Rav Moshe Weinberger writes:
Only after the destruction of the Temple could the order of our daily prayers be established. In the horrifying desolation and loneliness the Jewish heart began to scream and tefillos were formed. The churban meant the removal of the religious ritual with which we had become comfortable, and we found ourselves alone with G-d. – Prayer: Neglected Paths and Forgotten Longings – Jewish Action, Fall 1990
Rav Moshe Weinberger is the Rav of Cong Aish Kodesh in Woodmere, NY and the Mashpiah at Yeshiva University
I’m confused. The order of the Amidah was set by Anshei Keneses haGadolah, shortly after rebuilding the Temple. The court in Yavneh were filling in details into an existing framework. (Except for the addition of VelaMeshumadim, later changed by censorship into VelaMalshinim.) And for the Amidah, they apparently “only” converted the AKhG’s topics into fixed closings for each berakhah, with the bodies of the berakhah still largely left to the discression of the shaliach tzibbur. The concept of a rather scripted siddur like what we have today is later, from geonic period, when people didn’t trust themselves to craft the berakhos correctly, and turned to geonim (R’ Natrunai, R’ Saadia, R’ Amram) and their Israeli contemporaries for guidance.
So I am missing the perspective R’ Weinberger is giving that provides a connection between the destruction of the Temple and the siddur.
(Given how I was taught to view things, which is obviously quite different than RMW’s model, there is a more obvious connection between the end of prophecy and the siddur. As R’ JB Soloveitchik puts it, the AKhG invented the notion of a fixed prayer service so as to continue the dialog with G-d beyond their era, the twilight of prophecy.)
Micha,
Thanks for commenting (really)! RMW is basing the statement on the fact that Amidah was “instituted” after the destruction of Beis Rishon, as you wrote by the AKhG. There are sources to the quote from Rav Weinberger. I will email you the article..