Rav Kook on Prayer (Copy)

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 [they] spoke, to express [their] 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, [they were] unable adequately to express [their] 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 Standing Prayer / `amida). The first three blessings consist of praises of God and the last three, of thanksgiving to G-d. 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.

Prayer actualizes and brings to light, to complete life, that which is hidden in the depths of the neshama. And according to the measure of one’s inner purity, so is the magnitude of the impact of prayer’s appearance when their inner will emerges from their depths, as they turn to the Source of the life of all the souls and all the worlds.

Great and wondrous is the effect of their expressions on life. A great light pours forth with a properly derived word, it is taken from secreted storehouses of a rich life, abundant in its opulence. And according to the depth of its inner penetration, so is the scope of the luminous flight which the word reveals, brings to being, births.

The clarification of expression elucidates the particulars of this illumination, solidifies existence through a clear and specific desire, and things progressively come to be. It is impossible that prayer not make her impression. Whether she makes her impact according to her particular designated purpose, or sets in motion many complicated paths – these are the wondrous works of the One perfect in knowledge. (Iyov 37:16) [Do you know the marvels worked upon the expanse of clouds By Him whose understanding is perfect...]

In any event, the building of a whole world is revealed in prayer, whether in the one fixed, ordered and equal for all, or in that individual cry which issues from the depths of the heart of each individual and community according to their needs and situation. Together with all of the worldly traits, higher and lower; with all the practical and social, intellectual and artistic aspects through which humanity gradually perfects itself, arriving in a rectified fashion to a sweet and expansive life, the world orders in its exterior and, in known ways, even in its inner state - there comes at the head of all that internal order, the chief cause of all desires: prayer, which adds power and intensity into all the myriad branches of life, to all cultural stratagems and their enhancements, and one will know clearly how to apportion prayer and action, and their inter-inclusion one in the other. “For My House will be called a house of prayer for all peoples.” (Isaiah 56:7)