The Power Source of Prayer

וַיִּשְׁמַע הַכְּנַעֲנִי... כִּי בָּא יִשְׂרָאֵל דֶּרֶךְ הָאֲתָרִים וַיִּלָּחֶם בְּיִשְׂרָאֵל

And the Canaanite heard… that Yisrael had come by the route of the spies, and he waged war against Yisrael. (21:1)

The Midrash[1] informs us that this nation was actually Amalek. The reason they are called Canaanite is that the spoke in a Canaanite dialectic so as to mislead the Jewish people into thinking they were Canaanites. The goal of this ruse was that when the Jewish people would pray for victory, since they would mistakenly refer to their enemies as Canaanites, their prayers would be ineffectual. In the event, the midrash informs us that Bnei Yisrael were in doubt as to the identity of their enemy, and hence prayed to be delivered “from this nation,” as described in verse 2.

This Midrash raises a basic question regarding prayer: There is no question whatsoever that the Bnei Yisrael’s intention in their prayers was concerning the enemy before them with whom they were about to do battle. Are we meant to understand that even so, if they mistakenly called them by their wrong name, their prayers would be useless?

The Meshech Chochmah first discusses the possibility that this might indeed be the case. However, he then proceeds to offer another explanation, whereby even if the people’s prayers to defeat “Canaan” would have been accepted in their war with Amalek, those prayers would themselves be largely ineffectual:

Canaan is one of the nations whose land was promised by Hashem. As such, the notion among the people was that victory over Canaan was more or less assured. Hence, even if they would pray for victory before going out to battle, those prayers would have very little sense of urgency or intensity. Yet urgency and intensity are the source of the power of our prayers. The reality that enemy we were facing was Amalek, about whom no such assurance of defeat was given, meant we would effectively be entering a situation that demanded high intensity prayers, equipped only with low intensity ones. That was the disaster Amalek was hoping for.

This is the fundamental lesson that emerges from our battle with our enemies on that occasion. It is truly a lesson in prayer for all times.

[1] Tanchuma sec. 18, cited by Rashi to our verse.