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Work of Heart

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The prayer is often called the work of heart. Do you know why?

The sense of the very Tefila (prayer - Biblical language translation) word origins from Biblical תופל root, what means "join", "unite" in literal translation. That's why "Tefila" word is not quite precise translation of this word, coz to pray means to ask, to entreat, while our daily approaches to G-d are not only requests to satisfy our daily needs but something much more than that.

RAMBAM writes (Moreh Nevuchim III, chapters 36, 44, 51):

"We're to approach G-d with our prayers so that we could adopt well the basic principal: G-d knows all our ways and He can make them successful when we serve Him or unfortunate when we don't obey Him. Success or failure always has reason and basis".

The prayer is the means with which we unite with G-d by full spitirual unity. Our soul is permanently aspiring to that, its nature is like that - despite we realize that or not. That's why realizing that G-d is good and that there's nothing impossible for Him, we can spend our life with deep feeling of trusting in Him and confidence in Him. We get our power, cheerfulness and hope exactly in our unconditional trusting in G-d. And our daily prayer strengthens it in a very significant degree.

Besides, the prayer is often called the work of heart coz it's that "laboratory" where careful self-checking and self-appraising is being done, that is investigation of one's own soul, as a result of which human character traits are cleansed from alluvial admixtures. After visiting such "laboratory" we can feel cleansed and refreshed. And when we get back to our daily business, this feeling of purity and renewal doesn't leave us but elevates our everyday behaviour up to some new unique level.

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