Birkhot Kriat Shema: The Recitation in the Mikdash
The Gemara on Berakhot 11b cites the Mishnah in Tamid, which describes a recitation of Kriat Shema in the Mikdash distinct from the one familiar from Masechet Berakhot. According to that Mishnah, the memuneh instructs the Kohanim: “Barechu bracha achat” — a single blessing before Kriat Shema, rather than the two recited in Gevulin. They then read Aseret HaDibrot together with the three parshiyot (Shema, V’haya im shamoa, Vayomer), and afterward recite three blessings — Emet V’yatziv, Avodah, and Birkat Kohanim — adding, on Shabbat, one further blessing for the outgoing mishmar. The Sugya turns on three linked questions: the nature of this Mikdash recitation as against the recitation in Gevulin; which single blessing is the “bracha achat”; and the relationship of the Birkhot Kriat Shema both to one another and to Kriat Shema itself.
Two Recitations of Kriat Shema: Gevulin and Mikdash
Two Mishnayot describe Kriat Shema, and their characters diverge. The Mishnah in Berakhot addresses every Jew, wherever he lives, twice each day: he opens and closes his day with kabbalat ol malchut shamayim, declaring his commitment to the Kadosh Baruch Hu. The Mishnah in Tamid describes a ceremony performed by the Kohanim in the Lishkat HaGazit in the morning, immediately after the offering of the Tamid shel Shachar. The setting is significant: the Lishkat HaGazit is where the Sanhedrin sit, and until the days of Yoshiyahu the Aron HaBrit, bearing the Dibrot, rested in the Kodesh HaKodashim. The Mikdash recitation is therefore a declaration of commitment to the covenant and to the revelation at Sinai — a ceremony of a nature different from the Kriat Shema of Gevulin.
Several features mark this difference. They recited Aseret HaDibrot; Parshat Shema was expanded; the Birkhot Kriat Shema differed; and the timing differed. The Gemara in Yoma indicates that the anshei mishmar recited Kriat Shema early, before the proper zman. Rabbeinu Tam, cited in Tosafot in Yoma, derives from that Gemara that one who recited Kriat Shema together with the anshei mishmar was not yotzei, since they read it too early on account of their schedule in the Mikdash. The recitation in the Mikdash was thus not fixed to “u-vekumecha,” but pegged to something else — the opening of the Temple day with sacrifice and with a declaration of the Sinai covenant.
Mai Bracha Achat: Identifying the Single Blessing
The Sugya assumes that the “bracha achat” is one of the two Birkhot Kriat Shema known from our prayers — Yotzer Or or Ahava Rabba — though in principle it might have been something else. On that assumption, two questions follow: which of the two was recited, and what may be inferred from the choice of one to the exclusion of the other.
R’ Abba and R’ Yosi bar Abba, arriving at a certain place, were asked which blessing the “bracha achat” was, and could not answer, for there is no clue in the text from which to determine it. They inquired of Rav Matnah, who likewise did not know, and then of Rav Yehudah, who answered in the name of Shmuel: Ahava Rabba. On its face, two considerations weigh in this direction. Ahava Rabba speaks of the relationship between the Kadosh Baruch Hu and Yisrael — Torah, mitzvot, chukim u-mishpatim — and concludes “ha-bocher b’amo Yisrael b’ahavah.” Yotzer Or carries the Kedusha. The decisive criterion is not which blessing is “more important,” a measure difficult to apply, but which is more directly connected to the content of Kriat Shema.
B’firush or Miklala: What Resh Lakish Actually Said
Against Shmuel’s identification stands a second tradition: R’ Zerika said in the name of R’ Ami in the name of R’ Shimon ben Lakish that the blessing was Yotzer Or. Rav Yitzchak bar Yosef qualifies this: the attribution to Resh Lakish was not stated explicitly (b’firush) but inferred (miklala). The qualification reflects a broader concern over the transmission of Eretz Yisrael traditions to Bavel. Shmuel is a Babylonian Amora, whereas Resh Lakish lived in Tveria; such traditions reached Bavel through students who traveled — most famously R’ Zeira — and through the nechutei, who descended from Eretz Yisrael. The reliability of a given transmitter was at times in question.
Here the objection is not that Resh Lakish erred, but that he never stated the identification at all. What Resh Lakish said, upon learning the Mishnah in Tamid, was: “zot omeret berachot ein me’akvot zo et zo” — the very fact that only one blessing is recited, and not both, shows that the blessings do not preclude one another, and that one suffices for yotzei yedei chovah. The identification of the blessing as Yotzer Or is therefore not Resh Lakish’s own statement but a conclusion drawn from this remark.
The Inference From Ein Me’akvot, and Its Reversal
The inference that the blessing was Yotzer Or rests on reading Resh Lakish as holding that in the Mikdash only one blessing was recited, the other omitted entirely. If that one blessing was Yotzer Or, “ein me’akvot” follows: the time of Ahava Rabba had already arrived — Rashi notes that Ahava Rabba is fit to be said even at night — and the time of Yotzer Or had certainly arrived, since Yotzer Or requires daybreak. Both times having come, and yet only one blessing recited, the blessings evidently do not preclude one another. If, however, the blessing recited was Ahava Rabba, no such inference holds: perhaps Yotzer Or was omitted only because its time — sunrise — had not yet arrived, and would be recited when its time came; nothing then proves that one blessing suffices.
The qualification of b’firush against miklala is then pressed: if the conclusion that Resh Lakish meant Yotzer Or is correct, what does it matter that it was only inferred? The resolution overturns the inference itself. Resh Lakish’s statement can be explained even if the single blessing was Ahava Rabba, for Yotzer HaMeorot would then be recited later, when the sun rose. On this reading, “ein me’akvot zo et zo” refers not to omitting a blessing but to the seder — the order. Ordinarily Yotzer HaMeorot precedes Ahava Rabba; in the Mikdash they would begin with Ahava Rabba and recite Yotzer HaMeorot afterward, at a different time, not together. “Seder berachot ein me’akvot zo et zo”: only the order is not me’akev. It follows that Resh Lakish may never have identified the blessing as Yotzer Or at all, and that the bracha achat may indeed have been Ahava Rabba.
Are the Birkhot Kriat Shema Me’akev? Tzibur and Yachid
“Berachot ein me’akvot” admits two senses: that one blessing suffices and the other may be omitted, or that both must be recited but reversing their order is not me’akev. Resh Lakish, on the resolution above, speaks of the latter — seder ein me’akvot. The Mishnah on 13a opens a further question. One who is reading the Torah — reaching Devarim 6 — when the zman ha-mikra arrives, fulfills his obligation “im kiven libo,” reading Kriat Shema from the Sefer Torah with intent. Such a person presumably recited no Birkhot Kriat Shema.
The first Tosafot of the second chapter (“Haya korei”) cites the Yerushalmi that the blessings are not me’akvot — even one who did not recite two before or two after is yotzei — for otherwise “mai mehani im kiven libo, d’lo berech techilah.” This generates a contradiction: in the first chapter the conclusion is “seder berachot ein me’akvot,” only the order; here the implication is that the blessings themselves may be omitted. Tosafot resolve the tension by distinguishing Kriat Shema recited b’yachid from Kriat Shema recited in a public ceremony — “hatam iyri b’tzibur.” The very language of the Mishnah in Tamid, “amar lahem ha-memuneh,” marks a public ceremony (“dika nami”). Recited privately, the focus rests on the parshiyot of Shema, and the Birkhot Kriat Shema are not me’akev; in a public ceremony — even, in a sense, in the Mikdash — the ceremony must include them. The paradox is that the Mikdash ceremony recited only a single blessing, yet that blessing is the more integral to the ceremony.
The public character of the blessing is reflected in the Kedusha contained in Yotzer HaMeorot. Several Rishonim — the Rambam and Rav Saadya Gaon among them, and the position appears in Shulchan Aruch, though the Ashkenazim do not pasken so — hold that the Kedusha of Yotzer Or may be recited only b’tzibur, said in trop, like the yud-gimmel middot, which one does not recite alone. There is thus something inherently public about kabbalat ol malchut shamayim as Yotzer HaMeorot describes it — the manner in which the angels declare it. According to Tosafot, then, the blessings are me’akev in the public ceremony but not me’akev when recited privately.
The same dispute runs through the Geonim. The Rashba, in the Sugya on 11b, cites Rabbeinu Hai Gaon: the order (sidran) is not me’akev, but one must certainly recite both blessings. Rabbeinu Hai resolves the Mishnah on 13a as Tosafot do — “d’hacha b’tzibur” (amar lahem ha-memuneh) and “d’hatam b’yachid” — so that b’yachid the blessings are not me’akev. Against this, some of the Gaonim held that whether b’yachid or b’tzibur the blessings are never me’akev, their principal proof being the stam Mishnah on 13a, which presents Kriat Shema recited without its blessings. The Rashba sides with the latter, and re-reads the Sugya on 12a as making no positive claim: it never declares that the Birkhot Kriat Shema must be recited, but only examines what Resh Lakish meant and what may be inferred from his statement, laying out the options as mere dichuy (“dichuya b’alma d’dachinan lehu”). Since we do not know which blessing Resh Lakish intended, the Sugya proves nothing, the stam Mishnah on 13a stands, and the Birkhot Kriat Shema are not me’akev. This reading rests on the Rashba’s larger position, set out in his teshuva, that the Birkhot Kriat Shema are independent of Kriat Shema.
The Ramban: Ahava Rabba as Birkat HaMitzvah, Yotzer HaMeorot as Shevach
The Ramban’s treatment — the first of his chiddushim on the Shas — proceeds from the question whether one davening b’yachid should say “El Melech Ne’eman” before Kriat Shema. The practice arose because Kriat Shema contains 245 words, and some sought to complete the count to 248, the gematria of ramach, the number of organs in the body.
The Ramban’s foundation is methodological and stated at the outset: “lefi she-hadavar yadua she-Ahavat Olam birkat ha-mitzvah hi l’Kriat Shema” — Ahava Rabba is the birkat ha-mitzvah of Kriat Shema, since all mitzvot require a blessing over la’asiyatan. One would have expected a blessing “asher kidshanu b’mitzvotav v’tzivanu likro et Shema.” [Such a blessing does in fact appear in Geniza sources and in certain Eretz Yisrael siddurim, generally where Kriat Shema is recited without its blessings; Tzvi Groner treats it in his Berachot She-nishtaku, on blessings attested in sources but no longer recited — though it is not our minhag.] The blessing of Kriat Shema is supplied instead by Ahava Rabba, which is a birkat shinun Torah: one who rose early and learned, having recited Ahava Rabba, need not recite Birkat HaTorah again, “she-kvar niftar b’Ahavat Olam.”
Why, then, are two blessings recited before Kriat Shema? “Tiknu b’Kriat Shema shtayim l’faneha mipnei she-zmanah talui bi-yetzirat ha-or v’ha’aravato” — because the time of Kriat Shema depends on the transition from night to day and from day to night, Chazal instituted a blessing over that transition. But “birkat Yotzer Or u-v’Maariv Aravim birkat shevach hen” — Yotzer Or and Maariv Aravim are blessings of praise, not Birkhot Kriat Shema. According to the Ramban, then, Yotzer HaMeorot is an independent blessing, and the two blessings of Kriat Shema proper are Ahava Rabba before and Emet V’yatziv after — one before and one after, as with Kriat HaTorah. As a blessing of the morning bound to the rising sun, Yotzer HaMeorot can no longer be said once the morning has passed — which accords with the opinion, in the Mishnah on the recitation of Kriat Shema after its time, that one no longer recites Yotzer HaMeorot, it being past morning.
The Mikdash Sugya is the Ramban’s principal proof: there they would recite Ahava Rabba and defer Yotzer HaMeorot, demonstrating that the time of Ahava Rabba and of Kriat Shema need not coincide with that of Yotzer HaMeorot. From the same unity the Ramban explains why Emet V’yatziv does not open with “Baruch Atah Hashem”: “asu nami birkat Emet V’yatziv bracha smucha la-chaverta” — it is smucha to Ahava Rabba. The two blessings of Kriat Shema form a single unit; though Kriat Shema is recited between them, the continuation between them is preserved, and they remain linked one to the other.
The El Melech Ne’eman question returns here. The 248-word midrash, raised by the French students (“talmidei Tzarfatim”), the Ramban regards as mistaken in its application. In earlier generations the tzibur did not recite all the blessings themselves; the sheliach tzibur recited the blessings and the tzibur answered amen, thereby being included in his blessing. The chazzan recited Ahava Rabba and the tzibur answered amen — yet they read Kriat Shema themselves, “she-ha-mitzvah mutelet al kol yachid v’yachid,” for each must be mekabel ol malchut shamayim himself. To complete the count of organs, the tzibur would say “El Melech Ne’eman” in place of amen; or, as the Ramban allows, they truly answered amen, and the midrash merely counts the letters of the word amen rather than substituting El Melech Ne’eman. In any case the operative rule is davar barur: one does not answer amen after his own blessing, b’yachid or b’tzibur, “v’im ana harei zeh bur v’to’eh gamur.” One may therefore not say El Melech Ne’eman after reciting “ha-bocher b’amo Yisrael b’ahavah” himself, since that is amen after one’s own blessing. [Some accordingly conclude “ha-bocher b’amo Yisrael b’ahavah” together with the shatz and then answer no amen, in order to connect it.]
The Ramban states the same in his chiddushim on the eighth chapter, where Borei Me’orei HaEsh appears: “birkat ha-or she-b’virkat Yotzer HaMeorot u-shteihen birkhot ha-shevach hen.” The praise is this: the world makes use only of the light of day; at night that light departs and darkness sets in, and each morning the light is renewed — so Chazal instituted each morning the birkat ha-meorot, framing within it “ha-mechadesh b’chol yom tamid ma’aseh bereshit.” Each morning the Kadosh Baruch Hu renews nature and the sun rises, and the blessing acknowledges the light; but on the Ramban’s view it bears no relation to Kriat Shema.
The Relationship of the Blessings: Rashba, the Rav, and the Rambam
The Rashba, in his teshuva (Chelek 1, Siman 47), is choleik on the Ramban. “Birkot shel Kriat Shema einan birkhot shel Kriat Shema mamash k’birkat ha-Torah u-virkat ha-mitzvot” — none of the Birkhot Kriat Shema is, properly, a blessing over Kriat Shema; were they, we should have said “asher kidshanu b’mitzvotav v’tzivanu likro et Shema,” as we bless over Kriat HaTorah and over Kriat HaMegillah. “Ela she-tiknu omran lifnei Kriat Shema u-l’achareha” — they are independent units that Chazal instituted reciting before and after Kriat Shema, and so the Gaonim agreed. The obvious difficulty is then why, if they have nothing to do with Kriat Shema, they are recited adjacent to it.
The Rav z”l answered by identifying a direct correspondence between the three blessings and the three parshiyot. The first Parsha — kabbalat ol malchut shamayim, “Hashem Elokeinu Hashem Echad” — corresponds to Yotzer HaMeorot: the heavens, the angels, and the stars declare that they were created by the Kadosh Baruch Hu (“ha-shamayim mesaprim kvod Kel”), which is precisely the content of Hashem Echad. The second Parsha — kabbalat ol mitzvot — corresponds to Ahava Rabba, in which we declare that the Kadosh Baruch Hu gave us Torah, mitzvot, chukim u-mishpatim. The third Parsha, Vayomer, contains zecher l’yetziat Mitzrayim, which the Rav identified with Emet V’yatziv.
On the third blessing the matter is otherwise. Emet V’yatziv’s role is not to mention Yetziat Mitzrayim but to confirm Kriat Shema: having read “Shema Yisrael Hashem Elokeinu Hashem Echad,” one declares “emet,” that he believes what he has read and affirms it. The major content of Vayomer is kabbalat ol mitzvot, already expressed in Ahava Rabba; Emet V’yatziv stands apart as the confirmation of Kriat Shema rather than as a blessing continuing the theme of Ahava Rabba.
The Rambam: Two Series and Amen After One’s Own Blessing
The Rambam offers a structural division distinct from all the foregoing, arrived at through the halacha of answering amen after one’s own blessing. One ordinarily does not answer amen after one’s own blessing; the Ashkenazim retain the practice in one place — after Bonei Yerushalayim in Birkat HaMazon — while the Sephardim do so more frequently, after Yishtabach and after “Shomer amo Yisrael la’ad.” Amen is in origin a response, affirming a blessing one hears from another; but amen also marks the close of a series of blessings. The Ashkenazi practice after Bonei Yerushalayim is retained precisely to mark that Hatov VeHameitiv is not part of Birkat HaMazon.
The Rambam rules: “kol ha-oneh amen achar berachotav harei zeh meguneh” — answering amen after one’s own blessings is improper — “v’ha-oneh achar bracha she-hi sof berachot acharonot harei zeh meshubach,” answering after the blessing that concludes the final series is praiseworthy. So after Bonei Yerushalayim (the three blessings of Birkat HaMazon) and after the concluding blessing of the Kriat Shema of Maariv (Emet V’emunah and Hashkiveinu, a series of two), one answers amen. The Rambam then asks: why not answer amen after Ahava Rabba? The very question presupposes that Yotzer HaMeorot and Ahava Rabba form a series — otherwise it could not arise — and that Emet V’yatziv begins a new series, Kriat Shema having interrupted between them. The Rambam’s answer: “mipnei she-hi sof berachot rishonot shel Kriat Shema” — Ahava Rabba is the close of the first series, and one answers amen only after the last series recited. There are therefore two series in Kriat Shema: the first two blessings (Yotzer HaMeorot and Ahava Rabba), and the concluding blessings (at night two, Emet V’emunah and Hashkiveinu; in the morning, Emet V’yatziv).
The divisions may now be set side by side. According to the Ramban: Ahava Rabba and Emet V’yatziv wrap Kriat Shema as a single unit, smucha la-chaverta, while Yotzer HaMeorot stands independent. According to the Rashba: three independent blessings, none a blessing over Kriat Shema, and none me’akev. According to the Rav z”l: a series of three, each linked to one of the three parshiyot. According to the Rambam: two and two, or two and one — the first two a series, the concluding blessings a new series. The Rambam thereby contradicts the Ramban directly: for the Rambam, Ahava Rabba is the end of the first series, so Emet V’yatziv is not smucha to it but opens something new. This division fits the sources better, and accords with the reading on which Emet V’yatziv confirms Kriat Shema rather than continuing the theme of Ahava Rabba. Two blessings stand before Kriat Shema — Yotzer HaMeorot, expressing Hashem Echad and kabbalat ol malchut shamayim (in antiquity men worshipped the sun and the stars, and we rise to declare that the Kadosh Baruch Hu created them), and Ahava Rabba, expressing kabbalat ol mitzvot and linked to V’haya im shamoa — while Emet V’yatziv, after Kriat Shema, confirms it.
Aseret HaDibrot and Tar’omet HaMinin
The Mikdash recitation included Aseret HaDibrot before the parshiyot, and Rav Yehudah said in the name of Shmuel that in Gevulin too they sought to recite them — “af bi-gvulin bikshu lomar ken.” This is not the addition of a fourth Parsha but an expansion of Parshat Shema. Parshat Shema stands in Devarim 6, but the opening of Moshe Rabbeinu’s second address in Sefer Devarim — the address of the mitzvot — stands in Devarim 5 and begins with Aseret HaDibrot, the whole address centering upon them. “V’hayu ha-dvarim ha-eleh” can accordingly be read as referring to Aseret HaDibrot: “et ha-dvarim ha-eleh diber Hashem el kol kehalchem.” The difference is one of emphasis: where Aseret HaDibrot is recited, they stand at the center, and “v’hayu ha-dvarim ha-eleh” means that those Dibrot shall be upon the heart; where they are not recited, “ha-dvarim ha-eleh” is Hashem Echad.
The recitation was not adopted in Gevulin: “ela she-kvar bitlum mipnei tar’omet ha-minin.” Rashi explains the concern — that the amei ha-aretz not say that the rest of the Torah is untrue, supposing that only what was heard directly from the Kadosh Baruch Hu at Sinai is recited. The Yerushalmi states the matter plainly: Rav Matnah and Rav Shmuel bar Nachman both held that “be-din hayu kdai she-yihyu korin Aseret HaDibrot b’chol yom” — it would have been fitting to recite them daily — and that they are not recited only “mipnei ta’anat ha-minin, she-lo yihyu omrim elu l’vadam nitnu l’Moshe b’Sinai.” The purpose of the Ma’amad Har Sinai, as the Rambam teaches, was “v’gam becha ya’aminu l’olam”: Yisrael, seeing the Kadosh Baruch Hu speak with Moshe Rabbeinu, would know him to be a navi emet and accept all that he transmits in the Divine name. The minim, however, would credit only what was spoken directly at Sinai; lest the daily recitation of Aseret HaDibrot lend support to the claim that they alone, and not the rest of the Torah, were given to Moshe at Sinai, the recitation was abolished.
The same response recurs across the generations: Rabbah bar bar Chana sought to establish the recitation in Sura, and Rav Chisda answered “kvar bitlum mipnei tar’omet ha-minin”; Ameimar sought to establish it in Neharde’a, and Rav Ashi answered likewise. The Rambam, in a teshuva, opposes even standing for Aseret HaDibrot at the Torah reading: one may not treat Aseret HaDibrot as different from any other portion of the Torah, and one may stand for them only if one stands throughout the laining. The underlying logic is that the recitation rests on a sound instinct — Aseret HaDibrot is indeed central, the very reason the Kadosh Baruch Hu chose to reveal Himself — and was set aside only on account of the minim. Once the minim disappeared, the sound instinct could reassert itself: the Maharshal, in sixteenth-century Poland, holds it proper to recite Aseret HaDibrot daily after davening — not within Kriat Shema, which the Gemara forbids, but afterward, as many siddurim print them alongside the yud-gimmel ikkarim — and the practice of standing for Aseret HaDibrot is widespread today.
