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Introduction and Erev Shabbat

Written by Rabbi Professor Jonathan Magonet Tuesday, 01 October 2002

A Prayer Book in the Making

Though it is only just over 25 years since the first RSGB Siddur was published a number of issues suggested that it needed to be revised. The most obvious, and in some sense the most controversial, concerned the particular issue of "inclusive language", something already addressed partially in the High Holy Days prayerbook and more completely in the Pilgrim Festivals prayerbook. There are congregations that are very firmly committed to changes that give equality to women in various aspects of the language and content of the book but there are equally congregations that are very firmly rooted in the existing language and concerned about change. There are also individual problems with the translations which need to be addressed. There is no comfortable way out of this dilemma and yet the trend is towards this change. But having raised this delicate issue at the beginning, it is important to point out that the actual work of rethinking the prayerbook has raised a number of other issues which are as important, if not more so, in terms of our current needs as a Movement.

THE MOVE TOWARDS TRADITION

Like the rest of the Jewish community there has been a move in the Movement towards more traditional forms within our religious practice including services. Contexts like Limmud where people are exposed to more traditional forms of service, the experience of young people who spend time in Israel in such contexts and the experimenting going on in a number of congregations with alternative minyanim of a more Conservative form all point to a need for a more flexible range of services to be available within RSGB congregations. What was once a radical kind of service which attracted an earlier generation is no longer attractive to many whose "radicality" leads them to adopt more traditional forms. Though it is possible to use the existing Siddur for both kinds of service, there are ways of making it more adaptable for these particular needs. We find within our existing congregations today services ranging from the classical Lewandowski style service with organ and choir, through Debbie Friedman to Shlomo Carlebach orientated forms. It is possible to devise a variation on our existing Siddur to accommodate these but there is a price to be paid. Offering a variety of options within a service does require that people are better educated in the structure of the service, more confident in selecting parts of it rather than feeling that everything that is on the page has to be read or played or chanted. So this does mean that alongside the work on the new prayerbook, and particularly developing a far greater range of forms and particularly musical ways of conducting the service, our service leaders and congregations need to be better educated and more confident in their Jewish knowledge.

So one thing that has emerged from work on the prayerbook is the need to give clearer ways of indicating the different sections of the services and, within each of the sections, show what can be omitted and how such decisions and choices can be made.