Turning to Face the Public

Here is the introduction to my long overdue discussion of the final two sections. It will eventually lead into a discussion of the passage in the final section in which the performer acknowledges that which...those who who circled round Thy mighty throne have acknowledged.



Just as sections ten through twelve represent a more personal tone than sections previous, likewise the final two sections of the prayer, thirteen and fourteen take on a more public, interpersonal tone. As the performer moves closer to the end of prayer, engagement with the world comes closer in a very concrete way. These sections are a reminder that the performer is not alone. Rather he or she serves God and humanity alongside many others with whose cooperation great things can happen.
This is section thirteen. In form it greatly resembles the eleventh.

Let him then repeat the Greatest Name thrice, and kneel with his forehead to the ground, and say:

Praise be unto Thee, O our God, that Thou hast sent down unto us that which draweth us nigh unto Thee, and supplieth us with every good thing sent down by Thee in Thy Books and Thy Scriptures. Protect us, we beseech Thee, O my Lord, from the hosts of idle fancies and vain imaginations. Thou, in truth, art the Mighty, the All-Knowing.

One example of the switch from the private to the public is a very simple and seemingly insignificant choice of words. The alteration though becomes very obvious to anyone who has ever performed the prayer on a regular basis or tried to memorize it. Whereas section eleven begins with Praise be to Thee, O my God…section thirteen begins Praise be unto Thee, O our God. The change is for the most part inexplicable. The content of the praises is very similar. In both cases the performer praises God for the gift of faith. Furthermore, one might think that the prayer would have more rhetorical force if the beginning of the second expression of praise echoed the first. But instead it draws attention to the our where before their had been a my. This change is by no means irrelevant, for it draws attention to the ways in which faith is always enacted in some way at both an individual and a community level.