Completing Our Soul
Thus, when a person has a lack and he davens to Hashem about it, he must certainly ask for his lack to be filled—and it is no contradiction to his bitachon that this deficiency is the best thing for him. It was perfect for him, because it caused him to turn to Hashem—which is the perfection of his neshamah—and this has now been accomplished, he turns to Hashem and acknowledges that only He can help.
Sometimes, the answer to our request may be “no.” But this doesn’t change our approach and our avodah one iota. The fact remains that the entire purpose of the lack is for a person to be engaged in finding Hashem and turning to Him.
The greatest mistake we can make is to focus on the need itself and on finding our own solutions to it—leaving Hashem out of the picture—when the entire purpose of that need is to initiate closeness to Hashem! If we seek Him out and become close to Him, we will have fulfilled the purpose of the lack.
Need and Nearness
In other words, the purpose of prayer isn’t to fill the need—the purpose of the need is to engage in prayer!
It may be that the need will remain in place even after we have davened and attained closeness to Hashem; for example, when we daven for a person who is ill, but it has already been bashert that he should pass away, R”l. One may say, if so, what was the purpose of my prayer? The answer is that as we davened about our lack, we became closer to Hashem. The purpose of our davening wasn’t so that this person should become healed—it was for us to become closer to Hashem!
We must accustom ourselves to daven with humility: Ribbono shel Olam. You know and I know that I have no wisdom of my own. You can take away my sechel from one moment to the next, and for this reason I daven fervently and with humility ודעת בינה חכמה מאתך חננו—for the entire purpose of our dearth of wisdom is so we should turn to You! And even if it will seem that my tefillah wasn’t answered, I will continue to uphold my mission of davening to Hashem, even if, for reasons known only to You, you cannot fulfill my request.
Tefillah Is the Goal
Sometimes, the tefillah will be answered immediately—because it was already bashert for the yeshuah to come, and all that was needed was this one tefillah and turning to Hashem to bring it to fruition. The moment that the supplicant davened, the purpose of the lack was accomplished.
In other cases, there are Heavenly calculations that prevent the request from being granted. The matter cannot be changed through tefillah. And in yet other cases, tefillah can abolish the gezeirah and change teva, or it may take more time and more tefillah for the lack to be filled.
In any case, if a person approaches tefillah with his hands outstretched—as though the only purpose of his davening is to have it answered—he has not understood the purpose of why he was given this lack in the first place! The proper attitude must be that—whether or not our request is granted—the purpose of our davening is to become closer, to forge a connection with Hashem, regardless of what the answer will be.
What and Why
Let’s put it this way: There’s a what and there’s a way. When one asks what tefillah is, the answer is praise, requests, and thanks. This is the design of what tefillah is. But the reason we daven is something else entirely: so we should turn to Hashem and become close to Him. This is the why, the sole purpose of it—not to attain our desires.
Of course, it’s designed in a manner of expressing desires and requests—but the purpose and the reason for the requests is only that we should become completely submissive and nullified before Hashem and His will... to reach a state where we’re not angry... and we don’t try alternatives... and we don’t despair, either. We’re simply reliant with complete submission on Hashem.
Imperfection Is Perfection
Furthermore, if tefillah were to be an automatic action in which Hashem answers the tefillah of every person in precisely the way he asks it, the entire purpose of prayer would be lost—for we would regard it as we do any other form of hishtadlus... like buying a snack from a vending machine: we perform an action, and out comes a result! What’s the problem? There’s no lack here. I will do this and get that....
Precisely because the purpose of tefillah is to become submissive and nullified to Hashem’s plan, we’re kept guessing; sometimes we’re answered, and sometimes we’re not. Sometimes the response comes after a few years, and sometimes we never see it answered. But this brings about a tefillah of dependence and reliance... a tefillah of speaking to Hashem with submission and humility—and without anger. And when we don’t get what we want immediately, we don’t scream, we don’t rebel, we don’t despair, and we don’t become angry.
Just as the perfection of a person lies in his imperfections (because they lead him to turn to Hashem), the perfection of tefillah lies in the fact that it’s not readily answered in a way that we can see and appreciate (for this makes the tefillah real and dependent). We would never become changed through tefillah if it were positively answered every time.
It is precisely the imperfection in tefillah that makes it so perfect and the proper vehicle to attain blessed humility and submission to the Ribbono shel Olam.
