The Blogs: The Quietest Shachris in Modi’in

My wife and I had come to Israel for our first grandchild’s wedding, expecting to stay only ten days. Instead, that very Shabbos, the current war with Iran began, and our return home was delayed for nearly two additional weeks. During those anxious days of sirens, shelters, and uncertainty, I found myself writing.

THE QUIETEST SHACHRIS IN MODI’IN

If you are the only one in shul during a missile alert, can there really be a problem of talking in shul?

Our first missile alert, after about five hours of sleep, came inconveniently right at neitz (sunrise). Once the all-clear sounded, I was already awake. So I went ahead and davened Shacharis (morning prayers) in the beis haknesses (synagogue) of our hotel in Modi’in.

I stood at the shulchan (lectern) facing the Aron Kodesh (holy ark). I had checked earlier and seen the Sephardi Sefer Torah inside. For a few minutes, I held several distinguished positions simultaneously: chazzan (prayer leader), gabbai (sexton), president, and janitor.

In some ways, it was the perfect tefillah (prayer). The pace was ideal — my own — and the only sounds were my quiet whispers and the soft hum of the heating fans.

But the shul was empty. There were hardly enough guests in the hotel even to think about assembling a minyan (quorum of ten). And it certainly was not worth the risk of stepping outside to search for another shul if another alert might sound — assuming any nearby shul would even be open.

So it was a very quiet davening.

Nothing but my whispers and the heating system.

Not a peep.

I had been in many shuls and many minyanim during our two weeks there.

In Yerushalayim: the Chabad at Musika Square behind Ben Yehudah Street with its dependable 9:00 a.m. Shacharis; the 8:00 a.m. Sephardi minyan in a storefront just down the street from the former site of Sbarro’s; the Great Synagogue for Kabbalas Shabbos with two cantors — a younger tenor and an older baritone; the Kaminetz Yeshiva in Meah Shearim on Shabbos morning; the underground shul beneath the Kotel, opposite the heichal (ark), for a neitz minyan that happened to be celebrating a bar mitzvah. Nothing like a little scotch at 6:45 in the morning. And an eclectic Mincha (afternoon prayer) as we said our goodbye to the Kotel.

In Rechovot: Shabbos davening in a warm Anglo-friendly Ashkenaz shul, and the daily every-fifteen-minutes “minyan factory” down the street.

As I stood there that morning davening alone, I realized something.

I could hear all of those minyanim behind me.

Ashkenaz. Sephardi. Chabad. Yeshivish.

The old familiar tunes.

The Sephardic staccato.

The chazzanic flourishes.

So was my davening that morning quiet?

Not at all.

The room was filled with the echoes of every minyan I had attended during those two weeks.

And it may have been one of the most inspired tefillos of the trip.

So perhaps I opened with the wrong question.