World religions: judaism as daily practice

The daily practice of Judaism is meant to install the individual Jew with a sense of wonder and awe for his Creator. The very instant Jews awake in the morning, they are to say a short prayer expressing gratitude to God for allowing them to awake. It is best to wake before dawn to prepare for the morning prayers.

A Jew prays to God at three formal services every day, in the morning, afternoon and evening. It is best to gather with a group of at least 10 Jewish men (called a minyan) for these prayers, but in times of need they can be prayed alone. Jewish prayer is not limited to these special times and individual Jews are encouraged to offer their own prayers to God as often as they feel the need to. Also, some have the fixed practice of reciting various Psalms from the Bible daily.

The morning service is the main service of the day. At the morning service men wrap themselves in talleisim (special fringed prayer shawls worn by religious Jews) and wear tefillin (small boxes bound to the head and arm that contain small handwritten parchments containing verses from the Torah). One interpretation of this ritual is that God’s presence surrounds us (the shawl) and His Law, the Torah, is supposed to guide our thoughts and deeds (the tefillin) throughout the day. On Mondays, Thursdays, and Saturday (the Sabbath), passages of the Torah are read in Hebrew. Throughout the course of one year, the Jewish people finish reading the entire Torah according to a fixed calendar. To find out what the portion is during any particular week, contact your local Orthodox synagogue.

The daily study of the Hebrew Bible and other sacred writings and commentaries is a major portion of the religious Jew’s daily practice. If it is not possible to spend the entire day in study, one should at least make an effort to study in the morning, before or after the morning prayers and in the evening before retiring to bed. Study is the way by which Jews deepen their knowledge of God and His expectations of us, and studying the Torah is also a commandment in and of itself. It is amazing to consider the oceans of ink that have been spilled in the writing of Jewish religious texts. If you’re not sure where to begin your Torah study, consult a rabbi or knowledgeable Jew who can help you decide what to learn first. Learning with a partner or in a group is also considered to be of great value, but individual learning is important too.

There is a popular Jewish practice of trying to make at least one hundred blessings on God for different creations every day. We express thanks to God for the food He provides, and for all the basics of life. We bless God for creating wonders of nature like mountains and oceans, thunder and lightning. God is even blessed for good scents and the basic ability to see. We try to find opportunities to thank and bless God for everything in our world.

Much of the Torah bids us to control our more animal urges on a day to day basis. Jewish dietary law, or “kashrus” in Hebrew, teaches the individual Jew that you cannot just eat anything you want. God’s will has to be considered in everything we do, even the most trivial of things. Spirituality extends to the workplace, where we are commanded to practice decent business ethics and are not allowed to be dishonest in the slightest.

At the end of the day, when we lay down on our beds to rest, we take an accounting of the day’s events and forgive anyone who hurt or offended us, and hope that people we offended or hurt will do the same for us. Just before going to sleep, we recite verses from the Hebrew Bible reflecting God’s oneness and our trust in Him that He will return us to consciousness in the morning.