Persistence in Davening
Question: My understanding is that when a person davens when he really wants something, he needs to add on at the end of his tefillah “Only answer my tefillah if this is for my good”, because sometimes a person is davening so long for something which is really for his own good (even though he thinks it is), and since “In the way a person wants to go in, he is led”, Hashem will answer his tefillos even though it will be to his detriment. Is this true?
Answer: There are some times where that is true [where his tefillos will be answered even when it’s not for his good, because he keeps davening for it], and there are other times where no matter how much a person davens, his request will not get answered.
The Purpose of Tefillah and Hisbodedus
Question: How much time should we spend on tefillah and how much on hisbodedus?
Answer: Tefillah is our collective relationship with Hashem, whereas hisbodedus is one’s personal connection with Hashem. We need both aspects of our life. Therefore, the three tefillos we daven each day are not enough, and neither is hisbodedus enough. Through tefillah we can integrate with the collective unit of the Jewish people and through that we connect to Hashem; through hisbodedus, one brings his soul to have a personal connection with Hashem.
Husband’s Avodah When Wife is in Labor
Question: What is a husband’s avodah when his wife is in labor? How can he remain calm and make her feel calm as well, and at the same time davening to Hashem? And what should he daven for during this time?
Answer: On one hand, he should be reminding himself of the emunah that Ain Od Milvado, that nothing is in control except for Hashem (see Nefesh HaChaim shaar III, 12). He should also be davening that his wife should have an easy birth, and that the baby should be born healthy. At the same time, he also needs to sympathize with her pain, and he should be going back and forth between these different states: emunah in Aid Milvado, and davening for his wife and baby, and sympathizing with his wife.
Question
What should a husband do if his wife is in pain from having contractions and she is nervous, and when she hears him davening from a siddur or Tehillim it only makes her more nervous and she yells at him to stop davening and just remain calm?
Answer: Daven from your own language without using any of the prayers of the siddur, and you can also daven mentally. Make sure to cycle back and forth between emunah, tefillah, and sympathizing with your wife, as explained in the previous answer.
Question
Are the non-Jewish nurses and midwives in the hospital to be viewed as Hashem’s messengers to help bring my baby into the world, and do they have a zechus (merit) in bringing a Jewish neshamah into the world?
Answer: Certainly they are messengers of Hashem, and yes, they do have a zechus because of what they are doing.
Tzaddikim Who Daven Late
Question: What is the reason behind why there are Chassidish Rebbes don’t try to make zman tefillah and they daven late? How can it that there are tzaddikim who are so careful with every halachah and they are the greatest ovdei Hashem, but they daven very late, not just once in a while but as l’chatchilah, to begin with? Since we have an obligation to be dan l’kaf zechus a tzaddik, what is the way to understand their conduct?
Answer: Any tzaddikim who daven[ed] late was because they were an “onnes”, they were not obligated to daven since they didn’t feel spiritually prepared or physically clean enough for davening! The inner root behind it is because their soul root comes from Don, or, they have a “spark” (nitztoz) of Don in their souls, and Don’s role is to “gather together all the camps”, and that is why Heaven made them exempt from davening when the time came to daven, and therefore they davened later. This is only what we can say to judge them favorably, but we are not allowed to use this reason in practice!
Tzaddikim Above Time & Space
Question: The sefer Nefesh HaChaim explains that there are worlds above time and above the definitions of the Torah, which is a spiritual reality above our world and which does not apply to the world we live on, which is the world of action, where we must follow the Torah’s rules. It seems that the spiritual worlds that are above our world are only a reality that we can know about when we learn sefer Nefesh HaChaim, but when we close the sefer we’re back living on our world. My question is that there are tzaddikim, both who passed away and those who are currently living, who don’t align all their actions with the defining parameters of the Torah of the ‘world of action’ that we live on, and these tzaddikim live beyond time and space, and they don’t always keep ever aspect of halachah, especially with the example of not davening during zman Tefillah. I understand that these tzaddikim are very connected to these higher worlds but I don’t understand how they are able to ignore the reality of the world of action that we live on. Since they are tzaddikim, I want to understand their behavior.
Answer: Even when one is very attached in his soul to the higher worlds that are above time and space, he is never allowed to diverge from keeping halachah. However, there are some times where the tzaddikim rely on leniencies in halachah, in cases where most Poskim do not agree to a certain view and only very few existing opinions in the Poskim permit something, and, at a time of pressure [b’shaas d’chak] for the necessity of the light that was needed for their souls, these tzaddikim permitted certain views for themselves even where it wasn’t in accordance with the views of most opinions in the Poskim.
