Yeshiva
Beit Midrash
- Jewish Laws and Thoughts
- Prayer
- The Mitzva of Praying and its Value
The Talmud of Eretz Yisrael (Ta’anith 1:2 5b) tells us that the Rabbis’ search for candidates to pray for the Rains often came up not with Sages or men of great stature, but with simple people, peasants and even wanton wrong-doers.
The story is told of a man who entertained prostitutes while awaiting their clients. But when a needy woman came to him to sell herself to pay ransom for her husband, that same man simply gave her the money in order to prevent her from degrading herself.
Upon learning about this, the Rabbis declared that this man, irrespective of his profession was worthy to pray for Rain.
The Talmud of Eretz Yisrael teaches us that it is not entirely the quality of the person which moves God to respond to prayer, but the quality of the merit that the person earned! No Jew is too small, too simple or too obscure for God to overlook him.
So magnificent and powerful are the acts of an individual! Bringing down the rain benefits not just the individual who prayed for it, but the Jewish people in their entirety.
The fate of our people could very well hang on the acts of just a single individual! Not only may you have merit, hidden to you but revealed before God for your own prayers to be answered, but also to have your friends’, neighbors’ and even people’s needs addressed.
May the knowledge of the power of prayer fill our own prayers with zeal, fervor and lead us to benefit ourselves and the entire Jewish people!
Rabbis in Midrash
Lessons
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Hosha'ana Rabba FLYDUBAI & HOSHANA RABBA- ANI VAHU HOSHIA NA- I & HIM SAVE US
"Ani vaHu Hoshia Na", "I and Him, Save Us". We don't just pray to Him, but we also pray to and for ourselves that we should emulate and educate our children to have that instinctive altruism with which He created the world. President Trump seemed amused about Yaniv Hayon, our PLUMBER who confidently worked with G-d like Superman (he learned from a pilot on a TV show!) to save 174 lives on the Dubai hijacking, but we in Israel are totally accustomed already 78 years to our plumbers, teachers, garbage-men, rabbis, farmers & doctors being Hashem's shlichim! This is what Zionism is about.
Moreshet Shaul Hashem Is your Shadow – part I
Based on Siach Shaul, Pirkei Machshava V’Hadracha p. 420 – an address from 1941
