The Prayer of Faith“Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.” Deuteronomy 6:4 Faith is interwoven into this prayer even though it is not written out.
These words are spoken and prayed every day in Jewish life. The prayer is called the Shema, meaning “Listen.” Upon rising in the morning and going to bed at night, these words are on the lips of the faithful. They are spoken in the good times and the hard times, upon life and upon death. This prayer has become the breath of life for those whose seek to love God.
One of the greats of the Jewish faith was Rabbi Akiva. He lived during the time of the second Jewish revolt against the Romans in 135 CE. It is believed that he did not learn to read or study the Bible (Torah) until he was 40 years old. And at that age, he began his journey to become a great scholar and lover of Torah. He was eventually imprisoned by the Romans for teaching Torah and brought to a place called Caesarea. There, he was tortured and his body flayed. If you visit Israel today, you can stand in the Amphitheatre where Rabbi Akiva took his dying breath and imagine the terrible and tragic events that must have led to that moment.
Abba Kovner writes in his book Scrolls of Fire, “When they took Rabbi Akiva and flayed his flesh with iron combs, it was time to recite the Shema. He raised his head and spoke out of his suffering: ‘Just is the Lord whose work is perfect.’ His students trembled: ‘Rabbi! How can you!’ He said to them: ‘All my life I felt uneasy about that phrase, “with all thy soul” – even if He takes away thy soul – and I said, ‘When will I have the chance to use it? Now that I do, should I not?’ Rabbi Akiva drew out the last word of the Shema until his soul departed.”
In other words, he was never able to fulfill the obligation to love God with all his soul — that is, his life — until then. And so we understand from this that it is a lifetime journey to fully understand and do what it means to love God with all of our heart and soul and strength.
“These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.” Deuteronomy 6:5-8
We are told to embrace these words and talk about them and ponder them and remember them. If we can do those things then we can begin the path to true faith. Yes, it takes faith to believe in something we cannot see, but true faith is having total confidence in that something or someone. In order to have that kind of faith, it is a process. This faith grows into a deep and lasting love that can endure the hardships; a love that only God can oblige.
Commander Roi Klein demonstrated great faith in G-d.
Roi Klein served as a commander in the Israeli military. He devoted his life to studying Torah and protecting the people of Israel. In 2006, during the second Lebanon War, he saw a hand grenade fall over a wall into the midst of his comrades. He immediately began to run for the grenade. His fellow soldiers saw him running and heard him reciting the prayer of the Shema, “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength…” and with the full force of his body, he jumped on the grenade, saving all of their lives. He didn’t have to think about what to do, he instinctively, by faith, gave his life for theirs. That he had the presence of mind to speak out the words of the Shema while running to his death is testimony that the word of God was implanted deep in his heart.
Life is not easy, difficult at best. The choices we make can impact our lives and the lives of those around us for generations. Ultimately, our lives are not dictated by our circumstances but how we deal with those circumstances. For Rabbi Akiva, he continued to teach his students what it meant to love God until he drew his last breath. Two thousand years later, for Roi Klein, he made the ultimate love sacrifice in order that others could live. Both men were men of faith. Both men loved God with all that was within them. Both men died as example setters to those of us who are trying to live by faith.
The reason these stories make such an impression is not because of the tragedies of their deaths, but the awesomeness of their lives. May we be encouraged to live awesome lives, so that in our deaths we may truly understand what it means “with all thy soul.”
