# Prayer for Torah 23

> מקור: https://rabenu.app/books/kitvey-en/23/prayer-23/

23.

“Gladden the soul of Your servant for, to You, O Lord, I lift up my soul”. “May they rejoice and be glad in You, all who seek You.” “The righteous will be glad, they will rejoice with gladness.” “Serve G-d with joy; come before Him in song.”

Master of the Universe, Merciful One, Master of Joy; joy is in Your house. Strength and joy is in His place. Merit me, in Your immense loving-kindness, to always be happy. You revealed to us, through Your true tzaddikim that happiness is from the Side of Holiness, whereas sadness is from the Other Side. All the holiness of a Jew is specifically from his happiness. The only cause for our becoming distant from You and for the physical cravings to overcome us is sadness and depression. But You, now how far away I am from happiness for I have spoilt and blemished a lot. Therefore, I have come before You, Merciful One, to ask that You help me; gladden me in Your salvation. Show me an d teach me how to turn all the sorrow and misery into happiness, so that the Other Side will have no power to instill in me sadness, Heaven forbid. Rather, merit me to overcome it by strengthening myself with joy. However much more the Other Side wants to make me sad because of my many sins, let m fortify myself and turn it all into joy by remembering that You made me a Jew , not a heathen and merited me to perform many mitzvoth every day. That specifically, is my happiness; even someone so far away and blemished as me can merit to be involved with holy and awesome things such as Torah and mitzvot.

Gladden the soul of Your servant, for I raise my soul to You G-d. So, please enable me to really ascertain the paths of happiness in such a way that I can grab all the misery and turn it into joy. Thus, let me become continually stronger in my joy. By this, may I draw the spirit of life and holiness into the ten pulses within me. As a result, guard me and save me from all kinds of illnesses and pains, physically and spiritually. Cure me and all the Jewish People. Vitalize me with happiness and joy at all times for all cures stem from this, for whatever illness. Joy is the essence of a person’s vitality. So merit us to understand and ascertain the roads, pathways and trails how to achieve constant happiness. I will perform Your mitzvoth with joy and a heart of gladness until I merit to the joy of the future when we will see the great joy of the dance You will make for the tzaddikim in the future. Fulfill in us very soon the verse: “For G-d will comfort Zion, He will comfort all her ruins; He will make her wilderness like Eden; joy and gladness will be found there, thanksgiving and the sound of music.” (Isiah 51,3). “Be glad in G-d and rejoice, tzaddikim. Cry out in joy all the upright of heart” ((Psalms 32, 11).

24.

 It is a very great mitzvah to always be happy and to overcome and drive away with all one's

strength any sadness or depression and thus, to just be happy at all times. This a cure for all kinds of illness for all kinds of illnesses, may Heaven have pity, all stem from sadness and depression. One must make oneself happy by means of all kinds of advice. Mostly this is specifically by doing or saying frivolous silly things, as clarified elsewhere. Even though a broken heart is also a very good thing, this is only when a person sets aside for himself an hour a day to break his heart and explain himself before G-d., as we have brought elsewhere, but during the rest of the day he must be happy for from a broken heart a person can easily arrive to depression, more so than he stumble (and sin) through happiness by coming to unruly conduct, Heaven forbid. Therefore, a person must always be happy except for one special hour when he will have a broken heart.

25.

 (a) Secluded, individualized prayer is the greatest virtue and a very proper and straight path to come close to the Holy One. Each person should set aside some fixed times (hours) every day and express himself before G-d in his own language (that's to say, in our country, English); for it is much easier to express yourself well when you use your own language. You should speak out whatever is in your heart before G-d, whether expressions of regret and repentance for the past or whether requests and supplications to merit to really come close to the Holy One from now on. And if you can't speak at all before G-d then shout out and plead to Him about this itself that you have become so distant from Him that you can't even speak before Him. Ask for mercy from Him that He will have compassion on you and open your mouth until you can express your needs before Him. Each person, according to how much he knows his own hearts afflictions, how far he is away from G-d, should express himself and tell everything before G-d. It is impossible to explain or estimate the immense virtue of this method. It is superior to all others and includes all the service of G-d for, by this method, one can attain the ultimate good in This World and in the World to Come for everyone can accomplish anything through proper prayer and supplications. All of the greatest tzaddikim only achieved their spiritual level through this method. Anyone who considers it carefully will understand by himself the great virtue of this path. Happy is he who merits to set aside for himself a special hour every single day for this, while being happy for the rest of the day.

(b) It is also good to turn Torah study into prayers. See inside and understand.