Can't make it in person? Watch live on UStream. Video and audio recordings will also be made available on our website shortly afterward.
Session I: Meaning (September 19, 2011)
Taught by Rabbi Elie Kaunfer
Is prayer meant to be read as prose or interpreted as poetry? This session will look at the many layers beneath the text of the siddur and the mahzor and see how words and phrases have the potential to unlock deeper meanings beneath the text. Take home a methodology that will open up new pathways to make meaning from the text of prayer. Download sources
The words are only the beginnning. How loudly we say them, how we move, where we stand and the nature of our prayer space significantly impacts the prayer experience. We will explore all of these issues by examining traditional sources, with the goal of emerging with a greater consciousness of how aesthetics are critical to prayer.
Watch Session II (Not fully audible. See audio file above to listen without video.)
Session III: Music (October 3, 2011)
Taught by Joey Weisenberg
The printed page only has a hope of penetrating to the soul through music. In this session, we will explore the ways in which music can not only enhance prayer, but build communities who truly know how to pray together.
The Cosmic Power of Shabbat - Competing Images in Zemirot
Rabbi Josh Cahan is Beit Midrash Director at JTS and a Ph.D. candidate in Talmud. He is also the director of the Northwoods Summer Kollel at Ramah Wisconsin.
We will analyze the first blessing of the Amidah as a way of approaching the question: Are traditional prayer formulas able to express my own values/ideas of prayer? What do you do when you “disagree” with the prayer's content? We will analyze the original Biblical context to help us connect to the prayer.
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