Jam Davening @ JTS
From JTA:
Seeing Bob Dylan at a prayer service isn’t all that rare. Hearing a Bob Marley tune played on guitar while a minyan sings the Shema prayer is.
Marley and Dylan tunes are just as likely to be part of the nusach at “Jam Davening” as those of Shlomo Carlebach and Debbie Friedman. The monthly prayer group at the Davidson School of Jewish Education of the Jewish Theological Seminary is part guided meditation, part sing-along, part traditional prayer and part dorm-room musical jam that includes instruments ranging from guitars to didgeridos.
Participants say the result is invigorating and deeply spiritual.
Perhaps this is a new development in the Conservative movement, however I’ve heard the Bob Marley Mi Chamocha for at least 10 years now in the Reform movement. Also, based on my experience, it’s not uncommon in the indie-minyan/chavura world for tunes to be adapted from popular music. Chassidic Niggunim were occasionally adapted from Russian drinking songs – I heard a great teaching once about redeeming those melodies by putting them to holy use.
While I think it’s cool that this is happening at JTS, I wish the author had done a bit more research – this is hardly new, although it is good to see it spread.
Full story.
And Maoz Tzur was a Lutheran hymn! Not to mention the Automatic for the People kabbalat shabbat. But yasher koach to the Jam Davening crew for getting this kind of davening into perhaps the least likely place in the world.
One insignificant aside: The article says:
Now as the movement debates whether Jews should be praying for the rebuilding of the Temple or just Jerusalem
Does anyone know what this debate is about? Is this something specific in the next edition of Sim Shalom?
I’m amused that it views Carlebach and Debbie Friedman as somehow traditional.
Having said that, I am disturbed by the greater use of instruments during Shabbat (not the weekday). But I’m also amused by the fact that guitars are used both in Reform and Orthodox (especially YCT) communities during either tefilla or kumsitzim (different things, of course)
Though there are of course many communities that use instruments on Shabbat, the minyan featured in the article is a weekday minyan.
The article says:
Musical instruments had been excluded from Conservative synagogues on Shabbat partially because of Jewish law and partially as a remembrance of the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem nearly 2,000 years ago.
The latter explanation (which I’ve heard many times) is, as far as I can tell, completely without basis. Public mourning is forbidden on Shabbat, so if anything, the destruction of the Temple would be a justification for allowing instruments only on Shabbat.
Music was a part of Jewish prayer very early on. Note the verse below.
“A psalm, a song for the Shabbat day: lt is good to praise the Lord, to sing hymns to Your name, O most High; to proclaim Your steadfast love at daybreak, Your faithfulness each night with a ten-string harp, with voice and lyre together.†(Psalms 92:1-4).
Many sources mention that musical instruments and singing, allowed in the Temple, were no longer allowed owing to mourning over its destruction. Of course, today singing is the norm. That prohibition was ignored, it seems, from the start.
The other reason for not allowing musical instruments on Shabbat was “shema Itaken” – least one come to fix the instrument should it break. Today (guitar strings aside) few of us are experts in the repair of instruments.
There is also a matter of “shvut” – to complicated to go into here (but a concept that allows for flexibility).
Some Poskim held this prohibition doesn’t apply when music is used in the fulfillment of a mitzvah.
So one may ask the question: Does instrumental music enhance enhance the mitzvah of public worship?
If one thinks that it does so – then one may be inclined to allow for the use of music on Shabbat.
Of course, this discussion becomes less relevant in communities that are not guided by halalcah.
Many sources mention that musical instruments and singing, allowed in the Temple, were no longer allowed owing to mourning over its destruction. Of course, today singing is the norm. That prohibition was ignored, it seems, from the start.
And I don’t think anyone observes a general prohibition on musical instruments (on all days of the week) either. So as far as I can tell, anyone who connects the Shabbat question to this is just confused.
The other reason for not allowing musical instruments on Shabbat was “shema Itaken†– least one come to fix the instrument should it break.
The original Talmudic source for this is one more step removed — Beitzah 36b says no dancing on Shabbat or yom tov, lest one fix a musical instrument. It doesn’t actually say no musical instruments, though to be fair, perhaps that’s implied (by the Gemara’s explanation, though not by the original Mishnah). So those who think that dancing on Shabbat is ok (but not musical instruments) should perhaps reconsider what they really think about this gezeirah.
Of course, this discussion becomes less relevant in communities that are not guided by halalcah.
Or are guided by a different approach to halachah, or start from a different starting point.
I, like BZ grew up in a community where pop tunes were commonly used during davening, but mine was Orthodox. The prayer for the new month was often to a tune relevant to the month (eg if 4th of July was that month, then to the tune of the national anthem), and the kiddusha OFTEN had pop tunes or old favorites.
Not to mention the “shir ha ma’alot” contest, trying to find a song that doesn’t fit to shir ha ma’alot.
Once again, JTA is publishing old news.
it seems that the minyan at JTS was a teaser for the discussion of instruments on shabbat, the problem is, of course, that weekday instrument use with pop music, insofar as it is an issue, is a completely different issue from instruments on shabbat.
very good news that they are considering removing calls for the rebuilding of the temple. Moredchai Kaplan, while teaching at JTS, published a pleading-for-the-resurrection-of-the-sacrificial-system free prayerbook in 1945. As usual the conservative movement is doing the right thing, just a little later.
In the late nineteenth and early twentieth century it was common to find synagogues that would become members in the new Conservative movement with organs that were played during Shabbat services. In the 40’s the Committee on Law and Standards decided that it was not against halakhah.
I would love to see the media kit that JTS gave to the article’s author, because we did not play any Bob Marley, Reb Shlomo or Debbie Friedman tunes on Monday when he visited our minyan. I also know that, in my interview, I gave a lot of credit to developing this style in part through indie minyanim.
By the way, we generally use the Dan Nichols tune for Mi Khamokha. We sometimes sing a Marley tune (“One Love”) as a medley from a gospel tune (“Sanctuary” – aka “Oh Lord, Prepare Me…”); we then sing the Sh’ma to “One Love” as a heads-up that we are moving into Shacharit for those still davening P’sukei D’Zimra. It’s pretty sweet.
Hey, Andy, dumb question — you are using the “traditional” liturgy, right? Like, not skipping stuff (I’m defining “traditional” of course by what’s in the Sim Shalom). ‘Cuz the article seemed to imply otherwise but somehow that seemed a bit odd — and, as you mentioned, the article got some things a bit off.
Kol HaKavod w/ the minyan, though.
Avi – yes and no. We use Sim Shalom and follow the “matbeah shel tefilah” to meet minimum halakhic requirements for prayer, but we also create shared space for people to meet those obligations individually. This allows people to choose how to respond in the moment to the davvenen. Sometimes that is with the text, riffing on the text, silent meditation, etc. The article, as you wrote, did not get the exact details on how we balance structure and spontaneity.
Andy Shug:
Thanks for saying something about it, and yasher koach with the minyan! I got no sense of what it was actually like from the news article.
ZT:
Why is it”very good news that they are considering removing calls for the rebuilding of the temple. Moredchai Kaplan, while teaching at JTS, published a pleading-for-the-resurrection-of-the-sacrificial-system free prayerbook in 1945. As usual the conservative movement is doing the right thing, just a little later.“? If I were you I would have said something like “I’m happy the ‘Servos may be coming closer to my preferred practice”, because I can’t see what would be *objectively* better in praying using the oldschool praseology or an innovative one.
[Side comment 1: I’m pretty sure the current Conversative siddur does not include a line about restoring the sacrificial system.]
[Side comment 2: I could make an argument to say that tefillot that don’t include requests for the rebuilding of the Temple are the *real* “oldschool” liturgy, seeing as that’s what they would have prayed in the days when the Temple was standing and didn’t need rebuilding…..but I won’t.]