“NOTHING COMES WITHOUT TEFILLAH”
My beloved friend Michael Snaid owns several stores in resort areas near Savannah, Georgia. Here is an amazing story, in his own words: “I was outside my store, when I saw an Oriental man and his wife. She was screaming at him and berating him. I wanted to help, so I went up to them and asked whether there was something I could do.
“He told me that he had been carrying a large bag filled with all the cash that they had been planning to use for their vacation. He had lost it and she was furious.
“At that moment, my son drove up. He is a rabbi, so I asked him to give the man a tefilla he could say for lost objects. My son happened to have with him a sefer with a certain prayer written by Reb Nachman. My son showed the tefilla to the man.
“The man said, ‘I can say that.’ I thought that he was making fun of us, but no! He stood on the steps of my store and started yelling out this prayer at the top of his lungs, with total belief, even though he probably did not understand a word. I was in shock. Can you imagine: an Oriental man belting out a tefillah by Rabbi Nachman in the middle of a shopping center in the deep South!
“The moment he finished the prayer, my daughter drove up. She had heard our entire conversation, and she got the idea to look for the bag in a nearby restaurant. She spoke to the manager, who said, “Yes, someone just left this bag here.”
“So, just as the man finished the prayer, my daughter drove up holding the missing bag with all the money inside! Everyone was speechless! No one could believe what had just happened! My son said, ‘I wish I could have that man’s kavana when I daven!’”
Here is my comment: Michael Snaid thought to help the man and offer a Jewish prayer to an Oriental man! What does that tell you about Michael Snaid? Such derech eretz! Such chessed! What a Kiddush Hashem!
This story is a sequel to last week’s article about Moslem prayer and how we have a huge achrayis to daven from the depths of our heart in order to save ourselves and bring the Geulah Shelemah!
I saw remarkable ideas about davening in a sefer by Rabbi Shimshon Pincus zt”l.
Everything we do, whether spiritual or physical, is successful only because of prayer. This principle is learned from Parshas Beraishis, where Chazal tell us that the herbage of the field was created on the Third Day, but it had not yet sprung out of the earth by the Sixth Day. What delayed it? It was waiting for Adam to pray for rain! Once Adam davened, rain fell and the herbage burst up through the surface of the earth! So it is with all our spiritual and physical avoda. Tefillah is “the gate through which all blessing passes. This is a universal principle,” says Rabbi Pincus. “Nothing comes without tefillah.” (Gates of Prayer, Feldheim Publishers)
Hashem promised Avraham Avinu, “to your offspring I will give this land.” (Beraishis 12) He also promised, “Count the stars …. So shall your offspring be.” (ibid 15:5) He also promised that Avraham’s offspring would leave the land of their oppressors after four hundred years “with great wealth” (ibid 15:14).
All these things were promised, but each generation still had to pray for them: Yitzchak had to pray; Yaakov had to pray, and the Generation in Mitzraim had to pray, even though everything had been promised! Our enemies, lehavdil, know about prayer and we know about prayer, but sometimes we underestimate its importance and distract ourselves during tefillah, but we have to strengthen ourselves.
Please listen to these powerful words from Rabbi Pincus: “A person surely should make his Torah learning fixed and regular and all other occupations secondary. The main way to achieve spiritual elevation is only by toil in Torah. Nonetheless tefillah has special importance in our times….”
My friends, this says it all. If we want to save ourselves and see the Geulah Shelemah, it is incumbent upon us to throw ourselves into our tefillah as if our lives depend on it.
Because they do!
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| The author with Michael Snaid |
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| Herbage bursting up through the soil |
GLOSSARY
Achrayis: responsibility
Avoda: spiritual toil
Chazal: Rabbis of the Mishna and Gemara
Chessed: act of kindness
Daven: to pray
Derech Eretz: proper behavior
Geulah Shelemah: Final Redemption
Kiddush Hashem: Sanctification of G-d’s Name
Tefilla: prayers
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