It was principally on Sabbath and festival days, when the people were at leisure, that the service was well attended, and accordingly the weekly lesson from the Torah was read in full (cf. Pbilo, ed. Mangey, ii. 282, 630, 4.58) ; wherefore the synagogue was called the 'Sabbath place' par ex- cellence (Jos. Ant. XVI. vi. 2 ; cf. Bacher's quotation from Payne Smith, art. 'Synagogue,' in HDB iv. 636''). On Monday and 'Thursday the villagers coming to the cities for the coiirt or the market attended the synagogue in sufficient numbers to have a portion of the Torah read (Tvs. Tdaii. ii. 4). On week days only larger cities had the required 'ten men of leisure' (batldnim || Meg. i. 3, Sank, nb ; see JE, art. ' Batlanim ') for the daily service ; later it became a fixed custom to engage ' ten men of leisure' for tlie holding of the daily service where the attendance was too small.
6. The service : its elements and its develop- ment,— The Divine service assumed at the very outset a two-fold character : it was to offer common devotion and public instruction. But the devo- tional part, again, consisted at the very beginning, as far as we can trace it, of two elements : (a) the confession of faith, (b) the real prayer (tejillah).
(a) The confession of faith, termed in the Mishna ' the acceptance of the yoke of sovereignty of God,' Kahhdlath '61 Malkut S/idmayim (Ber. li. 2), by the recital of the Skma (Dt 6^-" ll'»- =', Nu \o^-"), was preceded by two benedictions, one containing the praise of the Lord as the Giver of light in view of the rising sun each morning, and of the With- drawer of the light of day each evening, and another containing the praise of the Lord as Giver of the Law to Israel, His chosen people, and followed by one benediction beginning with a solemn attestation of the monotheistic truth ])ro- claimed in the Sh'7)ia, and ending with the praise of God as the Redeemer of Israel with reference to the deliverance from Egypt mentioned in the clos- ing verse of the Sh'ma ch.apters (Nu IS'"). That this part is very old is shown, not merely by the discussion of the oldest Kabbinical schools concern- ing the details of observing the conimandnumt found in Dt 6' : ' When thou liest down, and when thou risest up,' but by Josephus' .source (-4 «^. iv. viii. 13), whicii ascribes to Moses the recital of the Sh'ma and of the beni'diction for Israel's redemp- tion. But what Philo tells of the Therupeutes,
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that ' they prayed each morning and evening for the light ot heaven' (ed. Mangey, ii. 475), and Josephus of the Essenes, tliat ' they otter prayers haniled down from their fathers towards the rising sun as if supplic'ating for its rising,' tliat is to say, with hjinds outstretclied towards the streaks of light coming forth (i?J^ II. viii. 5; cf. ii')?rW(, Ixxxiii. 11, Wis 1()^, Sib. Orac. iii. oOlf.), wliich corre- sponds witli wliat tlie Talmud says {Ber. 96, Jer. Ber. i. 3rt) of the V'thilnin, 'the enduring, con- scientiously pious' (another name for the Essenes), that ' they recited the Sh'ina at the time of the radiance of the morning sun,' points almost with certainty to Zoroastrian influence (see, besides Graetz, Schorr, and Kohler, also T. K. Cheyne, The Oririin and Reliqions Contents of the Psalter [BL], London, 1891, pp. 283, 448), and thus indicates a time when these prayers were ottered under the open sky.
(6) The real prayer (tefillah) consisted of either eighteen benedictions or seven benedictions on Sabbath and festival days. In both cases the three opening and three concluding benedictions were the same. On week days, however, twelve specific praj'ers are offered between these, six con- cerning human life in general and five concerning the national life of the Jewish people, the twelfth containing the supplication that all the prayers offered either collectively or individually be heard, whereas on Sabbaths and festivals only one specific prayer with reference to the day is ottered. _Tlie three opening benedictions are : (1) Birknth Abdth, ' the praise of the God of the fathers,' dwelling on the merits of the patriarchs and closing with the words ' Shield of Abraham ' ; (2) GebilrCth, ' the praise of the Divine Omnipotence,' as mani- fested in cosmic life and in the future resurrection : it closes, ' Ble.ssed be Thou who revivest the dead ' ; (3) Kedushah, ' the sanctification of the Lord by tlie heavenly hosts' : it closes with, ' Blessed be Thou, the holy God.' The three concluding benedictions are : (\)' AhGdah, prayer for the favourable accept- ance of the Divine service in the Temple, which, since the destruction of the Temple, has been changed into a prayer for the restoration of the sacrificial cult : it now closes, ' Blessed be Thou who restorest Thy Shekinah to Zion ' ; (2) H6ddah, thanksgiving for all the bounties of life and the wondrous doings of Providence; (3) Birkath K6ha- nim, the benediction connected with the Priestly Blessing (Nu 6-^""), which formed the conclusion of the service.
The twelve week-day benedictions are : (1) prayer for knowledge and wisdom ; (2) for spiritual re- generation ; (3) for Divine forgiveness ; (4) for the redemption of those in bondage ; (5) for the heal- ing of the sick ; (6) for the produce of the year ;