While at this beginner BT minyan I realized something very interesting. This was the type of minyan that the people are just learning Hebrew and the ways of yiddishkeit. They take forever for everything and you are mostly sitting around and waiting.
While waiting for shmona esray to finish I noticed a man who was up to silach lanu. Instead of the normal quickly repeated clops he clopped very slowly and then paused with his fist clenched in mid air for about 15 seconds and did the second clop.
This got me thinking about something, most orthodox people clop so fast that its hard to believe they actually times up the words with the clops. I mean is it possible to say the words that fast that there is no pause whatsoever between the two clops for silach lanu? I have a little pause, is everyone just so absentminded during shmona esray that they merely clop without lining up the words with the clops?
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Like changing a gear.
And that was one of our faster Chazzans…..thank goodness you didn’t come when I was leading. LOL.
There are a few parts of davening that are simply impossible to say, given the time that the chazzan allots before he finishes them.
They are korbanos, the halleluyas, tachnun on mondays and thursdays, baruch sh’mei before layning, vay-ehi no’am on saturday nights, and the stuff after ain kelohaynu before aleinu.
Um… that’s actually most of shachris.
Um… that’s actually most of shachris.
That’s why amongst… ahem… groups devoted to davening (as opposed to mumbling) and serving Hashem with kavana in general, it is encouraged not to daven with the minyan. Either start with the minyan and then daven at your pace or start earlier and time yourself to say S”E betzibur (but even that doesn’t help, because in… ahem… some minyanim the chazan is done with his S”E by the time you made your three steps back), or something like that.
Especially on Shabbos. There is a letter from the 6th leader of one such group that talks about how one Jew stopped being… a member of this group. To give an example, the author of the letter writes: “He davened with minyan even on Shabbos”. (My rabbi told me that his teacher who grew up not a member of this group thought for a long time that there was a “not” missing in that sentence.
(Any way to disable smileys?)
This is why I frequent the minyan Hesh describes in his post. Yeah, its slow, but I also don’t feel rushed to try and keep up. Even on the parts of davening that I know by heart I can’t keep up with other minyanim…because most of them aren’t actually saying every word properly. I’m still new to this, I still feel weird if everyone is done with the Amidah and I’m still going, I can feel their eyes upon me, waiting to start the repetition….it completely disrupts my tefillah. So I go to the minyan where the Rabbi takes longer to finish than anyone else….no pressure. I love it. So it takes 10 minutes longer…so what. What was I gonna do with that 1o minutes anyway?
I love davening with our shul here because they are Kabbalists and go really slow to do all the kavanot. ( I mean, a fast Shachrit is 2-2.5 hours) It’s so nice to not feel rushed, even if I’m davening in Hebrew instead of English.
They really speak clearly as well, even in the parts where saying one word doesn’t take 30 seconds or more. I think that’s way nicer than some of the “speed minyans” I’ve witnessed.
Hence the reason I say much of it in English or just daven alone.
If you think about it, how long does it really take to say “chatanu, m’chal lanu malkeinu ki pashanu?”
I would say about the same time as clopping your chest twice in a row.
Not if your clopping on Chatanu and Pashanu. If you’re clopping at any point of the last part then, sure, you can swing it. But that’s not the tradition….as far as I know.
It ain’t a race….it’s tefillah.
I say tachnun….especially on Mon & Thur….in English. By that time in shacrais I’m worn out on the Hebrew.
i pause between my clops. was that guy taking his time to read properly? or was he taking his time to concentrate on his sins….
Maybe those that don’t pause don’t have to think that hard to remember their sins.
Slach Lanu – forgive me for all my wicked deeds that I intend to perform the minute I finish davening.
Hey I am curious- when you women clop- is there any sort of bounce…I couldn’t help myself
I can relate to the clop-pause-clop guy maybe. Sometimes I remember a sin from a while back, sometimes from decades ago, one that I’d completely blocked out of my memory or something that happened while I was on one of my periodic leaves of absence from reality.
When I clop, I like to imagine I’m that guy from Predator that cuts his chest with a knife.
Hesh (15) Nothing compared to mammograms
About the post, not only BT’s take their time. It’s very fashionable in certain spiritual circles to doven veerrryy slooowlyyy, with all sorts of gestures, like mime.
hesh…i can’t speak for all women, but i just clop higher up so there’s no interference.
So, in one post you hit on (pun intended) two issues I, as a BT am having. First, the minyanim in my area are all SUPER fast. By the time I’m bowing modim, they’re done with S”E completely. The other is the famed clopping. I’ve seen it all from no clopping at all, to one guy who pounds himself repeatedly for a good 15 seconds…I’m the only one in the room who seems to actually time the clops with the words…
By the way, Shabbat Shalom from Seattle!
At least it’s better than the masochistic guys who look like they’ll pull a move from Mortal Kombat’s Kano and rip their own hearts out. I had a friend like that, and I’m happy to say that he is still in the land of the living today…maybe…if he would call.
Hesh-
If you don’t like the fast speed of the davening, then next time the rabbi chooses you to lead the minyan, say yes.