Friday night

[cellio]

At the oneg I received a rather effusive compliment on my torah reading on Rosh Hashana. I'm impressed that this long after the event someone sought me out to praise me. Nifty.

During the service I realized why I have a reaction that I do to one small bit. Our service leaders almost always face the congregation. There are points in the service where one is supposed to bow toward the ark (which is at the back of the bimah); the norm is for the leader to turn around at that point and do so. Someone on our bimah (not my rabbi) sometimes does the bow but doesn't turn around (so bows toward the congregation). This bugs me. I understand why it was happening (the reasons no longer apply but the pattern persists), but it still bugs me.

Last year after the Sh'liach K'hilah program there was a discussion in comments in my journal about which way the chazan faces, though not this particular detail. The article I'd read (that started the discussion) asserted that when the chazan faces the ark (to lead much of the service, not just these bowing bits) it facilitates more private prayer than when he's facing the congregation. That may be true, but it's just part of it.

When the chazan stands in the front of the room, faces the ark, and bows, he is leading us in prayer. He is our representative, our sh'liach tzibur, almost our stand-in, before God. Whose representative is he when he bows toward us?

I had this epiphany Friday night. It is as if the person bowing toward the congregation is representing God in the transaction. And that's just wrong. We do not presume God's participation and response in our prayers.

I don't mind the chazan conducting most of the service facing us; I understand how seeing a back for the entire service could be alienating to some. But there are parts where I'd rather the person turn around and be our representative.

Comments

This is Murmur311

[(Anonymous)]

I'm at work, and so not logged in. But, I wanted to comment on this before I got home tonight and forgot.

I'm not real big on the bowing thing in general. My rabbi doesn't bow and the reason he gave for not bowing has always made sense to me: he doesn't want it to seem like (or even to be like) he is worshipping the Torah/ark and not God. The only part of the service that I bow during is the Aleinu when it specifically says "we bow." We've had a real cantor once a month and on RH and YK for the past year now who has had arguments with my rabbi about turning towards the ark and bowing. He's made concessions, as has she.

What triggered this response was your comment above that the chazan is our representaive, our stand-in before God, which strikes me as antithetical to Judaism. I've always viewed Jewish prayer as being a direct communication with God--we don't need an intermediary/stand-in/etc. We don't need a rabbi present to pray for us, we don't need a priest present to represent us. We represent ourselves to God.

Re: This is Murmur311

[cellio]

What triggered this response was your comment above that the chazan is our representaive, our stand-in before God, which strikes me as antithetical to Judaism.

Partly why I hedged with "almost". It's hard, because we are a religion of individual responsibility and direct access to God, yet we clearly delegate some of those responsibilities to our leaders. When the chazan recites the first line of barchu, he is acting as an agent (we do not say that line ourselves). That's the clearest case; in other parts of the service, like the Amidah and Aleinu, he's just one of the crowd. That said, he is the representative for anyone not able to represent himself; the reason Judaism has the chazan's repetition of the Amidah is to make sure everyone has fulfilled his obligation. (The chazan is the agent through which you are yotzei if, say, you can't read the text yourself.) Granted that Reform Judaism has set a lot of that aside, but historically the chazan was sometimes our representative, in small ways he still is, and traditions die slowly.

As for bowing specificially, I often nod to people on the street to acknowledge them (just a casual gesture), so I don't have a problem making a deliberate gesture in the case of God. But not everyone bows and that's fine. I'd rather have the chazan face the congregation and not bow, if facing the ark isn't going to happen.

Re: This is Murmur311

[chaos-wrangler.livejournal.com]

When the chazan recites the first line of barchu, he is acting as an agent (we do not say that line ourselves).

I'd say leader but not agent in this case: the first line of borchu is roughly "okay everyone, time to do this together now", so it makes sense that one person says it and everyone else responds.