Introduction - from Rabbi Micah Friedman 

Lately, as my alarm sounds in the morning, my mind flutters with dread as I imagine what horrors await me in the headlines of Haaretz and the New York Times. In the moment of blurry consciousness when our tradition guides us to speak words of gratitude for the gift of another day of life, [1] my heart sinks as I read about the latest chillul Hashem (“desecration of G-d’s name”) from the hills of Judea [2] or the latest step in the ongoing war on American multi-cultural democracy. [3] 

By the time I’m ready to consider davennen Shacharis (praying the morning service), I frequently find myself far from the mood that we are enjoined to echo each morning: sichu b’khol nifle’osav (“speak of all G-d’s wonders”), reads my prayer book, but a voice within me echoes lamentations for the crumbling of world order as we know it. How can I pray in such a state? 

How are we meant to daven when darkness surrounds us and penetrates our hearts? How can tefillah/davenen (“prayer”) offer us guidance as we struggle to discern our role in the struggles of our moment? When the siddur (“prayer book”) seems beyond reach, a sefer (“book of Jewish wisdom”) can be a more emotionally accessible foothold. 

Recently, I picked up a copy of the siddur of Rabbi Isaac Luria (known as the Ari z”l), one of the most influential Kabbalistic teachers in Jewish history who led a circle of mystical practitioners in Tzfat in the 16th Century CE. In it I found a teaching about tefillah that I shared with my friend and chevruta. [4] We hope Luria’s advice can encourage us in our efforts to daven wholeheartedly and to build circles of community around shared commitment to chesed (“compassion”). 

What drew me to this teaching was how Luria acknowledges that sadness, gloom, and grave concern for material conditions of life often present themselves as obstacles to prayer. At the same, he teaches that in order to open ourselves up to the transformative potential of prayer we must, somehow, move beyond gloom. So, how do we move ourselves from gloom to gladness? 

At the end of the teaching, Luria references the mitzvah of “love your neighbor as yourself” (Leviticus  19:18) and encourages us to share our concerns and struggles with those people with whom we pray and learn Torah. He locates the gateway to transcending the spiritual malady of dejection in the practice of cultivating loving relationships with those who share in our spiritual practices. In order to live by the words of the morning prayers that implore us to seek G-d’s face constantly, we need to attune ourselves to the faces and feelings of those with whom we gather to pray. When we situate our lives in circles of loving relationships in which we can share our innermost concerns, then we are able to share the burden and, together, to open ourselves up to the light of G-d which flows into us in a unique way each time we pray.

Before quoting from Leviticus, Luria’s first piece of advice flows from his reading of a set of stories from the Talmud. [5] In the context of the Talmud, the ancient rabbis were concerned about the inverse emotional challenge: should one pray from a state of lightheartedness, of excessive joy? In two parallel stories, two revered sages arrived for prayer in a jovial mood and their teachers called them out for disturbing the seriousness and presence-of-mind that sets the appropriate stage for prayer. Here, the Talmud transmits the psycho-spiritual insight that we should not allow our emotions to come to an extreme, even a positive extreme. Yet, the sages reassure their teachers by declaring “I am putting on tefillin!” What does putting on tefillin [6] have to do with behaving with lightheartedness? According to Rashi, wearing tefillin represents the solemn stance of accepting the burden of G-d’s Sovereignty, thereby grounding us in our responsibilities to perform mitzvos with a sense of seriousness and purpose. However, in the reading of the Ari z”l, it seems that wearing tefillin is a physical practice which can counteract gloom or depression. Wearing tefillin awakens us to the awesome privilege it is to do mitzvos, the sublime honor of serving God. So, between Rashi and the Ari, it seems that tefillin can serve as a tool to help us find balance between depression and frivolousness, between doomscrolling and toxic positivity. 

In a sense, this is how I suggest we can whole-heartedly approach prayer in a moment like our own. Tefillah can be a practice of striving towards emotional and spiritual balance. When the reality of our current world weighs us down, as it almost certainly will, then we can find grounding in the words of Torah we tie to our heads and hearts. If we recall this teaching of the Ari, we can remember that the purpose of prayer is to receive and to spread light and love, starting within our circles of dear ones with whom we pray and learn. Then, from a foundation of love, we can turn our attention with urgency and realism to the work we must do in the world at large, l’yached shem yud-hey b’vav-hey b’shem kol yisroel (to unify G-d’s name, on behalf of all of us).

Translation by Rabbis Micah Friedman and Jacob Chatinover

Reflection - from Rabbi Jacob Chatinover 

Asur la-adam le-hitpallel tefillato be-itzavon - “a person is forbidden to pray while in itzavon”. What is this state that the Ari says is incompatible with prayer? We have translated it as “gloom,” but let’s unpack it further. To do so, I will draw on some insights I have gained in my own therapeutic journey exploring depression. My hope is that they will resonate with anyone who sometimes feels a gloom they cannot shake which blocks them from connecting with the Divine. 

First, there is a gloom of despair. Every day we witness further motion away from God’s vision of a redeemed world: a world of care, mutuality, integrity, and devotion. A world of truth. And we are small, each of us trying not only to fix what is breaking, but also to care for our families, our loved ones, and ourselves. The psalmist encapsulates it: our lives are short, and most of our time is spent at work or dealing with some new problem; days speed past and then fade to black (Ps. 90:10). Despair follows naturally. 

Then, there is a gloom surrounding prayer itself. All of us are just trying to do our unique part to bring the world closer to how it deserves to be. What does prayer even do? When we feel the urgency of the work to be done in the world, sometimes prayer can feel like a distraction. Or perhaps the weight of the work makes it difficult to summon the hope and faith to really pray. 

All of these lead to the gloom of exhaustion. I don’t know about you, but I feel constantly drained. No matter what I do, it never feels like enough. I don’t feel like enough. After all, if I'm not solving the problem, I am the problem, right? There’s nothing else to say about it, we’re just tired. 

This is the depression triad: helplessness, hopelessness, worthlessness. 

So what role can a prayer life play within this? Perhaps tefillah can help move some of what is blocked. We know that prayer isn’t the same as action, but I’d like to suggest that it also isn’t inaction. The Ari asks us to take prayer seriously as a core pillar of a life of Avodah (“service”), rather than an escape from it. That shift in perspective may allow us to perceive that “heavenly light that flows” when we begin to pray. 

The Ari offers two alternatives to itzavon. First, “demonstrate deep humility to the Blessed G-d, through awe and fear.” Awe: the recognition of our smallness, a drop in the Ocean; and fear: the desire for a future that we feel worthy of. Embracing these two can lead to humility. Yes, our lives are short and very busy. It never feels like enough, because it will never be enough. We won’t solve it all, not alone and not in one lifetime, because we aren’t meant to. [10] It is not despair, but humility, that leads me to say: you are not meant to heal the entire world. You can’t. Put that burden off your shoulders. It is forbidden to pray while carrying it. 

And let us turn toward fear. Fear, sorrow, anger, emptiness: these are not blocks to our avodah, they are indications that we are already deeply committed to a life of avodah. As Joanna Macy and Molly Brown wrote: “Our sorrow is in equal measure love. We only mourn what we deeply care for … In speaking fear, you also show the trust and courage it takes to speak it … the anger we express has its source in our passion for justice … emptiness is to be honored, too. To be empty allows space for the new to arise.” [11] Your fear is not able to stop you from praying, because it is already a prayer. 

Next, “be as exceedingly joyous as possible.” There is a well-documented danger that texts like this one present. It is not a good idea to try to “turn off” your feelings. It’s not healthy to shove them away, or deeper down. And it’s not very effective! I’d like to suggest a slight tweak in how we read the Ari’s charge. It isn’t about deciding to be joyous and shunting away our gloom, so that we can then pray. It is about acknowledging what gloom does to us – how it freezes, drains, separates, and closes. And seeking, through prayer, to find an opening of the channel of supernal light. And through a life of prayer, to widen that opening. 

As Brené Brown puts it, "you cannot selectively numb emotion”: when we numb grief, shame, and fear, we also numb joy, gratitude, happiness. [12] So how are we to access a state “as exceedingly joyous as possible?” Be-khol ha-efshar: as much as possible. Given what is happening around you and within you, total bliss may not be possible. When you open up to pray, be honest about what is possible for you in this moment. But we must acknowledge the inverse: in any moment of prayer, some light is possible. It is as false to deny light as it is to deny darkness. Do not dismiss it! Its effects are very great. 

So, if we view tefillah as an oasis from the waves of itzavon that crash around us, new possibilities emerge: 

When we feel helpless - how can prayer show us what we are capable of?

When we feel hopeless - how can prayer sharpen our vision of a better world?

When we feel worthless - how can prayer renew our sense of self? 

What can prayer draw down into us that will renew our capacity to be of service? This moment is painful, and rightfully gloomy. When you pray in the context of this moment, you have a unique opportunity to express the needs of this moment. This was true in every fearful time in the past, and it will be true in every desperate time in the future. 

Lastly, remember that you are not alone. You feel the pain of others because you seek connection with them. Itzavon wants us to isolate, and we cannot. By definition, it reveals our connection. Our sorrow is in equal measure love. Know your friends’ pain, and davven as one limb of a body. Others are davvening for your needs too; and they are friends who know your soul. Know this. 

As we share in pain with each other, let us pray, together, that despair never overtake us. That exhaustion remind us that no act is wasted. That our frustration be a refusal to accept the world as it is. That together, we can say to the gloom: “I reject your reality, and I substitute my own.” 

Endnotes:

[1] See Modeh Ani Prayer.

[2] In January 2026, the IDF acknowledged a drastic spike the previous year in general and severe acts of violence perpetrated by Israeli settlers against Palestinians in the West Bank. See https://www.timesofisrael.com/idf-settler-violence-rose-by-27-in-2025-severe-attacks-spiked-by-over-50/. Israeli Human Rights organization B’tselem documents many of these incidents and analyzes trends in such violence perpetrated in the name of the Jewish people: https://www.btselem.org/topic/settler_violence.

[3] For an expert analysis of the efforts to undermine American democracy in international context, see https://carnegieendowment.org/russia-eurasia/research/2025/08/us-democratic-backsliding-in-comparative-perspective 

[4] Like all of the “writings” of the Ari, the transcription of this teaching was done by one of his main students, Rabbi Chaim Vital.

[5] Berakhot 30b.

[6] Tefillin refers to the ritual practice of binding head and arm with leather straps and boxes containing words of scripture.

[7] Vidui is used to refer to a few different liturgical formulations of confessional prayers including the acrostic paragraph which is recited on Yom Kippur that begins with Ashamnu, Bagadnu, Gazalnu (we are guilty, we have betrayed, we have stolen) as well as the liturgy recited when one fears they are on their deathbed. In the Nusach (liturgical arrangement) of Edot haMizrah (Middle-Eastern Jewish communities) which was adapted into the Hasidic Nusach Sefard, a Vidui is recited daily as part of Tachanun (supplications) following the Amidah (standing prayer). 

[8] The Hebrew is ambiguous here, the verb “will be able to” could refer to your Prayer (“she/your prayer will be able to grow upwards”, 3p fem.) or to You (“you will be able to grow upwards”, 2p masc.)

[9]  Since this teaching was written down by R Chayim Vital in the name of the Ari z”l, here we see him “break the fourth wall” and move into his own voice to describe the frequency with which he heard his teacher stress this point.

[10] See mAvot 2:15-16 

[11] Joanna Macy and Molly Young Brown, Coming back to Life: The Updated Guide to the Work That Reconnects (Gabriola Island, Bc: New Society Publishers, 2014), chapter 7.

[12] Brené Brown, "The Power of Vulnerability." TED Talk, Houston, TX, June  2010, 15:40. Accessed via: https://www.ted.com/talks/brene_brown_the_power_of_vulnerability.