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Feedback and Issues Raised - Page 4

Written by Rabbi Professor Jonathan Magonet Friday, 01 October 2004

A Prayer Book in the Making

Musaf – Additional Service

We have already developed the Musaf service for Yom Kippur, and subsequently provided truncated Musaf services for the Pilgrim Festivals. Nevertheless there is some resistance to providing a Musaf service as an option for Shabbat. The arguments in favour tend to be that it is a traditional element that will be familiar to people with a more traditional background. The arguments against range from the pragmatic, the extra time it adds to a service already overly long, to a concern about emphasising the sacrificial cult, which Reform has long ago given up – especially as the traditional Musaf prays for the rebuilding of the Temple and the restoration of sacrifices.

Nevertheless it must also be pointed out that the Amidah in the morning and afternoon services is likewise intended as a substitute for the sacrifices that were held at those times in the Temple, so in this respect the Musaf for Shabbat and festivals is no different and merely continues a system we have long ago accepted. Every traditional Amidah similarly calls for the restoration of the Temple sacrifice in the ‘Retzeh’ blessing. It may be that since in Reform circles we do not often hold daily services, there is no feeling of the need to provide something ‘additional’ to mark the distinctiveness of the Shabbat.

The version that we have introduced uses an element from Israeli Reform liturgy emphasising that prayer has indeed replaced sacrifice, thus consciously subverting the traditional view. But we have added the hope that Jerusalem becomes a place of peace and a place for prayer for all peoples, a legitimate expression of our Reform ideology that is nowhere else so directly expressed in the liturgy.

The problem of timing can be overcome, when Musaf is included, by cutting down on the introductory parts of the service and saving the choral parts of the morning Amidah, for the longer Musaf Kedushah. A much shortened version of the Musaf Amidah is also available in which the opening three and closing three blessings are amalgamated.

The question of the length of the service is very much dependent on local circumstances. There are synagogues that have to deal with many barmitzvah celebrations which tend to require more time, while others are simply constrained by the problems of local parking and the need to finish by a fixed time. However it must also be pointed out that there are chavurah groups and examples of experimental minyanim, often with younger people, who enjoy the atmosphere that can be built over a long and more leisurely period of worship. Hopefully the prayer book will offer sufficient flexibility to meet the needs of such different ‘congregations’, some of which may even be meeting in the same building.