps develop an awareness of, and
relationship with, God, and develop the belief, feeling, confidence,
that everything that happens is part of a plan; this is comforting. The
fervor of prayer can lead to a connection, and the concentration on the
words and intents can help develop the belief that it is all for the
good, that eventually one will understand why it is all happening
(either in this life or in the afterlife), and that God cares and is
aware of your suffering and loves you and etc. The connection that is
established is valuable in of itself, as any deep relationship, but it
also can help one achieve the perspective from which to view events and
suffering, whether one’s own or that of others.
One can even pray to God that one should have the strength to bear the
suffering, that one should be able to draw closer rather than farther
etc – this expression of desiring to be closer can cause us to
get closer, as in relationships with people.
Also, by elevating the spiritual level of the universe, the path of
history continues on a preferred course to what it otherwise would have
been – but there is no guarantee that this preferred course of
events involves less pain.
Self-Development:
It is not a goodf strategic situation to have your happiness depenedent
on that which is not in your control. Yu are in trouble if you
can't get what you want, and you have what you don't want. The way to
resolve this: change what you want! ie change yourself
so that what you have is what you want and what you don't have you
don't want. Then you'll be happy. In this sense happiness depends only
on yourself.
Perhaps we can develop ourselves sufficiently so that we want what God
sends our way, and just as whatever happens is God’s Will, it
becomes our will too, ands so by definition we get what we pray for.
But although all can theoretically obtain this high a level,
realistically it is a level that will be reached only by the very few.
Prayer and good deeds (besides affecting the universe in the spiritual
plane of existence in a deep way) can help defocus one from one’s
self and focus on others and on a greater picture. Seeing events in
this way can help in developing relationships with others and oneself,
and in diminishing one’s ego, and reduce the impulse to see the
universe (or even a relationship) as a platform for the realization of
one’s desires and ambitions and needs; as a result prayer and
good deeds can help us accept and even embrace what occurs, including the personally
painful, perhaps can raise us to the point where we see it as a gift, an opportunity rather than as a seeming punishment, and then de facto prayer has brought us to the point where we have what we want.
When troubles befall us, we often sense our vulnerability and turn to a
higher power. This is a good response. Our nature is to then request
specific things, health if we are sick etc. The prayers are structured
to reflect these feelings, and to channel them, helping us see the
troubles we face as opportunities for growth, or as part of a divine
plan (and not as punishment) and therefore at least to accept them with
equanimity. Our feelings of vulnerability are reflected in and
channeled by all the prayers referring to God as great and powerful and
merciful. The suffering we experience and the anxiety that we have are
reflected in and channeled by the prayers which are effectively
supplications for God’s mercy and for specific benefits such as
health, success, redemption etc but they are not to be taken as
implying that indeed prayers for physical health or success or
redemption now for me are answered by the granting of these now for me.
…………. Bad Things/Good People
Bad things happen to good people, as made so very clear in the Biblical
book of Iyov (Job). So no one can ever assume that a “bad
thing” is a punishment; maybe the person is so holy and perfect
that God is directing challenges to them as with Iyov, or as with
Abraham and the sacrifice of his beloved son Isaac, maybe to have them
bear some burden for the rest of the world, or for their descendants.
Pain is not necessarily a punishment, it can be a gift in order to
bring about growth. But it is not usually an appreciated gift.
Is there more good or bad in the universe, is it better that a person
was created, with all the suffering involved, or not? A poll of the bet
midrash as recorded in the Talmud records the impression of the
majority that existence is not convenient overall.
God will send our way whatever it is that God decides is needed, and
praying to God to do what God wants to do is absurd, since of course
God does what God wants to do. God will not send our way what we want
if it is different than what God wants. We can however develop
ourselves to want what God wants and therefore to accept with joy
whatever comes our way. And of course as we grow, what God wants for us
can change. For example, if we become stronger and more
highly-developed, we may be able to bear higher levels of pain and so
greater challenges will be sent to us as a result of our growth.
Judging Others
A person may
be perfect relative to what they could have been expected to do – Job
(Iyov) was perfect (God testifies to this) without keeping the mitzvot,
he was not Jewish, so one cannot equate perfection with mitzvoth.
Indeed one cannot even deny perfection to the practitioner of great
anti-social behavior: a child born among thieves and murderers who
knows no better, but struggles mightily against the overwhelming forces
of environment and conditioning can be a holy murderer.
One cannot
look at a person’s pain in life, and then hear of their mistakes and
transgressions, and say that the pain is a result of their
transgressions, whether as a punishment or as a result, since it may
well be that the transgressions occurred as an unavoidable result of
their life situation (child born among thieves), the external facts of
heredity environment life-history (twisted parents), and the internal
ones of innate inner psychology etc. Even if they do things that if you
did them you would consider yourself an evil person deserving of
punishment, you cannot make the same assumption about others. (Nor
should you about yourself.) Maybe they acted with great courage and
self sacrifice all along, and the pain is the result of suffering they
do not deserve (from the human moral perspective).
Why do mitzvoth?
According to Jewish teachings there is a metaphysical effect of
mitzvoth; every mizvah we do can raise us, and can help the universe
achieve its purpose. Furthermore, God is the creator and the Torah laws
are mandatory; also there is a reward in the world to come. There
may also be a feeling of well-being upon discharging what one believes
to be one’s obligations; also the ethical mitzvot lead to greater
harmony between neighbors, between children and parents, between
spouses etc. But doing mizvot does not necessarily accomplish for us
anyhting directly in a way that is not explicable within a purely
naturalistic universe, and that is backed up by statistics.
Religion Provides Support
Religion cannot claim that if one is ‘religious’ and does
all the mitzvot only good will happen (although this is implied in
various places,”vehaya im shamoa” etc). Statistics will not
bear this out. Instead, religion provides frameworks for people to live
within while experiencing joy and pain, it helps them channel their
experiences so that their pleasure and their pain will lead to growth
rather than emptiness/hedonism and bitterness etc.
Shabbos helps, having a community helps, shiva helps, gmachim helps,
davening helps etc. Not that the torah and God are pain killers:
rather: in some respects the purpose of existence is to achieve higher
levels: Inasmuch as the purpose of life is growth, and growth can be
catalyzed by pain, then all the above help produce the desired result,
where life’s inevitable pain when experienced within the
guidelines of a religious life helps people grow.
Postscript
The above was an attempt to construct a model which conforms with:
what we know about the way the natural world works;
the working assumptions about nature made by scientists;
the assumptions/beliefs about the workings of the universe made by atheists;
the fundamentals of Jewish tradition.
Here we will accept the honesty, integrity and openness of scientists
and philosophers in that we do not assume they are ‘blind’
to truth, or deliberately evading the acceptance of evidence for the
existence of God etc.
The model is intended to be intermediate between the following two paths:
1. The universe is purely naturalistic or there is a God but in respect
to the issue here the universe is just the same as it would be if there
was no God: prayer and mitzvoth can help psychologically, socially etc
but cannot help one in any metaphysical sense. The only sensible way to
deal with the inevitability of pain is to embrace it as an opportunity
for self growth. [A religious Jewish person deals with this by reading
this psychological insight into the Torah and to turn the tables and
declare that this world is not a bad one because of the pain, but in
fact the world is as it is because god loves us and wants us to grow
etc.]
2. The ultimate reality is spiritual and prayer and mitzvoth access
this ultimate reality. Prayer and mitzvoth can cause an effect in the
natural universe. We are granted things that we are desirous of in this
world as a result of our prayer and doing mitzvoth. We can attain
specific things that we want, in this world, financially, healthwise,
romantically etc via praying for them, and by doing mitzvoth for merit
e.g. learning Torah in the merit of a sick individual, in order that
they will recover. Bad things befall people individually, and the
Jewish people collectively, due to non-observance of mitzvoth.