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Does the tune for Maariv on Rosh Hashanna and Yom Kippur give you a spiritual experience? Does it recall ones from the past?

I want to talk about words and song, about text, tradition and innovation and about how we all can create a spiritual prayer experience.

Lets get back to the song. What if I changed even one note? Or sang it off key? Would that not elicit a visceral response, or at least a squirm? We are wedded to that niggun

My daughter Yona feels that way and she is 2. She calls it the “Ah” song—and insists on hearing it on our car ride back from day care, at the same time, in its full entirety, without me interrupting.

Bristling at change, even of the best intentions, can be found in a story from the Gemarra in masechet Berachot:

A certain [reader] went down in the presence of R. Hanina and said [from the Avot portion of the shemonah esrei which usually just says”hakeyl hagadol vehanora-- great, mighty, awewsome”], O God, the great, mighty, awesome, majestic, powerful, awful, strong, fearless, sure and honoured. [R. Hanina waited till he had finished, and when he had finished said to him, Have you concluded all the praise of your Master? Why do we want all this? …… It is as if an earthly king had a million denarii of gold, and someone praised him as possessing silver ones. Would it not be an insult to him? 

This passage from the gemarra in berachot makes it clear that it is not ours to decide how to pray to G-d, even if it is adding praise—changing what was given to us to say cheapens the praise. And for many it simply doesn’t feel right.

When I daven people say two things to me: Why did you use the same tune? Or why did you use that new tune? How come I’m never asked “why did you use the same words?

It would seem that we, and Jews throughout history have an intuitive need to say the same things, and some of us have an intuitive need to hear the same tunes.

But yet elsewhere in the gemara berachot there is this Mishna:

RABBAN GAMALIEL SAYS: EVERY DAY A MAN SHOULD SAY THE EIGHTEEN BENEDICTIONS—the mishna starts but recounting the need for ritual with a regimented prescription to me, but then this amazing quote comes in response:….. Kol haoseh tefilato keva ein tefilato tachanunim R. ELIEZER SAYS: IF A MAN MAKES HIS PRAYERS [INTO] A FIXED TASK, IT IS NOT A [GENUINE] SUPPLICATION.

The gemara expounds upon Rabbi Eliezer: What is meant by a FIXED TASK? These are the three suggestions —

R. Jacob b. Idi said in the name of R. Oshaiah: Anyone whose prayer is like a heavy burden on him.

The Rabbis say: Whoever does not say it in the manner of supplication.

Rabbah and R. Joseph both say: Whoever is not able to insert something fresh in it.

R. Zera said: I can insert something fresh, but I am afraid to do so for fear I should become confused

What is it that can make a prayer not be a supplication (and here by tachanunim, supplication, we probably mean something meaningful as prayer)? 1. If it feels rote, 2. if it doesn’t feel spiritual, and radically, 3. if it doesn’t have a textual innovation.

The rabbis here and throughout the ages struggled with the balance between needing to do what is prescribed and not letting mitzvot get stale. They also struggled with the human need to praise more without cheapening that praise. Rosh Hashana and Yom kippur take so long,because we kept adding this or that for fear we weren’t praising enough, even though there were plenty of Rabbis then, and I’m sure congregants today, who were rather bothered by the all the long davening. The tension was real throughout history between fixed prayer and innovation in prayer.

Music theorists say that music at its best is an _expression of something that can’t be put into words. An example of this could be the shofar. The shofar may well be used on Rosh Hashana as a way of expressing ourselves when words fail. During the mussaf service we use verses from the bible to crown Gd as the ultimate king(a section called malchuyot) so that our faith will appear clear. We then bring verses to remind Gd of the good we have done, of the statements he made about always saving and redeeming us (zichronot) in order to make the case for a good judgement, and then we do something altogether different, we bring verses about a sound—the shofar blast (a section called shofarot) which heralds redemption. The sound, in the end, is something we cannot put to words. And so during that part of the service we actually interrupt the words with blasts from the shofar.

A second important point music theorists make is that what makes us enjoy music is the setting up of familiarity with a melody, and then a change from the expectation created by the melody. It’s as simple as singing da da da da, then da da da di) That instant of change and newness either of a note or of intonation or instrument or trill is what we enjoy in music. Without either the expectation created, or the surprise change, the enjoyment and experience are lessened.

So musical theory shows that we can express with music what we can’t in words and feel a sense of excitement from both familiarity and change—both are needed.

I would argue that the nusach and the melodies of davening bring out what the music theorists say. The tunes can draw tachanunim or supplication out of the words, and changing those tunes breaks from rote and becomes spiritual. They are expressions of this same tension between the tunes that warm us from familiarity like the smells of matzoh ball soup and the new tunes or trills that surprise us and snap us out of our davening coma-- like the staccato the blast of the shofar, or a new spice that is added to that matzo ball soup (without ruining it) 

Can spirituality or tachanunim come from a niggun set to words? Yes, and it has been understood that way throughout the ages:

“Song is a form of service to Hashem. For example, the Levites would chant daily song during the Temple Service. The voices of the Levites had to be pleasing, as it is written in Divrei Hayamim 11 5:15, when the trumpeters and singers were as one. Rashi explains this to mean that the music sounded harmonious (Chulin 24b). When a Levite‘s voice ceased to be resonant, he was disqualified as a singer [I better watch out]. Our tefilos have replaced the sacrifices in the Temple, and song continues to be an integral part of prayer services, as we say every morning during Shacharis “habocher b‘shirei zimrah” (Hashem, who chooses musical songs of praise).  Shulchan aruch 53 :23

The same Shulchan Aruch lists rule after rule about the chazzan, the quality of his voice, his attention to the mood of those for whom he prays, the length of his beard and pants, his standing in the community (as an interlude it also says says that if there is only enough money for either a rabbi or a chazzan, you hire the chazzan unless the Rabbi is really really impressive) all of which point to the fact that there was tremendous concern for the aesthetics of davening in addition to the attention to the detail of the words and times.

It was no secret to the Rabbis that people had a hard time with davening the same way every day—the Rabbis themselves did too. Issues with kavannah, literally attention but figuratively communing with Gd in prayer, go way back:

Rabbi Hiyya said, “I have never concentrated on prayer all of my days. Once I tried to concentrate, but all I could think about was politics—who goes up first before the king? The Arkafta [a high dignitary in Persia or the Exilarch (the leader of the diaspora)?’”.” Shmuel said, “During prayer, I count chicks.” Rabbi Bun Bar Hiyya said, “I count the stones in the wall when I should be praying.” Rabbi Matnaya said, “I am grateful to my head, because it knows to bow automatically when we reach the Modim prayer.”—Yerushalmi, Berachot 16a

One traditional explanation of this is that the Rabbis used these methods to better concentrate. Many others see it as an honest _expression of futility and frustrations on the part of those trying to daven. Perhaps for this reason the Rabbis put such legal emphasis on the aesthetics of davening.

One solution used for many years was the Chazzan whom we just described—a talented singer who improvised and thrilled with phenomenal, usually tenor voices. Like the Kohen Gadol, he performed the service as an individual for the many.

But in the past 40 years or so, davening has not been as much of a spectator sport. The availability of books with translations and transliterations has improved access to and knowledge of the many prayers, and musical media allowed for the ease of introduction and dissemination of tunes. Services are far more participatory.

In the same way we struggle over changing words, it should be clear that we should struggle over changing niggunim as well. Melodic innovations cannot assume every form. The niggun set to words needs to be rooted to the words— there is a line from the mahzor which reads “uveshofar gadol yitaka, vekol demama daka yishama” “and the great shofar is sounded and a small still voice is heard” the first part is read loudly with flourish, the second quietly. Singing it the opposite way would seem silly. There are many examples today of texts we sing today where the tune is rather inappropriate for the text. Ideally, the niggun colors in the black on white printed text, the outline created by the words and hues that fill it should be complementary.

We’ve been talking about the struggle to achieve spirituality in prayer through words and song. In the end, why is that so important?

If someone were to ask me what spirituality is, my answer would be exceeding limits. The world around us can appear to be nothing but natural laws, nothing beyond what we see in front of our face, and as a scientist I am tortured by that vision on occasion. But the flip side is that the world is nothing short of the perfect vessel with which to see G-d.

Spirituality is going to a place that is not limited by the natural laws that govern how I feel most of the time. Reaching G-d is not just perceiving something beyond but also moving into that beyond. In Deutornomy, a fascinating line appears (Ch30 v. 6):

Umal hashem elokecha et lvav’cha ve’et levav zarecha leahava et hashem elokecha bekhol levav’cha uvekhol nafshecha lema’an chayecha: And G-d will circumcise (mal) your heart and the heart of your seed in order to love your G-d with all your heart and all your soul for the sake of your life.

Anatomically, the heart is surrounded by the pericardium, a wrapping of sorts which, in theory (and in unfortunate cases, in certain diseases) can limit the expansion of the heart. Figuritively, circumcising the heart would permit it’s unlimited expansion. Hence the removal of that limit is what G-d will do for us to be able to love him completely.

A spiritual prayer service does not fall into the trap that we are to rotely follow words—rather we use the words as a vessel as we move into the G-dly world by breaking through the limits, by singing. When a chazzan trills she/he breaks free. When he uses an appropriate new tune to traditional words he breaks free. When everyone joins him they all break free. When a harmony flies from across the room over a note that no one expects, the sound breaks us free.

What goes on around the chazzan individually and everyone else communally impacts everyone individually and communally. When I am down before the ark davening, and see someone with kavannah when I’m leading, whether because of the niggun or the words or something internally driven I get more kavannah, I hear their shofarot and want make my own primordial cry to join them. Each extra voice that I hear crying sends me beyond the limit. Each bellow or closed eyes, or focused gaze literally gives me a thrill, one which a limited world could know nothing of. The reciprocal energy from everyone in this new paradigm of communal prayer when we really hit it right transports all of us into the limitless. Along the same lines each extra voice of private conversation to anyone but G-d brings me and the folks around the talking back from the Gdly realm to within the limits of man. It can be devastating.

When the congregation belts out together, it breaks free of the limits it felt before walking in. It knows and learns a framework, called tradition, which, as the musical theorist says is the absolute requirement for the next thing it encounters which is change. The change is not a change unless it is rooted in a tradition. The colors are random unless they fill and bring out the outline.

Our shul tries that—we root in tradition, but yet we explore with newness. We don’t depend on one person—each different addition to the symphony makes the collective sound reach higher. And at all times the traditional words and innovative songs have utmost respect for each other.

As Jews we will struggle with the concept that our rootedness could be a recipe for becoming stale and our desire for newness and individual _expression could leave us flailing in the wind. This season, lets let our words of prayer be familiar to us and sound familiar to G-d, let our singing join the tunes we are used to, to those which are newer, and let our unlimited prayer take us in to the G-dly world, into the G-dly court of judgment, together.