THIS CHAPTER is designed for two kinds of reader: it will outline traditional rabbinic reading strategies for readers unused to them and will provide an introduction to contemporary literary criticism for those to whom it is unfamiliar. The two approaches—traditional and modern—have been aligned before, since some contemporary critics have paid close attention to midrashic texts and the features they happen to share with liturgy, including multiple or unknown authorship, fragmented surface textures, and submerged narrative themes. A discussion of the way a narrative sequence may emerge from a text such as the liturgy will also make it possible to outline what this particular narrative has to say about the world as seen through rabbinic eyes. Since contemporary literarycritical approaches have also contributed to the method adopted in this analysis, outlining them here is an acknowledgement of influence.

The Case for a Liturgical Genre

The question of genre barely arises in rabbinic thought and has become less relevant in other contexts too, as blends between prose and poetry, for instance, no longer cause surprise. However, the subject needs to be discussed here since liturgy retains closer links with everyday life than perhaps any other Western literary category, so much so that the sort of text analysed in this book might deserve to be regarded as a genre in its own right. There are other characteristics which make it stand out. The prayer-book is unusual in that it is neither read in solitude nor listened to by an audience, but is ‘realized’ when ‘acts are performed and … utterances voiced’ by an individual or a congregation. Ritual objects and gestures, as well as the location—home or synagogue—in which these are used, play central roles in the liturgy and are essential to its meaning. So, for example, the liturgical sequences discussed here span the time from when the worshipper wakes in bed, then washes, dresses, and finally either leaves for synagogue or worships at home, and are recited partly while standing and partly while sitting. On weekday mornings adult men (and in some circles increasingly women too) wear talit and tefilin, the ritual garments.