Parashat Toldot, Gen. 25:19-28:9

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in memory of Joel Michael Swirsky.

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The Real Power of Prayer?

Study with Baruch Sienna

This past week we visited a friend of ours in the hospital, and my wife offered: "You'll be in my prayers." Somewhat sheepishly she added, "I don't know if it helps, but it helps me." I thought to myself, "Well, maybe it doesn't help, but it can't hurt."

Indeed, it was initially thought that patients who were prayed for recovered faster and better. And that makes sense. People who belong to a religious community might have more visitors and receiving more attention, might benefit from better care. Or those who have a positive outlook on their lives, might just take better care of themselves which promotes healing. But a recent rigorous double blind study done by Dr. Benson of the Harvard Medical School and funded by the Templeton Foundation found that there was no effect of prayer on the patients who had undergone cardiac procedures; and in fact, the group prayed for had an unexplained higher rate of complications.

But while praying for strangers may be appropriate for a clinical study, I think there is little we can learn from these scientific results. Because when we talk about prayer, we are usually talking about our own prayers. Now it can be argued that such prayer might simply be a case of the 'placebo effect'. This was described by Beecher in 1955, where patients reported improvement after receiving dummy pills with no active medicinal ingredients. The effectiveness of placebos is controversial, as is the efficacy of prayer. But prayer may function like a placebo, in that the act of believing that prayer helps, makes it work.

At the beginning of this week's parasha Toldot, we find the familiar pattern of the barren wife. Isaac prays to God on Rebecca's behalf, and lo and behold, God answers his prayer, and Rebecca becomes pregnant. On the word translated as 'pleaded' (vaye'etar) Rashi explains, 'Isaac did much praying and pleading.' But be careful what you wish for (or pray for, in this case), because as it turns out, it is a difficult pregnancy, and now it is Rebecca who turns to God and asks, cryptically, "lamah zeh anochi", which seems to be an unfinished sentence, "Why me..."

"Why me?" is the question that most often elicits prayer. When tragedy strikes, it is (somewhat) easier to bear, if we think that there is a plan, and there is a reason for our suffering. Nothing is worse than feeling that our lives are random. We want to have meaning in our lives, and such meaning is clearest to us when we believe God is in charge. That is why so many of us are so drawn to faith and belief. Without faith to sustain us, we are easily exhausted. Esau, who represents the physical (and entirely non-spiritual) world, returns from the field, fatigued and famished. "Esau came tired from all his accomplishments and all his conquests. He was exhausted and disappointed. This is just like modern man, who, with all his progress, his innovations and his inventions, is still full of internal doubt, tortured by disappointment, bothered by anxiety, fearing death." Soloveitchik comments that it is not only because Esau is physically tired, but that he lacks a sustaining faith to give meaning to his life. "He is weary of the pointlessness of life and the inevitability of death." Today, many in our society who don't find meaning through religion fill the void with sex, drugs, or other replacements to produce a spiritual 'high.'

I understand that infertility can be a devastating blow for a couple or an individual who wants children. But in that case, prayer is not enough. The common saying goes, "God helps those who help themselves." William Barclay, a twentieth century Christian theologian, writes,

Prayer must always remain quite ineffective, unless we do everything we can to make our own prayers come true. It is a basic rule of prayer that God will never do for us what we can do for ourselves. Prayer does not do things for us; it enables us to do things for ourselves.

There are support groups and medical options that should be explored. In the Bible, it seems so easy; a prayer to God, and behold! A pregnancy. I wish it were that simple; but that is not how it works. Many of us don't believe that the natural, scientific world can be disrupted by miracles. The problem is that we want to eat our cake and have it too. We want the latest medical and scientific procedures to assist us with issues around pregnancy and healing disease, but the solace that religion can offer through ritual and prayer when we experience infertility or are seriously ill. Those that have faith find comfort in prayer.

So what is the purpose of prayer? We too often make the mistake of thinking that prayer is asking for something. Prayer is not supplication, but expressing gratitude. Neale Donald Walsch in his best-selling book, Conversations with God (now a major Hollywood motion picture) says, "Therefore, never supplicate -- appreciate."

And the central question: does God answer prayer? The Reform prayerbook's answer is, "Who rise from prayer better persons, their prayer is answered." So there are things we can pray for: wisdom, patience and strength. "Prayer invites God to be present in our spirits and in our lives," writes Abraham Joshua Heschel. "Prayer cannot bring water to parched fields, or mend a broken bridge, or rebuild a ruined city; but prayer can water an arid soul, mend a broken heart and rebuild a weakened will.... To pray is to take notice of wonder, to regain a sense of the mystery that animates all beings, the divine margin in all attainments...."

Prayer can't cure serious disease, but prayer can cure the loneliness or hopelessness that sometimes overwhelms us when we or someone we love are ill. It invites hope into our hospital rooms. That's the real power of prayer.

 

Shabbat Shalom.

BDS