It’s so important because the scales of heaven can be tipped sometimes even by the smallest thing! One more tefillah sometimes can make a difference. Sometimes that one more tefillah can be the thing – your tefillah for a fellow Jew can make a difference.
We’d be surprised if we could know how much tefillos aided other people. It’s not something small to daven for your fellow Jew. The doctors are trying to do this and that and very many times doctors are surprised that the man survives. They said it’s useless but he survived. A girl was waiting for a shidduch for years and out of nowhere the yeshuah came. Tefillah works!
Absolutely, a person is capable of helping his fellow Jews by means of tefillah; he’s capable of extending people’s lives, of helping them make a living, of making good shidduchim. We don't realize that it was somebody's tefillah that helped. Like we say in the Akdamus of Shavuos, תָ א וְ הַ נְיָ א ב – Tefillah helps. When a person davens, he’s mechuyev not only to think that Hashem is actually listening, but that it helps. We have a lot of pull with Hakadosh Baruch Hu.
ַָת עַמְּךְפִלָּה שׁ וֹמֵעַ תִּי אַתְּ כְ רַ חֲ מִ י ם יִ שְׂ רָ אֵ ל ב – Hashem listens to our prayers with mercy. And therefore, never despise the power of a tefillah.
Part III. The Obligation to Pray
The Sin You Didn’t Know About
Now you might think that this entire subject is middas chassidus; that everything we’re saying here is for certain people, great people. But the truth is that it’s much more than that. It’s an obligation; we're all mechuyav to pray for our fellow Jews. Not only it’s a good deed or a mitzvah; it’s a chiyuv – it means that if you don’t do it it’s a sin.
We learn that from Shmuel Hanavi. Shmuel Hanavi was speaking to the Bnei Yisroel and he said, ַעַדְ כֶםֵל בִּי מֵחֲ טֹא לַה' מֵחֲ דֹל לְהִתְ פַּלַּם אָנֹכִי חָ לִילָה לְּג – Far be it from me to sin against Hashem and refrain from praying on your behalf (Shmuel I 12:23). He called it a cheit to not pray for a person who needs help. “Chalilah that I should do a sin and not daven for you.” And on this possuk the Gemara (Brachos 12b) says: ֵ שֵׁ שׁ רַ חֲ מִ ים עַ ל חֲ בֵרוֹ וְאֵ ינוֹ מְ בַ קֹל שֶׁ אֶ פְ שָׁ ר לוֹ לְבַ קֵּ נִקְרָ א 'חוֹטֵ א' – Anyone who is capable of davening to Hashem on behalf of his friend but he doesn’t, so he’s called a sinner.
Now that’s a big chiddush. Because we understood that it’s a good thing to daven for a friend. If someone is in need of a refuah, it’s a wonderful thing if you daven for that person. If someone needs a shidduch and you daven for that person, that’s excellent. But what Shmuel is saying here is a novel idea: that you must daven, that you’re a sinner if you don’t do it.
Doing the Minimum
So now you know what to do if you hear that someone needs a yeshuah. Let’s say you find out that someone you know has a child who is sick. You can’t help him? You’re not capable of doing anything? So at least pray for him! At least that you can do!
Ask Hakadosh Baruch Hu to help him. Ask for the child’s name and make sure to be mispallel for him. Your friend doesn’t have to hear it. Stand in a corner somewhere and speak to Hashem. Find a telephone booth. You can even take the receiver in your hand if you want and make a long distance call to Hashem: “Please Ribono Shel Olam, send a refuah shleima to so and so, b’soch shaar cholei Yisroel.”
And not once and then you forget about it. Many times! You should carry papers with you that have the names of cholim and other nitzrachim and from time to time look into the papers and be mispallel. It’s very important to live with that attitude of praying for our fellow Jews.
The Secret of the Siren
When you hear the siren of an ambulance speeding down the street, don't just take it as one of the phenomena of daily life. The wail of the siren, it should be to you as if the sick man himself is crying out to you, “Please help me!” That's how you should consider the siren.
Of course the man who is driving the ambulance is making more noise so he should advertise his company. He doesn't need all that noise but he's doing it anyhow; he wants you to see what a good company it is. But you should listen to it as the wail, the outcry, of that afflicted person who is battling for his life. The oxygen is being administered to him and his heart is barely beating! “Help me!” he cries to you.
But you don’t know anything about medicine. What can you help? The answer is you can daven! Say something! Say a tefillah: “Oib er is a Yid – if it’s a Yisroel there, then Hakadosh Baruch Hu should send him a refuah shleimah b’soch kol Yisroel.”
A National Obligation
So somebody asked, “What about if he’s an Italian? Then you shouldn’t pray for him?” The answer is, do Italians pray for Italians? They don’t do that. An ambulance passes by, which Italian prays? Ah nechtiga tug. We pray for Am Yisroel. That’s our obligation, a special obligation for our nation, to pray for each other.
And not only for the cholim. If you know that someone is in some difficulty, difficulty with parnassah or with the law or trouble with his neighbor, whatever it is, all kinds of difficulties people have, you should feel it’s your duty to intervene and pray for them.
Look how many girls need shidduchim. How many people can’t find shidduchim for their daughters? You ever think of davening for all the fathers who need to marry off their daughters? Did you ever spend five minutes davening for the girls? Young men too are looking for shidduchim. They’re in a quandary. They’re always calling me on the phone asking me, “What should I do? It’s not going.”
Sometimes all we can do is daven for them. If you can do more, absolutely you must. That’s what Avraham said. Number one is help me l’maaseh; speak to Efron for me. But if you can’t do something right now at least you can take a few minutes and daven for all the girls and boys who need shidduchim. That’s our contribution, the minimum contribution. Constantly it should be on our minds to fulfill that obligation of praying for our fellow Jews.
The Constant Opportunity
And that brings us to one of the great opportunities of life that we don’t appreciate enough and that’s Shemoneh Esrei. Shemoneh Esrei means very many things to us; very many achievements are available in the davening. But one of the important ones is that we’re always praying for each other.
It’s a remarkable thing that all of our prayers are so arranged that we're praying for Jews constantly. When we daven, we daven in plural; the whole davening we say b’loshon rabim. You don’t say רְ פָ אֵ נִ י ה' – unless you say nusach Galicianer. It’s ה רְ פָ אֵ נ ו' – Heal us! Plural! Us! When you say אָ בִינו בָ רְ כֵנו – Bless us, our Father, so some people think us means ‘me’, the majestic me. רְ פָ אֵ נ ו and בָ רְ כֵ נ ו means, ‘Bless me,’ ‘Heal me.’ “We means me,” he thinks.
Public Prayer
No. We means we; all of the loyal Jews. ָ ל עַ ל כָ יִ שְׂ רָ אֵ ל עַ מּ ֶ ך – The whole Jewish people. You’re praying for your neighbors. You’re praying for chassidishe Jews in Williamsburg. You’re praying for the Young Israel Jews in Scarsdale. For the Lakewooder Jews and Monsey Jews. And for the Teimani Jews and the Flatbush Jews and Eretz Yisroeldige Jews. We want all of the Am Yisroel to have yeshuahs. That’s why when we stand Shemoneh Esrei we're saying everything in plural.
Now, it’s not a bad idea, in order to get into the hergel, the practice, to think at least about your fellow Jews right around you, in the shul. Maybe it's too big to think of everybody but at least in this minyan where you are.
So you say, “Well, of course. I intended everybody.” You intended nobody. You weren't even thinking. Maybe yourself you were thinking about. Maybe.
Expanding the Prayer
So make it a habit as you're saying ' ה רְ פָ אֵ נ ו וְ נֵ רָ פֵ א, you’re thinking also about the man next to you. You're asking that his heart should be healthy. His kidneys should be healthy. His eyes should be healthy. It didn't even occur to you! Heal us means all of us; all the people in my shul, and their wives and their children, they should have healthy hearts. No one should get that dreaded disease.
Mention names of those you know. It should be a practice of yours at the end of your Shemoneh Esrei to take out that paper from your pocket and read off the names. If you know the nusach you can say it in the middle of refaeinu, the tefillah for sick people. You can shed a tear too! They need it and it will help.
Sometimes, you can expand your tefillos outside of the shul, outside of the neighborhood. Think of all the hospitals where there are so many Jews right now waiting for help. So why shouldn't you daven for them? “ה' וְ נֵ רָ פֵ א רְ פָ אֵ נ ו! All frum Jews should be well!”
Praying for Boys
Not only health; pray for the wisdom of our nation. חָנֵּנו מֵאִתְך דֵעָ ה בִינָ ה וְ הַ שְׂ כֵ ל – with knowledge, understanding and wise conduct. The first brachah, the request for understanding and wisdom is plural because it’s not only for you. You're asking for all the boys in the yeshivah; you’re praying to Hakadosh Baruch Hu they should have good heads.
You know how important a good head is? A boy with a poor head gets so discouraged in the yeshivah, especially with the rebbis who are saying big pipulim; they’re not saying plain pshat. A rebbi thinks it’s beneath his dignity to say plain pshat – he wants to show he's Rabbi Akiva Eiger and so he's saying deep pilpulim; I don't know how good they are but he's trying anyhow. And the poor, bewildered talmidim understand nothing; instead of getting the plain pshat, they understand nothing.
So a few very good boys succeed, a few baalei kishronos. But that’s not good enough for us. We want every single one to succeed! We have to pray for all those boys that are being frustrated and being disappointed and very many of them are turned off because they don't understand what's going on. We pray אַתָ ה חוֹנֵן לְאָדָ ם דַעַת ... חָנֵּנו מֵאִתְך – Hakadosh Baruch Hu please give a blessing to Jewish boys in the yeshivah. You can daven for the illuyim too, yes, but don’t forget to daven for the weaker boys.
Praying For Girls
And Jewish girls too. We want them to be matzliach in the Bais Yaakovs. There was a girl here who couldn't keep up with her studies and they wanted to send her from Bais Yaakov. The father came running to me. “What can I do?” he said. “I can't put her in public school! Gevald! What are they doing to my child?!”
They said “we can't keep her. She’s too far behind.” So they made a deal finally. They let her go just to English alone. But it was a terrible thing, a calamity. The girl couldn't keep up.
And so we have to pray. So many of our children need our tefillos. They have nisyonos, troubles, and they need our help. If you can do something, absolutely you must. That’s number one. But in very many cases there’s only so much we can do. But to daven, to pray, to cry out, to shed a tear even, that’s something we all can do and therefore there’s no end to the opportunities in this career of praying for our fellow Jews.
And so whoever you are – every man and woman, every boy and girl – and wherever you are – whether it's in the beis hakenesses or whether it's in the street – every opportunity should be used. People need help. You can’t help them? But this much you have to do. Daven! Besides for achieving for yourself a greatness of character and a perfection of the neshama, it helps them too! And so with your prayers you can be a savior; with tefillah you can be an oheiv Yisroel and accomplish yeshuas Yisroel.
Have a Wonderful Shabbos
Let’s Get Practical
Praying for Others
We learned about the great responsibility of praying for others. This week I will bli neder begin to practice what Rav Miller recommended; to begin writing down the names of people I know who could use prayers. During Shemoneh Esrei I will remember to think of others as I use the lashon rabim, moreover, after Shemoneh Esrei, I will review the list and try to pray earnestly for each one.
This week’s booklet is based on tapes: 135 - Calling in Truth | 554 - Giving and Getting Blessings 715 - Desire the Unattainable | 864 - Seven Objectives of Tefillah E-259 - Improving the World
