The Outline of the סידור and the Purpose of כוונה

Rather, Rav Naḥman bar Yitzḥak said: Who are the early prophets, with regard to whom it states that use of the Urim VeTummim ceased immediately after their death? This term early prophets serves to exclude Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi, who are the latter prophets. The Urim VeTummim was used throughout the First Temple period, up to, but not including, their time. As the Sages taught in a baraita (Tosefta 13:3): From the time when Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi died the Divine Spirit departed from the Jewish people, as these three were considered to be the last prophets.

(4) When the people of Israel went into exile in the days of the wicked Nebucednezzar, they mingled with the Persians, Greeks and other nations. In those foreign countries, children were born to them, whose language was confused. Everyone's speech was a mixture of many tongues. No one was able, when he spoke, to express his thoughts adequately in any one language, otherwise than incoherently, as it is said, "And their children spoke half in the speech of Ashdod and they could not speak in the Jews' language, but according to the language of each people" (Nehemiah 13:24). Consequently, when anyone of them prayed in Hebrew, he was unable adequately to express his needs or recount the praises of God, without mixing Hebrew with other languages. When Ezra and his Council realized this condition, they ordained the Eighteen Benedictions in their present order. The first three blessings consist of praises of God and the last three, of thanksgiving to Him. The intermediate benedictions are petitions for the things which may stand as categories of all the desires of the individual and the needs of the community. The object aimed at was that these prayers should be in an orderly form in everyone's mouth, that all should learn them, and thus the prayer of those who were not expert in speech would be as perfect as that of those who had command of a chaste style. For the same reason, they arranged [in a fixed form] all the blessings and prayers for all Jews so that the substance of every blessing should be familiar and current in the mouth of one who is not expert in speech.

It was stated: Rabbi Yosei, son of Rabbi Ḥanina, said: The practice of praying three times daily is ancient, albeit not in its present form; prayers were instituted by the Patriarchs. However, Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi said that the prayers were instituted based on the daily offerings sacrificed in the Holy Temple, and the prayers parallel the offerings, in terms of both time and characteristics.

It was taught in a baraita: One who prays must focus his heart in all of the blessings. And if he is unable to focus his heart in all of them, he should focus his heart at least in one.

(15) Concentration of the mind—how is this condition [to be fulfilled?] Any prayer uttered without mental concentration is not prayer. If a service has been recited without such concentration, it must be recited again devoutly.

(1) If one has recited the Amidah without devotion, he should recite it again devoutly. If he, however, concentrated his attention during the recital of the first blessing, he need not read the prayer again.

Know that the words one is forming with his tongue are like the shell and the meditation on the words is like the fruit, (or) that the uttering of the prayer is like the body, and the meditation is like the soul. When one prays with his tongue but his mind is distracted in a matter other than the prayer, his prayer will be like a body without a soul, or like a shell without a fruit, because his body is present but his mind is not with him in his prayer... And since it is difficult for the mind to remember all of this, it was necessary for our sages to arrange a written order of the matters which most men need, which demonstrate to them their great need for G-d and their need to submit to Him on account of them. These are the matters of prayer which were ordered and arranged, so that the person can greet his Creator, and not be ashamed in approaching Him, and to see in the prayer matters which bring it humility and submission before G-d.

(2) Prayer comes in its perfected form only with the consciousness that the neshama is always praying⁵“For a person to be praying without this awareness is almost as if prayer is unnatural to his condition, and unnatural to the condition of the world, but for a person to pray with the awareness that really all the time I’m in the state of prayer, it’s just there are times when that comes to manifestation and times when it does not, is to recognize that I’m embedded in something which is the ongoing reality of myself – which is a whole different relationship with the act of praying. It’s not something which is external to what I am. When I come to pray, this is what I am, this is happening now not because I’ve been told to do it, not because I’m under obligation to do it, not even because I currently have a need to be doing it, but rather that all of those circumstances are actually the means by which, and the context within which, I come to the fullness of the expression of what it is that I really am.” R. Daniel Kohn. Does she not fly, and join to her beloved (Shir haShirim 8:5) without any break⁶The word הפסק means that which separates. In Orot HaTorah 9:7, Rav Kook comments on the mishna in Pirke Avot 3:7 "Rabbi Yaakov said: One who walks on the road while learning and interrupts (ומפסיק) his learning and says: 'How beautiful is this tree! How beautiful is this plowed field!' – The Torah considers it as if is liable to death." He explains that there are many levels of the world. Individuals who possess exalted spirituality obviously see the light of G–d shining in a tree, but the light of G–d which is found in the Torah is even brighter. A tree contains life, but the Torah contains the very source of life. Rav Tzvi Yehudah Kook adds that everything depends on how one looks at the tree: Is it an independent creation detached from the source of life or is it connected to the Living G-d? The problem is when one "interrupts” his learning, meaning that he breaks his connection to G–d in order to relate to the tree as something separate and disconnected. (from R’ Zvi Yehudah Kook, L’Netivot Yisrael vol. 2, p. 144). at all? It is only that, in the time of active prayer, the soul’s ceaseless prayer is revealed in actuality. This is her fineness and her pleasure, the glory and beauty of prayer, which is like a rose that opens its fair petals to greet the dew or the sun’s rays which appear on her in her radiance⁷“That’s the beauty, in a sense, of the circularity, or the relational aspect of prayer. It is a calling from G-d. It’s His sun shining on you which is then drawing out of you what it is that he has planted within you: that drive for fulfillment and for wholeness, which is reflected in words in tefillah. And so anytime you experience that movement towards growth and fulfillment, anytime you are expressing in your life, either an aspiration or an activity, that moving towards greater expression of what it is that you are, you are like this flower that is opening up….. But certainly it’s the case that when it comes to the Ribbono Shel Olam, who’s drawing out of our fulfillment, is as it were, drawing out His own fulfillment, because it is He who is us, who is in the expression of our souls.” R. Daniel Kohn; therefore, “Oh, that one would pray all day long!” (Berachot 21a) ⁸“This means that prayer, in the externality of the halachic issue, is something you can do anytime, but in the inner understanding of it - prayer is something which is being done all the time” R. Daniel Kohn

s 1, 403).