When I was a teenager, I used to pray fervently for my family’s health every night. If I stumbled over a word in my prayer, I would start over. I feared that if I didn’t pray perfectly and messed up even one word, something bad would happen to my family.
In my late teens, my prayer compulsion faded, and I mostly stopped praying for health and healing. Praying felt futile. My life experience showed me that no matter how much I prayed, my loved ones would feel pain and eventually die. Why waste my time praying?
My relationship with healing prayers has changed since starting my job at the Hebrew Educational Alliance. At weekday morning services, during the healing prayer, I hear folks reading their lists of sick community members. Whether or not an active divine force is listening to these prayers and responding, I feel the power of these lists. When I hear these names, my empathy is activated. I wonder how these sick people might feel, how they spend their morning, and who is with them. I wonder how many of these people know they are being prayed for, and I imagine how this might make those sick people feel less alone, and less forgotten. I overhear conversations at the synagogue that show me that the list of names of sick people inspires phone calls and home visits.
As part of my job, I have prayed with people who were in the last hours of their lives. In those moments, I had no hope that the healing prayer would extend someone’s life or take away their pain. But singing healing prayers with these folks really did seem to bring some calm to these folks and to their loved ones.
How else do healing prayers work in your experience?
In this week’s Torah portion, we read Moses’ simple healing prayer for his sister, Miriam. He prays, “El Na Refa Na La” - “God, heal her, please.” I wrote a melody for this prayer as part of Rabbi Micah Shapiro’s Yetzirah songwriting program, and this melody has been a companion for me as I pray with and for community members. Marni Loffman, Rabbi Deborah Sacks Mintz, and Andy Curry were kind enough to record this melody with me for Congregation B'nai Amoona’s soon-to-be-released collaborative album, Shirei Amoona. Ana El Na is now available wherever you stream music (Listen on YouTube | Listen on Spotify). I hope this song brings you healing or any of the other benefits of healing prayer.
Credits: Eitan Kantor - vocals, songwriting Marni Loffman - vocals Rabbi Deborah Sacks Mintz - vocals Andy Curry - upright bass Doron Levary - mixing/mastering Rachel Bray Spezia - album art Thank you to the generous donors who have made the Shirei Amoona project possible.
