Now I know when people daven they pray for all sorts of things. Some pray for ordinary things like money, good health, sex and doing well in miztvos, while others may pray for a good crop, good concert season and that their girlfriend is not cheating on them. Then there are those that pray at the pump. Thats right folks, a faith group out in St Louis had organized praying sessions for lower gasoline prices and it looks like it worked somewhat. I don’t expect gas to ever go below $3 a gallon again, in fact I think we will eventually have the same prices as Europe.
But that did get me thinking, as did that post a while back about paying people to find your wife at the kotel while praying, or was it praying at the kotel for a wife, no matter, whatever it was its a pretty lucrative business- this praying thing- because between you and me, most folks just don’t want to or know how to pray. I myself have been “praying” for close to a quarter decade (I just needed to say that) and haven’t really figured out how to pray. I got the shuckel down correct, but other then a few forward and backward strokes, some chest clops and a couple of bows- I don’t do much besides pinch the fat on my arm in between the tefilin straps- have you ever tried this? Its way fun.
Imagine if you could pay someone to pray for your health, wealth, family and loads of other things. I mean if we could have people praying at the kotel for us to find a wife, and folks praying for lower gas prices, we may as well have people praying for all sorts of things.
People pray everyday for the lost Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit and he aint back.
pray for sex? never heard that one…
Hesh, is there something wrong with my computer that half of your site, on your home page, is missing for the last two days, or is it a problem with your server/homepage?
If they held their praying session as the prices were on their way down they would feel like a kid sitting in his parents car. whenever the car gets stopped at red light the child chants “1-2-3 CHANGE!” eventually he will get it right and think he has the ability to change the light. I don’t mean to diss other relegions but siging “We’ll have lower gas prices.”
in place of “We shall over-come” hardly seems like a relegious activity. It appears to be much closer to a publicity stunt. and even then, if the prices do drop, will they thank their god for hearing their chants of “we’ll have lower gas prices”? or will they look to macroeconomic events and worldwide supply and demand and perhaps see g0d in THOSE events.
Hiemishe- which browser are you using- this site works best with Firefox- though I have no idea because no one else has complained.
I am using Windows Internet Explorer. The funny thing is that, i can see this post and the next one, but i cant see teh post about double coverings. THe Recent Posts, recent Comments and random posts are also goneonly when I go into other comments, can I see the sidebars, escept for that post. very wierd
I have had issues on IE before- I personally hate IE for several reasons- the most important being that it doesn’t give you little red lines under misspelled words.
Firefox 2.0 kicks 3.0 ‘s butt by the way.
Site renders fine in Safari on OSX. I no longer get notice mails for post replies though.
I had to take that off because it was messing with the comments.
I wouldn’t be so brash to say that praying FOR THINGS is a waste of time, but praying isn’t about getting things. It’s about praying for strength or help in mending a heart or for ease of mind and such. I think praying for the lowering of gas prices is pretty damn stupid.
How about praying for the strength to not disgruntled and blow something up becuase you’re peeved about gas prices? Or praying for G-d to help guide you through this shitastic financial time?
I really don’t think G-d is helping lower the price of barrels of oil. Seriously.
I couldn’t disagree more with some of the sentiments here. It’s like I say on my post — if you believe in prayer and an infinite G-d then does it make any more inherent “sense” to pray in a hospital than it does in a gas station? Why would it? Isn’t it true that G-d “did, does, and will do all actions”? Is a healed broken bone more “in G-d’s jurisdiction” than $2.09 gas,?”??
It doesn’t make sense for me NOT to pray at the pump….or anywhere else you feel like asking for Divine intervention. On anything. Period.
Now, the introspective part (“why not pray for G-d to make the person less angry at the gas prices?”) *does* make sense, but the fact that these ppl are praying for cheap gas shows, at a minimum, ?????, should we diss that?
the world is both a synagogue and a library. welcome.
You CAN pay people to pray at the Kotel for you to find a wife – just $18 for 40 days – mamash a metzia!
Hey thats pretty cheap, this other one I saw was like $150, but you get a free time life doowop set with each purchase- so who knows.