Ashrei
Ashrei

There is a prayer Jews recited called the Ashrei. It is said three times daily. It is from Psalm 145 basically. A verse each for Psalm 84 and 144 are added to the beginning. And a verse from Psalm 115 is added to the end. The prayer is called Ashrei because that is how the first two verses begin. The name of the psalm comes from the verses of Psalms 84 and 144 that begin the prayer. Ashrei means happy, fortunate, praiseworthy.

The Talmud cites Rabbi Eleazar ben Abina's (of the 4th century) saying that anyone who thoughtfully recites Ashrei three times daily, particularly the verse פותח ("Thou openest thine hand, and satisfiest the desire of every living thing") has a guaranteed place in the World to come (Olam haba).

(See Talmud Brachot 4b: http://www.jewishtreats.org/2013/11/fortunate-fortunate-forunate.html)

Psalm 145 is an acrostic psalm. Each of its verses begins with a letter of the Hebrew Alphabet. It makes the psalm easier to learn and commit to memory.

https://www.learnhebrewpod.com/jewish-prayers/Ashrei

This is an English translation from the site:

Happy are those who dwell in Your house; they are continually praising You. (Psalm 84:5)
Happy the people who are thus fortunate; happy the people whose God is Adonai. (Psalm 144:15)
Psalm 145: David’s song of praise
א I will extol You, O God my King, and I will bless Your Name forever and ever.
ב Every day will I bless You, and I will praise Your name forever and ever.
ג Great is Adonai and highly to be praised; God’s greatness is beyond our understanding.
ד One generation lauds Your deeds to another, and tells of Your mighty acts.
ה I will tell of the glorious majesty of Your splendor and of Your wondrous deeds.
ו They will speak of Your awesome power, and I will recount Your greatness.
ז They will utter a recollection of Your abundant goodness, and will sing joyously of Your righteousness.
ח Adonai is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and full of kindness.
ט Adonai is good to all, and God’s tender mercies are upon all of God’s works.
י All Your works will thank You, Adonai, and Your faithful ones will bless You.
כ They will speak of the glory of Your kingdom, and will tell of Your power.
ל To inform all human beings of God’s mighty acts, and the majestic glory of Your dominion.
מ Your kingdom will last forever, and You will rule in every generation.
ס Adonai supports all those who stumble, and straightens all those who are bent.
ע The eyes of all look to You in hope, and You give them their food in due season.
פ You open Your hand and feed every living creature until it is satisfied.
צ Adonai is righteous in every way, and faithful in every deed.
ק Adonai is near to all those who call, to all who call upon God sincerely.
ר God will fulfill the wishes of the reverent; God will hear their cry and deliver them.
ש Adonai protects all those who love God, but will destroy all the wicked.
ת May my mouth utter the praise of Adonai, and may all flesh bless God’s name forever and ever.
We will bless God now and forever. Halleluyah! (Psalm 115:8)

The site continues: One of the best known of the Psalms, ashrei is recited three times every weekday (once at the morning service, once at the afternoon service, and once in personal prayer) and a fourth time on Shabbat (during the Torah-reading service).

It takes the form of an alphabetical acrostic… as if to say “Let every single letter of the alphabet find a way to praise the Eternal One!” The ashrei is the earliest such example of the alphabetical acrostic in prayer; hundreds of medieval piyyutim (poem-prayers) later followed its example. The only letter missing from the acrostic is נ.

Legend has it that the Psalmist omitted that letter because it begins the root n f l נפל  “to fall,” and its use would therefore remind the worshiper of the “falling” of the two Temples in Jerusalem and the subsequent exiles of the Jewish people.

The ashrei is noteworthy, too, because of its use of parallelism, a literary device in which the first half of a Biblical verse is restated—and therefore amplified—in the second half of the verse. For example, “Adonai supports all those who stumble, and straightens all those who are bent.”

So it is clear that Ashrei means: happy. And we have only begun to explore the blessings of Ashrei.

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