Jewish Liturgy, A Comprehensive History by Ismar Elbogen,The First Signs of Regular Public Worship [179]
In Babylonia the Jews were lacking a common center. If they intended to maintain their link with the past, to preserve their national and religious identity...the only thing for them to do was unite and give expression to the ideas and feelings that throbbed in all of them. Especially on Sabbaths and national memorial days, the people would assemble to hear the words of their teachers. Here lie the roots of the regular assemblies for divine worship…

What challenges did Jews face to preserve their cultural and religious identity in Babylon? How did establishing regular assembly times with their teachers help? How do regular assemblies with learned teachers help preserve our cultural and religious identity today?

Jewish Liturgy, A Comprehensive History by Ismar Elbogen, The First Signs of Regular Public Worship [180] The position of people and the Temple had undergone a fundamental change during the exile. The old view of the value of the sacrifices…no longer suited the new spirit, which demanded personal piety and the participation of every individual in religious life…the psalms became communal songs dearly beloved by the people…This explains their tremendous influence on the liturgy and on religious life in all ages.

After Persia defeated Babylonia Jews were allowed to return home, rebuild the Temple and reestablish sacrifices. But Temple worship was no longer the only religious experience the people wanted. How did adding the recitation of psalms fulfill the religious needs of their time, and how do a common collection of prayers fulfill our spiritual needs today?

Jewish Liturgy, A Comprehensive History by Ismar Elbogen, The First Signs of Regular Public Worship Cont. [180] In order to guarantee the people’s participation in the sacrifices, the institution of the ma’amadot was established--the people were divided…into 24 groups. One week every half year each of these rotations would send a mission to Jerusalem that would “stand over/ma’amad” the sacrifices…During this week of service the representatives of the people would hold four services each day, consisting of prayer and the reading of the Torah; likewise those who remained at home held daily assemblies for the same purpose.The establishment of the ma’amadot created for the first time prayer services that were held…on weekdays.

The first communal prayer experiences in Babylon were only on Shabbat and holidays. After the Jews returned home, they established a system for the people as well as the priests to experience weekday prayer. How do you imagine this change affected people's religious lives?

Jewish Liturgy, A Comprehensive History by Ismar Elbogen, The First Signs of Regular Public Worship [183] Once public worship became a fixed institution, the formation of a fixed liturgy of prayers was inevitable. It is hard to imagine that an individual would pray every single day without repeating himself, and without his prayer eventually acquiring a fixed pattern; but it would be impossible for a community to assemble for prayer at regular intervals without fixed patterns emerging and recurring regularly.

Fixed timing and content made it possible for Jews to gather communally for prayer. Daily prayer evolved to meet the spiritual needs of the Jews in a particular time and place. Have our spiritual needs changed? In what ways yes and in what ways no?

Jewish Liturgy, A Comprehensive History by Ismar Elbogen, The First Signs of Regular Public Worship [184] The ordinances of the Men of the Great Assembly (council of 120 sages in the Early Second Temple Period) had to do only with the order of the prayers and their content but not to do with their texts. The text was not established and prescribed, but was left to the inspiration of the moment.

The Men of the Great Assembly were like cooks who when asked for a recipe provide a list of ingredients and steps but not exact amounts or the exact timing of each step. They gave us the form of the service we use today, but not all the details. How did the loose guidelines for a service serve the needs of the people at the time of the Great Assembly?

Jewish Liturgy, A Comprehensive History by Ismar Elbogen, Prayer in the Tannaitic Period After the Destruction of the Temple [192] The trouble of the Mishnaic period...led R. Gamaliel the II to institute fixed regulations in the area of public worship…The passages of the Shema were already well established…Therefore, the Amidah was edited; this was done by a certain…Simon the Flaxworker who edited the Eighteen Benedictions…

During Babylonian and Roman tyranny, Jews experienced the threat of losing their religious traditions. In the Babylonian period, they responded by creating communal gatherings for prayer and Torah reading. In the Roman period, they responsed by determining the exact words of the Amidah. How did canonizing the words of the Amidah help the Jews resist Roman oppression?

Jewish Liturgy, A Comprehensive History by Ismar Elbogen, Prayer in the Amoraic Period [202] The Amoraim (wrote the second part of the Gemora, 3rd to 8th century CE) strived to achieve two things: to bring everything into fixed forms, and to imitate the exemplary behavior of famous men. The private prayers…can only have become publicly known by disciples asking their masters for them and then handing them on…

The Amoraim strove to imitate the private prayers of their teachers and mentors. Why? Do modern Jews look at the prayers of teachers, mentors or rabbis for inspiration in our prayers? Who or what inspires our prayers today?

Jewish Liturgy, A Comprehensive History by Ismar Elbogen, Prayer Books and Orders of Prayer [268]With the spread of the Karaite sect (Jews who don’t accept the authority of the Gemora and subsequent law codes), questions to the Geonim (leaders of Babylonian Talmud academies 7th to mid 11th cent CE) on liturgical matters became more numerous and lengthier, as did their answers. The Geonim insisted on strict observance of the tradition, and rejected any “deviation from the words of the sages” not merely as error, but actually as sin. --

This is a new phase of codification. It’s no longer about the “right words and customs”, it’s also a rejection of the “wrong words and customs”. Did becoming more rigid about liturgy help or hinder the evolution of Jewish prayer? How do strong conventions about prayer practices help or hinder our spiritual experiences today?

Jewish Liturgy, A Comprehensive History by Ismar Elbogen, Prayer Books and Orders of Prayer [271]The first proper prayer book in the modern sense is the Collection of Prayers and Praises by Saadia haGaon (892 CE-942 CE)…Saadia was led to compose his prayer book by his observation that prayers had been so often added to, deleted and abridged…he laments the fact that scholars were arrogating to themselves freedom to introduce innovations not grounded in tradition, that the mass of new materials had displaced the ancient customs and that, as a result the local rites had come to differ greatly from each other even in neighboring communities.

The Geonim canonized liturgy, but people continued to innovate. Rav Saadia’s prayer book is the oldest known siddur, and he hoped it would once again create consistency in Jewish prayer. Does the need for structure and innovation in Jewish prayer ebb and flow? What do the Jewish people need right now in their prayer experience?