The Tefilah Podcast

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! This evening (12/28/22), in our Wednesday night Tefilah shiur, I shared a summary of the fruits of the learning I've done over the past couple of weeks with our newly minted chosson, Yehoshua, in preparation for his marriage to Brooke. We've been learning through some ideas in the sheva berachos and I figured it would be good to...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! This evening (12/21/22), in our Wednesday night Tefilah shiur, we began with a comprehensive review of all the ideas from the past shiurim in the series. We then spoke briefly about R' Chaim of Volozhin's model of mitoch she'lo lishmah ba lishmah as it pertains to tefilah. Then we continued our investigation of the question...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! This evening (12/14/22), in our Wednesday night Tefilah shiur, we began with a discussion about the difference between learning vs. tefilah. Next, we did a comprehensive review of all the ideas of Adonai Sfasai Tiftach and "Baruch" which we covered in the past couple of shiurim - some of which we developed beyond what we had prev...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! This evening (12/7/22), in our Wednesday night Tefilah shiur, we began with a quick review of all the ideas of Adonai Sfasai Tiftach and "Baruch" which we covered in the past couple of shiurim. We then learned through the Sefer ha'Chinuch's explanation of the ideas behind "Baruch" and "Yisbarach," wh...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! This evening (11/30/22), in our Wednesday night Tefilah shiur, we began by wrapping up the Adonai Sfasai Tiftach topic that we began three weeks ago. We then took up the very basic question: What do we mean by "baruch" in the phrase "baruch atoh Hashem"? We learned two interpretations: one from the Abudirham, and one fr...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! This evening (11/23/22), in our Wednesday night Tehilim/Tefilah shiur which fell out on Erev Thanksgiving, it would be apropos to take up "inyanei d'yoma" as it were. Since this perek is only five pesukim long, I was fairly confident we might be able to get at least one main idea tonight, and - despite what seemed like a sca...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! This evening (11/16/22), in our Wednesday night Tehilim/Tefilah shiur, we continued our analysis of Adonai Sfasai Tiftach and Yihyu l'Ratzon. After reviewing the idea based on the Rambam we covered last night, we developed three more approaches: one based on a pasuk in Mishlei cited by the Abudirham, one based on the commentary of the...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! This evening (11/9/22), in our Wednesday night Tehilim/Tefilah shiur, we began our analysis of Adonai Sfasai Tiftach and Yihyu l'Ratzon by reviewing my MMMMMM method of tefilah analysis. We then did a brief overview of the sources for this halacha in the Gemara and the Rambam. We ended Part 1 with our first explanation of Adonai Sfasa...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! This evening (11/2/22), in our Wednesday night Tehilim/Tefilah shiur, we attempted to land the plane ... and crash landed. We began by reviewing the translations and questions from last time, then made some little moves here and there, but did not manage to answer any of Adler's Four Questions, and did not end up with any sort of take...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! Synopsis: This is the audio version of the 1-page article I wrote, entitled, Beur Tefilah: Who is the "Aleinu" in Sim Shalom? If you, like me, never even noticed this question before, then I encourage you to take a moment to think about how you would answer it before reading or listening to my approach. Let me know what you think...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! This evening (10/26/22), in our Wednesday night Tehilim/Tefilah shiur, began our analysis of Sunday's shir shel yom. We translated the perek, raised a bunch of questions, identified the pivot point, and mapped out a few inroads AND we figured out what Selah means. Maybe. ----- מקורות: תהלים כד אבן עזרא - תהלים ג:ג רד"ק - תהלים כד...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! In today's Friday morning "Machshavah Lab" shiur for women (9/30/22) we took up a very basic question. I can PRETTY much guarantee that if I ask you, "What is Neilah?" the answer you give will be incorrect. There are some basic facts about Neilah of which most people are unaware. In today's shiur we examined N...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! This evening (9/21/22), in our Wednesday night Tehilim/Tefilah shiur, we concluded our analysis of Tehilim 27 - at least, for this first time learning it! After a LENGTHY review and refinement of the points we covered last time, we finished analyzing the remaining pesukim, then attempted to summarize the purpose of the perek as dictated by...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! This evening (9/14/22), in our Wednesday night Tehilim/Tefilah shiur, we continued our analysis of Tehilim 27. After hearing some approaches from the participants in the shiur, we began learning the Meiri's approach. We got a little more than halfway through - enough to appreciate what seems to be The Main Idea. Next week our goal is...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! This evening (9/7/22), in our inaugural Tehilim/Tefilah shiur of the season, we began our analysis of Tehilim 27, which is customarily recited between Rosh Chodesh Elul and Shemini Atzeres. We spent the first half of the shiur translating the perek, noting many of the nuances and ambiguities, and spent the second half raising questions, ma...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! This evening (6/14/22), in our last Tehilim/Tefilah shiur of the season, we finished the "Aleph cluster" of pesukim. First we reviewed our interpretations of pesukim 1-4, then we worked out pesukim 5-8 with the help of the meforshim. By the end, we had a unified approach to the entire eight pesukim which can stand as its own sub-...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! This evening (6/9/22), in our Tehilim/Tefilah shiur, we reviewed our approach to Tehilim 119, read the theories of three commentators on what the perek as a whole is about, and then began working on the first four pesukim. The various participants in the shiur ventured their own theories, and we concluded by going over my own theory, which...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! This evening (6/7/22) in our Tehilim/Tefilah shiur, we learned the entirety of Tehilim 119 ... JUST KIDDING. We learned through the Radak's overview of the perek, came up with a game plan for how WE intend to approach the perek, and made a first pass at the first eight pesukim. On Thursday we'll attempt to understand them as a un...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! I'm sharing this recording on all five of my podcasts, regardless of their subject matter, because Rabbi  Moskowitz is responsible for all the Torah I learn and teach. This is the audio of the eulogy I gave for my beloved rebbi, Rabbi Morton Moskowitz zt"l on Erev Rosh Chodesh Sivan 5782 (May 30th, 2022). For the video, click her...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! About an hour before I was scheduled to give shiur tonight (5/26/22), I received the terrible news that my rebbi - Rabbi Moskowitz (Meir ben Esther Malka) - will no longer be able to continue dialysis. Because I couldn't manage to take my mind off of the imminent implications of this, I decided to do what Rabbi Moskowitz would do in s...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! This evening (5/24/22), during our regularly scheduled Tehilim shiur, we took a break from Shir ha'Maalos so that I can address a question I was recently asked: How does davening for other people work? I've had an answer to this question for a while, but I recently came up with a new theory. We spent the first half of shiur revie...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! This evening (5/19/21) in our Tehilim/Tefilah shiur, we began learning the third Shir ha'Maalos. Usually I have a chance to prepare these Tehilim shiurim in advance, but because we finished 121 so quickly, I haven't yet had time to prepare this with my chavrusa, which meant that it was new to all of us. We made some nice progress...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! This evening (5/17/21) in our Tehilim/Tefilah shiur, we started AND finished learning the 2nd of the Shir ha'Maalos (or, if you ask Rashi, the 1st of the Shir ha'Maalos). We were perplexed at first, but we eventually came up with a sound theory. Not only that, but we figured out how to apply the insights to ourselves - as Jews in...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! This evening (5/12/21) in our Tehilim/Tefilah shiur, we continued and concluded our analysis of Tehilim 120, thanks to the Meiri! Not only did we understand the main idea of the perek and how all the pesukim contribute to that idea, but we also emerged with practical insights into how to use THIS tefilah, and how to enhance our OTHER tefil...

Have any questions, insights, or feedback? Send me a text! This evening (5/10/21) in our Tehilim/Tefilah shiur, we began the first of the 15 Shir ha'Maalos! We immediately noted the differences in style and substance compared to the other perakim we've learned, but that didn't stop us from diving in. We made it through the translation, the Targum, and half the Meiri before we had to...