Reflections

There is something profoundly moving and beautiful to me in sharing a prayer across time and space, especially when the meditation relies on imagery of a natural world we all share. The lead-in to the blessing for putting on the tallit (prayer shawl) is one of those liturgical jewels.

Liturgies are designed to move us from one place to another, to take us on a journey of the imagination. These verses from Psalm 104 combine intimacy and grandeur in a remarkable image, starting our journey with an outward orientation, awed by the vastness and beauty of our natural world as we imagine God wrapping Himself in a garment of light and spreading the heavens like a curtain:

בָּרֲכִ֥י נַפְשִׁ֗י אֶת־יְה֫וָ֥ה יְהוָ֣ה אֱ֭לֹהַי גָּדַ֣לְתָּ מְּאֹ֑ד ה֭וֹד וְהָדָ֣ר לָבָֽשְׁתָּ׃ 

Bless the LORD, O my soul; O LORD, my God, You are very great; You are clothed in glory and majesty,

עֹֽטֶה־א֭וֹר כַּשַּׂלְמָ֑ה נוֹטֶ֥ה שָׁ֝מַ֗יִם כַּיְרִיעָֽה׃ 

wrapped in a robe of light; You spread the heavens like a curtain.

Bless the Lord, O my soul . . . Our soul, the consciousness breathed into us, blesses the consciousness from which it comes in this extraordinary image that points us to creation.

And then, bringing ourselves from the vast grandeur of creation to our present moment, we reflect God’s actions as we also wrap ourselves in a beautifully adorned garment: “I am enwrapping myself in the fringed garment . . .”

Next we imagine our action as a hope for ourselves in the “world to come,” that is, the Garden of Eden. We have come full circle in our imaginative journey, from creation, to our action in the present moment, to our future place, the Garden of Eden, another reference to creation. The steps of our journey have taken us from the vastness of creation as we view the heavens and the light of sun and stars to the intimacy of creation in the Garden, where we “began,” hope to “return,” and are now in the present.

We are in the timelessness of the ritual moment that embraces past, present and future in one, that brings God’s action and our action into unified reciprocity.

And now we recite the blessing for putting on the tallit:

בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה הָ׳ אֱלֹהֵינוּ מֶלֶךְ הָעוֹלָם אשר קדשנו במצותיו וצונו להתעטף בציצת.‏

Barukh ata Adonai Eloheinu melekh ha’olam, asher kid’shanu b’mitzvotav v’tzivanu l’hit’atef ba‑tzitzit.

Blessed are You, LORD, our God, King of the universe, Who has sanctified us with His commandments and has commanded us to wrap ourselves with fringes.