אַתָּה חוֹנֵן לְאָדָם דַּעַת וּמְלַמֵּד לֶאֱנוֹשׁ בִּינָה: חָנֵּנוּ מֵאִתְּךָ חָכְמָה בִּינָה וָדָּעַת בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה ה’ חוֹנֵן הַדָּעַת – You graciously grant man with wisdom and teach humans understanding. Grant us, from You, with knowledge, understanding, and prudence. Blessed are You, Hashem, Who grants us with knowledge.
The First Request
The Amida is broadly divided into three sections; the first section consists of praise, the second of personal requests, and the third of thanksgiving and appreciation.
The request for wisdom and understanding is the very first request, and it’s important to consider why that might be the case. It precedes any request for peace, prosperity, health, happiness, family, or redemption.
Humans self-identify as homo sapiens sapiens, which means wise or knowledgeable man, to distinguish themselves from other hominids and animals; we are the only species with higher intelligence that has articulated knowledge, self-representation, and self-consciousness. Humans alone possess the mental faculties to choose to recognize the Creator, to decide whether or how to articulate and express a prayer we can comprehend in our own thoughts and words; wisdom is a defining trait of what it is to be human, what it means to be created in God’s image.
It follows that wisdom is the first thing we must ask for.
Wisdom is what makes you you
Wisdom is what makes us human in general; your personal blend of wisdom gives rise to your consciousness and makes you distinctively and uniquely you.
Humans have a generalized commodified need for health, food, shelter, love, and happiness, but your consciousness is hyper-personal; there will only ever be one you. Someone else can experience all the same facts in their life, be born to the same parents, have the same upbringing, and perhaps even be your twin; they still wouldn’t be you. As our sages teach, the notion of boundaries, distinctions, and separation can only emerge as a function of understanding – HVDLA MINAYN CITE
Your consciousness is the definitive marker of your uniqueness, the intimate essence that distinguishes you as irreplaceably you. Our consciousness remains intensely personal—a singular occurrence in the expanse of existence.
How many people live half-consciously, never thinking about who they are and where they’re going? As Socrates said, the unexamined life is not worth living. Asking for higher consciousness and deeper self-understanding is asking to be more you, and it’s the first and most important thing to ask for.
Relationships are built on understanding
The building blocks of relationships are the understanding of the people in it.
Closeness and connection between individuals hinge on mutual awareness and recognition of oneself and one’s counterpart. Personal relationships flourish when each party genuinely understands and appreciates the essence of the other, grounding the relationship in authenticity and presence.
Imagine a man and woman on a date. She tells him her name is Sarah, she’s from California, and she is vegetarian, and he falls in love with her. But what if her real name is Rachel, she’s from New Jersey, and her favorite food is chicken wings? The facade of her false identity isn’t simply an obstacle to forming a relationship with this man; the relationship he thinks he is in never existed at all, and his understanding of the person he thinks he loves isn’t real.
Inverting the dating metaphor, imagine a man in a serious yeshiva, only for serious guys. But in reality, he is casual; he comes late, leaves early, frequently steps out for a coffee and a smoke, and is always on top of the nightly sports and weekend plans. If a young woman wants to marry someone committed to their learning, she might or might not see through him; he might be enrolled in a serious yeshiva and on the Torah production line, but he is actually deeply unserious about his lifestyle and is entirely out of sync with the track he has put himself on. To the extent he is unaware, the problem is more acute, and he lacks self-awareness and a relationship with himself.
Our prayers have the capacity to articulate and build a bridge of connection and relationship with the Creator. To the extent that is possible, it is only real to the extent our understanding of the relationship is grounded in truth and reality; any deceptive foundations or lack of authenticity will preclude the possibility of genuine connection and meaning. Prayer requires the elements of clarity of self-awareness and the earnest desire to comprehend the Divine.
Without one of these, a relationship is impossible.
Structure of the prayer
The request prayers conform to a particular format. They opening with the request, and close by affirming that only God is capable of granting our requests – סְלַח לָנוּ אָבִינוּ כִּי חָטָאנוּ / כִּי מוחֵל וְסולֵחַ אָתָּה, רְאֵה נָא בְעָנְיֵנוּ וְרִיבָה רִיבֵנוּ / כִּי אֵל גּוֹאֵל חָזָק אָתָּה, רְפָאֵנוּ / כִּי אֵל מֶלֶךְ רוֹפֵא נֶאֱמָן וְרַחֲמָן אָתָּה.
This blessing doesn’t conform to that formula and inverts it. It opens by affirming that God grants humans wisdom and closes with our request – אַתָּה חוֹנֵן / חָנֵּנוּ מֵאִתְּךָ.
Our prophets imagined a Heavenly court, with prosecution and defense teams, where the respective merit or obligations of any particular thing are carefully measured and weighed.
Our prophets imagined a metaphor of a Heavenly Court system, a meticulous balance of justice where the merits and obligations of each soul are weighed by justice and compassion, prosecution and defense. Central to this celestial tribunal is the role of the accuser who challenges our entitlements, pushing back against our requests. Far from being an obstacle, this adversarial presence is a fundamental aspect of our spiritual ecosystem, intended not to thwart us but to propel us toward growth and self-improvement.
Our souls originate from a realm of completeness, where our needs and desires are instantaneously fulfilled; the Creator saw fit to create a world that demands our participation and struggle, a place where our efforts are intrinsic to our spiritual and personal development. This dynamic ensures that our achievements are not merely handed to us but are the fruits of our labor and perseverance, enriching our journey with purpose and meaning.
Our sages suggest that a person may deserve something, yet the prosecuting angels can interfere with their ability to receive. This emphasizes the complexity of divine justice, where effort, merit, and celestial advocacy intertwine, reminding us that our engagement with the world and our pursuit of righteousness are integral to navigating the challenges laid before us; the value of our endeavors lies not solely in their outcomes but in the growth, character, and resilience we develop through the process of striving.
We open the prayer with a simple and undeniable statement of fact, not a request; the angels cannot object – אַתָּה חוֹנֵן.
It is a strategic spiritual maneuver that opens our requests with facts that even the prosecuting angels, celestial advocates usually inclined to challenge, cannot dispute.
And yet, if such a strategy can compel even the prosecuting angels to concede, why is it not employed more frequently?
There is a very good reason to avoid shortcuts, both spiritual and every day. There are frameworks for how the world works, with obstacles that exist for good reason. These obstacles aren’t punishments; they are structural features that stimulate opportunities for growth and development when capitalized on. They stop people from getting things they don’t deserve; they force people to act and become the things they are supposed to be in order to deserve them. Genuine achievement requires effort, struggle, and perseverance, fostering a deep sense of fulfillment and worthiness.
These challenges are divinely placed to ensure that we engage in the necessary work to evolve and refine ourselves, aligning with the virtues and character we are meant to embody; it would be counterproductive to the purposes of creation to circumvent the things the very things that support growth.
Knowledge, wisdom, and understanding stand apart in the pursuit of personal and spiritual growth, underscoring why it is the first request and deviates from the normal structure of prayer. Unlike shortcuts, which bypass the essential processes necessary for genuine development, knowledge directly contributes to and enriches these processes. It serves not as a detour but as a critical path toward understanding, growth, and enlightenment.
Knowledge provides the groundwork upon which wise and informed decisions can be made. It equips individuals with the understanding needed to navigate complex situations and make choices that align with their values and goals. True knowledge inspires growth, introspection, critical thinking, the questioning of assumptions, internal expansion, and self-awareness. When facing life’s obstacles, knowledge acts as a tool for empowerment rather than avoidance. It enables individuals to confront challenges with a deeper understanding of their context and potential solutions, thereby transforming obstacles into opportunities for learning and advancement. A more compassionate approach to interactions with others and a greater appreciation for the complexity of the human experience. The journey toward personal and spiritual fulfillment ensures that growth is an ongoing process marked by curiosity and a relentless pursuit of understanding.
Knowledge is the very essence of the journey itself.
Granting freely – חונֵן
A grant is a gift bestowed by an entity for a specific purpose linked to a public benefit. The essence of a grant is an investment in potential; it’s an acknowledgment that the recipient possesses the vision, skill, or plan necessary to achieve meaningful outcomes but lacks the resources to realize these objectives.
For example, a person unable to afford school tuition fees may be given a grant if the school deems their attendance beneficial. When something is granted, it means it was not due or owed; the recipient is evaluated and found to have quality and needs a little help – חונֵן.
A grant is a unilateral act; it is not bilateral in the way a loan is given, with the obligation on the recipient to repay. A grantor does not expect repayment of the grant, but there is something else the grantor expects. A grantor usually sees the recipient as capable of doing something, and the grant is what enables the recipient of rising to the challenge. People who aren’t up for the challenge will not receive the grant; a large part of grant seeking is demonstrating aptitude and desire for what the grant is supposed to help you become.
We acknowledge the Creator’s role in generously providing us with abilities, insights, or resources that we, by our own merits, might not have obtained.
The Hebrew word for granting is cognate to the word for free chinam CITE. These associations capture how our consciousness and faculties are unconditional gifts, blessings that come without prerequisites.
It also shares a common root with the word for charm and grace – chen CITE. Grace is a quality that endears someone or something to others. It’s an almost ethereal attribute that makes a person or action pleasing, often in a way that transcends rational explanation. When we attribute chen to a person, we recognize in them a divine spark of favor that elicits a positive response from those around them.
The intriguing dynamic between these concepts illuminates how grace operates in the realm of human interaction and perception. Two individuals might perform the identical action yet be received entirely differently by those around them. One might be seen as charming or endearing, eliciting a warm response, while the other’s identical action might be perceived as annoying or obnoxious, lacking the same grace in the eyes of the beholder, highlighting the ineffable quality of grace that allows an individual to find favor in the eyes of others, seemingly without effort. It’s not merely about the actions we undertake but the manner in which these actions are perceived, shaped by an intangible grace that can sway judgments and responses.
To humans – לְאָדָם
In most languages, there are different words to describe people, with slightly different connotations. There are more casual and more idealistic terms with different connotations: dude, guy, man, person, individual, human. Generic terms tell us little about who a person is, but more idealistic terms suggest far more; there is a world of difference between a good dude, which may suggest someone fun to hang out with, and a good human, a label that suggests that a person embodies the highest ideals of what a human being looks like.
Hebrew uses similar language to describe the way a person can be – אָדָם, אֱנושׁ, and ISH, among others.
The baser word for human is typically associated with the mortal, fallible, and vulnerable aspects of human nature – אֱנוֹשׁ. It underscores the fragility and transient nature of human life, reflecting on the limitations and weaknesses inherent in our existence.
The higher word for human in this blessing is inherited from Adam, the primordial first man, a word that captures a powerful duality. The word for human is related to the word for earth, the raw matter our bodies are made of – אֲדָמָה; and yet it is also connected to the most idealistic and aspirational aspect of human nature, our unique capacity to reflect divine attributes, to create, to reason, and to exercise moral judgment – אֲדמֶה, literally, “I will compare to” or “I will emulate.”
The Hebrew name of our species recognizes human complexity. We are, at once, beings of the earth, bound by our physical and moral limitations, and yet, we are also beings with the potential for divine emulation, capable of transcending our material origins through creativity, morality, and spirituality. This dialectic serves as a reminder of our humble beginnings, our vulnerabilities, and our ultimate aspirations to reflect higher, divine qualities, defining the scope of human endeavor.
Humans possess the capacity and potential to go in both directions, either static as earth or vibrant and life-affirming like God. Living up to the greatness we are capable of requires wisdom and understanding to identify and make quality choices to realize our tremendous capabilities, and we can’t do it alone – אַתָּה חוֹנֵן לְאָדָם דַּעַת.
The dynamic between aspiring to be godly yet being creatures of the earth captures the profound ebb and flow of human spiritual and moral life, an oscillation that reflects our ongoing struggle between our higher aspirations and our earthly origins. While wealth and health can come and go from one day to the next, wisdom is a more enduring gift, a divine spark that, once ignited within a person, remains with most people until late in life, even when misused.
The sanctity and permanence of consciousness and wisdom suggest that it operates with different parameters, quite unlike our other blessings. In spite of our ability to misuse God’s gifts, God doesn’t withhold from us and gives freely. We can use the same skills to figure out how to help the most people or get the most money from the government. We can use the same bargaining skills to negotiate fair terms or crush our counterparts. Life isn’t just about struggling to get what we want; an essential component of the challenge is how we get there and what we do with it once we get it.
The flip side of creating humans and hoping for the best is that sometimes, we let God down and use our gifts and talents incorrectly, but God doesn’t take it away – the gifts aren’t conditional. People can use their intellects to deny God’s existence, and God allows it.
On a deeper level, Creation wasn’t a one-off event at the beginning; it is consistently sustained and renewed every moment—HMCHDSH OLAMO BETUVO—which suggests that our blessings and gifts are renewed every moment as well. So not only does God allow us to keep our blessings when we squander them, but God gives them to us anew and believes in our ability to change!
God grants us the ability to think in the way we want to – אַתָּה חוֹנֵן לְאָדָם דַּעַת.
Knowledge – דַּעַת
The Torah opens with humanity’s awakening in the Garden of Eden and the incident with the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. The name itself suggests knowledge of the link between good and evil, the connection between them and their conclusions, death and ruin, or goodness and eternal life in this world and that next.
The blessing contains 17 words, the numerological value of good – tov CITE. Wisdom and goodness are inextricably linked; all our requests for blessings and goodness follow from our understanding of self-understanding, who we are, and how we hope to use our blessings.
The blessing contains 68 letters, the numerological value of life – chaim CITE. This blessing is the gateway to all worlds, to life in this world, the next world, and our inner world.
The Chiddushei Harim notes that consciousness is ephemeral; it is not something you can identify in the human anatomy. Philosophers and neuroscientists grapple with the mind-body problem and that hard problem of consciousness; you can identify every part of the body and its function, but not the mind. How does physical matter generate the subjective experience? Your eyes are how you see, and your nose is how you smell, but how does everything come together to make you you?
The most cutting-edge equipment can identify every physical part and describe how it functions, but no one can point to anything and say there, this is you; only the Creator does that – אַתָּה חוֹנֵן לְאָדָם דַּעַת
The Rambam suggests that the ultimate form of knowledge is to know that we do not know – תכלית הידיעה שלא נידע. This profound statement captures a central theme in Jewish philosophy and in the broader realm of epistemology, the study of knowledge, emphasizing the outer boundaries of human understanding in the face of the divine.
This teaching suggests that the highest form of wisdom a person can achieve is the recognition of their own limitations and the vastness of the unknown. It humbles the human intellect, positioning true wisdom not in the accumulation of facts or assertions of certainty but in the humble acknowledgment of our finite capacity to comprehend the infinite.
Acknowledging what we don’t know invites us into a space of intellectual humility and openness, which becomes a foundation for inquiry, reflection, and growth. It challenges us to question, explore, and remain perpetually open to learning and revising our understanding of the world and the Divine. This approach to knowledge not only honors the complexity and mystery of creation but also aligns with the Jewish tradition’s emphasis on lifelong learning and the pursuit of wisdom.
One of the greatest weaknesses a person can have is thinking you have all the answers, being a know-it-all. If you know everything, what do you have left to learn? It’s a blind spot, and no one is immune to this, from sages and scholars to scientists and parents; you have to pay attention to the data.
Presuming to have all the answers underestimates the unknown, uncertainty, and complexity of our universe. When a person adopts a mentality that assumes absolute certainty it limits the scope of inquiry and discovery. True inquiry is based on the understanding that knowledge is provisional and subject to refinement or even overhaul in light of new information.
Wisdom is freely given, which ties into the humility necessary for continual learning. The moment an individual presumes they have reached the pinnacle of understanding, they effectively close themselves off to further learning. This stance is antithetical to the very essence of wisdom, which thrives on curiosity, openness, and the recognition of one’s own limitations; the ultimate form of knowledge is to know that we do not know.
Our place in it
We embrace the tools and understandings of science; when we look within with microscopes and into the beyond with telescopes, we enter a shared space of inquiry and wonder that transcends cultural, religious, and personal boundaries. These instruments, symbols of human curiosity and the pursuit of knowledge, allow us to peer deeply into the fabric of the universe, from the minuscule building blocks of life to the vast expanses of the cosmos. Yet, what we perceive through these lenses can vary profoundly, influenced by our backgrounds, beliefs, and philosophical perspectives.
When we look at nature when we gaze upon the moon and the stars, we see not just celestial bodies obeying the laws of physics, but intertwining our observations of physical phenomena with awe and spirituality, we recognize the markers of the Divine glory with the Creator’s signature flair:
כִּי־אֶרְאֶה שָׁמֶיךָ מַעֲשֵׂי אֶצְבְּעֹתֶיךָ יָרֵחַ וְכוֹכָבִים אֲשֶׁר כּוֹנָנְתָּה׃ מָה־אֱנוֹשׁ כִּי־תִזְכְּרֶנּוּ וּבֶן־אָדָם כִּי תִפְקְדֶנּוּ – I behold Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and stars that You set in place what is man that You have been mindful of him, mortal man that You have taken note of him…
This reflection encapsulates a profound sense of humility and wonder in the face of the natural world, acknowledging the vastness of the universe and questioning the place of humanity within it. It’s a moment of recognizing both the grandeur of creation and the intimate relationship between the Divine and humanity. Fully compatible with the scientific exploration of the universe, it embraces and enriches it with a layer of meaning and purpose. The same tools that unlock secrets of the physical world also open pathways to spiritual insight and contemplation.
There’s a famous existential comic that depicts a boy shouting into the night sky, “I’m significant!” but as he remarks in the next panel, he “screamed the dust speck.” This poignantly captures the paradox of human existence, the tension between our apparent insignificance in the vast cosmos and our innate sense of self-importance and meaning. This imagery evokes the humility and awe inspired by our understanding of the universe’s enormity, as well as a defiant assertion of individual worth and identity in the face of such an overwhelming scale.
In a similar comic, he stares at the night sky with a friend, who admires the view, “What a clear night! Look at all the stars. Millions of them!” And the boy replies, “Yes, we’re just tiny specks on a planet particle, hurling through the infinite blackness…” They stand together for a few moments, and the boy says, “Let’s go in and turn on all the lights.”
The universe is a much bigger place than it was just a few centuries ago. There’s more than one continent, the world isn’t flat, the world isn’t in the center of the universe, isn’t the only planet, only solar system, only galaxy, and it goes on. It’s a lot grander, it’s a lot bigger, but it’s also a lot more frightening and alienating in some sense. Because the cosmos has become so vast, it’s so easy to think of humans as trivial specks on a trivial speck on some misbegotten end of a galaxy, among hundreds of millions of other galaxies, to see ourselves as nothing in the span of time.
This realization can be humbling or even unsettling, as it challenges our perceptions of centrality and importance. And yet, seeing the same galaxy as everyone else, we aren’t intimidated by our smallness and our place in the universe because we know the greatness we are capable of, the divine image that is localized in this corner of the universe and nowhere else – אַתָּה חוֹנֵן לְאָדָם דַּעַת.
Prayer and wisdom are both necessary, but neither are sufficient
The Rambam suggested that if a person wants to know the Creator, they should study creation and contemplate its beauty, complexity, and interconnectedness.
Yet Rav Moshe Meiselman commented that for all the time he spent in science labs, he never once heard his peers see the beauty, complexity, and systematic unity of the sciences and conclude that there is a Creator. He suggested that the missing ingredients were prayer, humility, curiosity, openness, recognition of their limitations, and the desire to see beyond them.
The sages of Alexandria asked R’ Yehoshua how to become wise; he said to work less and study more. They countered that many people had tried and hadn’t become wise; R’ Yehoshua thought for a while and responded that they must also pray for wisdom.
The story records the full exchange; study alone isn’t the answer but must be accompanied by prayer for success.
He took a practical approach to achieving goals; you have to put in concrete and tangible efforts that make sense.
If there’s a big exam, probability distributions conclusively demonstrate that people who know the material usually pass; people who don’t study typically fail. You might pass or fail, and the test might never ultimately matter in the fullness of your life as it unfolds.
But you won’t ever know that sitting in the room, staring at the paper, scratching your head, searching for the answer. If you want to learn something, it’s not going to happen if you don’t open a book and dedicate the time to learn. You can pray until the heat death of the universe with the loftiest intentions, but it just doesn’t work like that. God can’t do it for you; you need to sit down and do the work; that was the sage’s first answer.
His second answer doesn’t override the first answer; it modifies it with a caveat. You can work forever and spend all your time on something, and get everything completely wrong, make the wrong connections, draw the wrong conclusions, and go down rabbit holes that lead nowhere. God can’t do it for you, and you also can’t do it by yourself.
You need to put in the work, and you need to pray for everything to come together right.
וּמְלַמֵּד לֶאֱנושׁ בִּינָה – teach humans understanding
We ask God to teach humans to understand things, to understand each other – וּמְלַמֵּד לֶאֱנושׁ בִּינָה.
Since the late nineteenth century, pyschology has developed a framework to conceptualize the unconscious mind, a revolutionary epiphany that we take for granted today; the idea that your perceptions and your actions and your thoughts are all informed and shaped by unconscious motivations that are not fully under your voluntary control.
It is not possible to make someone understand something; Socrates said that he could not teach anything, he could only make them think. When the newly crowned King Rehoboam asked his court for advice on taxation policy, his senior advisors suggested that tax cuts would show goodwill to citizens and earn favor and loyalty, but his newly appointed advisors, his friends, and cronies, suggested a harsher tax on his people to assert his authority without compromise. He did not see the wisdom in what his senior advisors had recommended, but it was right in front of him and made perfect sense.
Knowledge doesn’t come from others, and it doesn’t come from ourselves either; if we miss the wisdom that’s granted to us, we ask God to teach us so we can absorb it וּמְלַמֵּד לֶאֱנושׁ בִּינָה.
Beyond our structured attempts at learning, there exists a more profound, often inexplicable, mechanism through which knowledge and understanding are imparted. When flashes of inspiration and sudden insights pop into our minds, where does that information come from? It comes from the unconscious teacher, in a broader, more cosmic sense; the universe seeding ideas and revelations within us, often when we least expect, and often as a product of prayer – וּמְלַמֵּד לֶאֱנושׁ בִּינָה.
Even when wisdom is taught or shared, some students may not perceive its depth or value immediately, if at all. Knowledge, when shared, plants a seed, an idea that might lie dormant until the right conditions or moments awaken it, underscoring the challenges and mysteries inherent in the transmission of knowledge and insight, a journey that can be as unpredictable and mysterious as it is deliberate.
חָנֵּנוּ מֵאִתְּךָ – Grant us, from You
There is plenty of wisdom in the world, but we want the Creator’s wisdom – כִּי־ה’ יִתֵּן חכְמָה מִפִּיו דַּעַת וּתְבוּנָה / תוֹרַת־פִּיךָ.
Our sages were secure in their belief that there is wisdom and knowledge to be found outside of the Jewish people, the idea that God disperses knowledge throughout humanity, which invites us to recognize and respect the insights and advancements made by various cultures.
But, while all wisdom comes from the Creator, the wisdom we pray for is the kind that comes directly from the Creator, not mediated indirectly through third parties – חָנֵּנוּ מֵאִתְּךָ.
Imagine a king hosting a royal banquet with many guests. There are countless food options, and his young son comes to sit on his lap. The child can have any dish in the room, but he will only eat off his father’s plate. The food is all delicious, and everyone is having a great time, but the intimate nature of the source is what makes the interaction desirable due to its direct association with his father; it’s not from the serving platter, it’s my Dad’s!
In Moshe’s final speech to his people, he calls the Torah he leaves them their wisdom and understanding – וּשְׁמַרְתֶּם וַעֲשִׂיתֶם כִּי הִוא חָכְמַתְכֶם וּבִינַתְכֶם לְעֵינֵי הָעַמִּים אֲשֶׁר יִשְׁמְעוּן אֵת כָּל־הַחֻקִּים הָאֵלֶּה וְאָמְרוּ רַק עַם־חָכָם וְנָבוֹן הַגּוֹי הַגָּדוֹל הַזֶּה.
God gives humans the ability to understand things and make discoveries, expanding knowledge and developing wisdom, especially in recent times. All the great scientists, doctors, jurists, philosophers, and teachers have wisdom; few have Torah, God’s wisdom. The wisdom of that world is marvelous but will never satisfy us; we crave God’s wisdom – חָנֵּנוּ מֵאִתְּךָ.
This distinction doesn’t diminish the value of secular knowledge or the contributions of those outside the Jewish world. Instead, it highlights the unique nature of Torah wisdom as a divine revelation that offers not just knowledge but a comprehensive way of understanding the world, guiding ethical behavior, and connecting with the divine, integrating spiritual insights, moral guidance, and a deep sense of purpose.
At this point, it is statistically evident that the Jewish People feature disproportionately among Nobel prize-winning scientists; there is something about our cultural practices that leads to outsized outcomes, something that makes us wise.
But something that has been clear for far longer is that while wisdom can be found globally, the Torah alone has been a source of values, morality, and spirituality that has revolutionized the planet – חָנֵּנוּ מֵאִתְּךָ.
It’s not an overstatement; apart from the obvious influences of Christianity and Islam that have conquered much of the world, the bedrock of the modern political theory in the West is also borrowed from the Torah. The notion that republics are the only legitimate regimes begins with the Torah’s institution of a constitutionally limited monarchy; the idea that the state should maintain an egalitarian distribution of property is mandated by the Torah through Shemitta and the Jubilee; the belief that if humans are free then they need a free society within which to exercise that freedom.
Greece and Rome were two of the jewels of classical antiquity, the height of civilization in their day, and two of the greatest in human history. And yet, for all their remarkable contributions, many of which still shape our world today, one of their main forms of sport and entertainment was the amphitheater, where people would take the family and meet their friends and buy tickets and drinks to watch slaves hack away at each other in a fight to the death. For everything Greece and Rome have in their favor, their glorification of brutality and oppression is disgraceful to decent people with ethics and morals who value peace and human dignity as ideals – Jewish ideals, the Torah’s ideals – חָנֵּנוּ מֵאִתְּךָ.
(!ed Torah guidance on meaning and identity today?)
חָכְמָה דֵעָה בִּינָה וְהַשכֵּל (ספרד: חָכְמָה בִּינָה וָדָּעַת) – with knowledge, understanding, and prudence
The blessing concludes with a progressive sequence of the acquisition and purposeful application of wisdom that is both deeply spiritual and intensely practical toward creation and fostering deeper connections within it.
Knowledge represents the foundational level of wisdom, the accumulation of facts and observations about the world around us – חָכְמָה. The word itself is a composite that can be broken down into its component parts, literally, the power of “what” – KOACH MAH CITE. The power of asking questions showcases the best of human curiosity and openness to what is behind what can be observed.
Understanding takes acquired knowledge and delves deeper, seeking to uncover the underlying principles and reasons – בִּינָה. It is the intellectual process of connecting dots, much like realizing the existence of gravity from observing an apple fall. Understanding is the domain of asking “why” and “how,” pushing past the surface to reach a more profound understanding of the mechanisms behind what we observe. This stage transforms raw data into meaningful insights, enabling us to grasp the complexities of the world in a more structured and enlightened way.
Connection is the culmination of this process, representing the connection or intimate relationship that results from applying our knowledge and understanding – דָּעַת. It is the word used to describe the intimacy between Adam and Eve; it is the deep, almost existential connection we forge with the knowledge we’ve acquired and understood. It’s the stage where knowledge and understanding are not just intellectual exercises but are integrated into our being, connected to conclusions and outcomes, and influencing our actions, decisions, and relationships.
The progression outlines a holistic approach to wisdom that suggests that true wisdom is not merely about collecting information or even understanding it in depth but about integrating this understanding into our lives in a way that deepens our relationship with the Creator, with others, the world around us, the people we love, and with ourselves.
בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה ה’, חונֵן הַדָּעַת – Blessed are You, O Lord, Who grants us with knowledge
When we ask for the capacity to make the right decisions, strength of character, and the ability to follow through without excuses, we are seeking more than just favorable circumstances; we are asking to be endowed with qualities that define our essence. This is a prayer for internal transformation, for the wisdom to see the world through a lens shaped by divine guidance, and for the fortitude to act upon that vision with integrity and resolve.
Acknowledging that this wisdom is from the Creator emphasizes the recognition that our ability to discern, decide, and act rightly is not solely a product of our own making but a reflection of divine grace. It is a humbling acknowledgment that the best of our qualities and our most inspired decisions are also gifts and not something to take credit for and feel superior about.
In praying for God’s grace in granting wisdom, we admit our fallibility; we’ve all made bad decisions, and we count on divine assistance for improvement and learning. We pray not for knowledge as information but for wisdom as the capacity to practically apply that knowledge in ways that align with our highest moral and spiritual values and take us in the direction we hope.
A healthy mental composition and the ability to reason and think clearly are big blessings that should not be taken for granted. We pray to be more ourselves, more consciously, intentionally, thoughtfully, smarter, wiser – בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה ה’, חונֵן הַדָּעַת