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imasoftov
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Wed, Feb 20 2019, 10:12 am
amother wrote: | I've always struggled with the concept of "no prayer goes unanswered". |
Before we struggle, what's the source?
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amother
Seagreen
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Wed, Feb 20 2019, 11:20 am
imasoftov wrote: | Before we struggle, what's the source? |
I'm not sure where the source is, but I'm sure there is one as I've heard this concept many times. For me, it wouldn't make it simpler or easier to accept and understand if I'd see the source clearly. It still is an idea that is completely beyond a human being on every level. I guess it takes blind faith to internalize things that we are told to accept yet make no sense. Put another way, I struggle with blind faith.
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someone
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Wed, Feb 20 2019, 12:00 pm
imasoftov wrote: | Before we struggle, what's the source? |
Good question (Although since I saw your question I have this song about how Hashem doesn't turn away the tears of a bat melech stuck in my head, thanks for that).
I always thought the source was the gemara that says אין תפילה חוזרת ריקם because I have heard that quoted a lot. But then I looked it up to see the context and saw that its part of a longer meimra. Its a gemara in Brachot (32b) and the full quote is
אמר רבי חנין אמר רבי חנינא כל המאריך בתפלתו אין תפלתו חוזרת ריקם
So it seems that the end is talking about someone who prays at length or many times (the example the gemara gives is Moshe Rabbeinu) and not about tefillah in general. So I personally don't know where there is a source (I'm assuming you mean a source from the gemara/rishonim and not more contemporary sources) but now I'm curious and I'll try and find time to go look it up more in depth.
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someone
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Wed, Feb 20 2019, 12:06 pm
amother wrote: | I'm not sure where the source is, but I'm sure there is one as I've heard this concept many times. For me, it wouldn't make it simpler or easier to accept and understand if I'd see the source clearly. It still is an idea that is completely beyond a human being on every level. I guess it takes blind faith to internalize things that we are told to accept yet make no sense. Put another way, I struggle with blind faith. |
Personally, I don't find it completely beyond human understanding. Hashem sees the world on a completely different level than us. The same way that sometimes my kids really want something and I refuse because I know it's bad for them even though they think it would be the best thing in the world, so too Hashem sees things we don't and knows that sometimes this is the time to say no. Why the thing we are asking for is not right for us is beyond our comprehension, but the fact that this exists is something which I personally can comprehend.
So that is more about Him saying no. But then the question is, ok, He said no to the tefillah because He sees things we don't. So what happened to that tefillah? It had no impact? This brings us to the idea that the power of tefillah is such that it has an impact on the world even if not in the specific manner we intended it to. To me that makes logical sense (but I am half asleep and am meant to be giving my kids supper not philosophizing online so I'm not sure if it makes sense to anyone else).
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imasoftov
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Wed, Feb 20 2019, 12:51 pm
amother wrote: | I'm not sure where the source is, but I'm sure there is one as I've heard this concept many times. For me, it wouldn't make it simpler or easier to accept and understand if I'd see the source clearly. It still is an idea that is completely beyond a human being on every level. I guess it takes blind faith to internalize things that we are told to accept yet make no sense. Put another way, I struggle with blind faith. |
That people say something repeatedly does not make it true. I am not looking for the source to help with the struggle, finding if there is a source or not preceeds the struggle.
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PinkFridge
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Sun, Feb 24 2019, 8:53 am
amother wrote: | [u]
I've always struggled with the concept of "no prayer goes unanswered". For me to truly internalize something it has to make sense. At least a little. If you child is struggling in school and you go to the PTA and the teacher smiles at you and says everything is great, you'd be confused. I guess it really comes down to blind faith. To daven and still have a tragedy happen while hashem is all-loving and accepting our tefilos is impossible to understand. (At least for me) To then just say, hashem loves us, and no tefila is wasted, what does that mean? How do we understand it in a way that makes a drop of sense? |
Rabbi Menachem Nissel has a shiur called Understanding Unanswered Prayers.
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