Jewish Prayer Book

Q. What is your opinion about believers using the Jewish Prayer Book for prayer?

A James 5.16 speaks about the effectual prayer of a righteous man accomplishes much, and that is the goal and the heart of prayer, to mean something. The Apostles (talmidim) saw that Yeshua’s prayers were accomplishing things and they asked Him to teach them how to pray, and the Lord gave a model prayer in Matt 6 and Lk 11. This is not an original prayer but a “model” meaning we should pray as the Scriptures teach us. This prayer was not meant to be repeated verbatim but it summed up the major themes found in the Word.

This indicates many things. The Jewish people were not hypocrites because they did not know what to say, and Yeshua’s prayer model would be very acceptable in the first century and very familiar. Jewish prayer was fine and Yeshua used them in His model. The problem was not in the prayers themselves, the words or content. All of that was consistent and as it should be. The problem was they did not pray with sincere hearts, with repentance and truth, with true faith. The best prayer is useless when it doesn’t express the true intentions of the heart.

The Lord looks at the heart and He examines any prayer by the faith in which it is offered. Any Jewish person in the first century would’ve agreed with, consented to and approved of His model prayer and would have understood it as such, a model. There is a warning about praying the same words over and over again in the Scriptures thinking repetition will gain favor with the Lord. This was the Jewish mentality. The ritualist/ legalist mentality will insist on the repetition of the same prayers over and over again 3 times daily, which was and is the practice today.

In the “Didache”, which is a Christian book that is very ancient, there is a section on prayer that said that Christians should pray the Lord’s Prayer 3 times a day, obviously imitating the Jewish practice. This ritual carries with it the deadly mistake of turning prayer into a “performance” instead of the true intentions of a hungry heart reaching out to his Father. We would not approach our earthly fathers like that, how much more our Heavenly Father! Our prayers should be the genuine expression of heart that loves Him and filled with gratitude. That is true prayer.

But, the form and content, no matter how “orthodox”, is worthless without true dependence on the Lord. If the prayer is not the true and honest utterance of your heart, it will not be effectual. The Apostles prayed many of the prayers found in the Jewish Prayer Book, called a “siddur” which means “order of prayer”. But they wanted to know “how to pray” more effectually because it wasn’t working for them and they knew it. There are many beautiful prayers found in the prayer book, and other places.

But, we must avoid praying the letter if it doesn’t express the true intentions of the heart. Liturgical prayer, corporate prayer and private prayer were done in the Temple, at the command of the Lord. There are several prayers in the Bible that God specifically said to pray when you worship (Dt 21.1-9; Dt 26.1-15; Num 6.22-27; Num 5.11-28). The Book of Psalms is a song book and used by the Levitical choir in the Temple.

So, it’s not that we cannot pray or sing a written prayer, but we must be careful about turning them into a mundane ritual void of the true intentions of the heart. Lastly, the prayer called “The Lord’s Prayer” is really a model on how to pray. For the real “Lord’s Prayer”, read John 17.1-26. I hope this helps.