What is the Secret of the Healing Power of “Shema Yisrael”?

Parashat Va’etchanan

Why am I so Careful to Recite Shema with its Three Paragraphs Daily?

The one prayer, that is most well-known to even the most assimilated Jew, is without doubt the Shema Yisrael. This succinct, six-worded phrase is on a Jew’s lips throughout the cycles of life –

from the baby’s Brit Mila (circumcision) ceremony to his very last breath – until 120! After the Holocaust, R. Yosef Kahaneman zt’l, the Ponevezhe Rav, began looking for Jewish children who had survived the war. It was known that some of the children had ended up in churches and were being raised as Christians. The Rav encountered one church that denied the existence and presence of Jewish children within their midst. He was granted permission to enter the children’s quarters to inspect for himself. When he entered, he began calling out “Shema Yisrael” and instinctively many of the children raised their hands to cover their eyes and started calling out, “Mama! Mama!”   

The Shema Yisrael is known for expressing the essence of Judaism’s monotheistic faith. Yet, more than the quintessential declaration of Jewish belief, reciting the Shema Yisrael together with its three following paragraphs, is one of the many Jewish spiritual healing practices. I have always been familiar with the Shema, all the way back to my assimilated childhood. Since I embarked on the Torah path, I have been careful to recite it together with all its three paragraphs, even after I learned that women are only obligated to recite the first two sentences of Shema Yisrael. This is because we are still obligated in the mitzvah of emunah (faith in G-d), and therefore it is proper that we accept the yoke of heaven daily by reciting the two verses “Shema Yisrael” and “Baruch Shem” (Shulchan Aruch 70:1; Mishna Berurah 5; Kaf Ha-ĥayim 5). The reason why I am so meticulous about reciting all the three paragraphs following the Shema, is that since my first year in Yeshiva, I heard that these texts bring about healing. Our Sages teach that Shema is comprised of 248 words and that in a person’s body there are 248 organs. When we recite Shema properly, each and every organ is healed by the word corresponding to it. 

The Healing of Shema in Halacha

The Torah provides life and healing to the world and to all humanity. This is especially true concerning Shema Yisrael, in which the fundamentals of faith and the fulfillment of the mitzvot are included. “Rav Nehorai said in the name of Rav Nechemia: Shema Yisrael has 248 words, corresponding to the 248 organs of man. When we recite Shema properly, every single organ takes one word and is healed thereby, as it is written ‘They [the words of Torah] will be healing for your navel, and fat on your bones’ (Mishlei 3:8)...” (Midrash Ne’elam, Zohar Chadash Ruth 95a). Further on in that Zohar, the child prodigy brings to the attention of the Rabbis, that if you count the words of the Shema with its following three paragraphs, you’ll actually come up with only 245 rather than 248 words. The Rabbis in the Zohar then explain, that in order to make up the missing three words, the prayer leader should repeat the last three words of Shema, “Hashem Elokeichem Emet” (Hashem, your G-d, is Truth). This became the accepted halacha (Shulchan Aruch 61:3). What if you pray alone, without a minyan, which the majority of women do most of the time? Rabbi Moshe Isserless, the Ashkenazi commentary to the Shulchan Aruch, mentions the custom, that one who prays without a congregation prefaces the Shema with the words “El Melech Ne’eman” (G-d, Faithful King). Therefore, Ashkenazim, who say Shema without a minyan, should preface the Shema with these words (Mishna Berurah, Orach Chayim 239:1-4). The custom of most Sephardim is that a person praying individually should complete the three missing words on his own and repeat, “Hashem Elokeichem emet.” I find it interesting that the Halachic sources all quote the Zohar, about the healing powers of the Shema and are concerned about how to best ensure access to this healing, for all of our 248 organs. This teaches us, that reciting the Shema Yisrael engenders infinite potential for the healing and rectification of both the physical and spiritual bodies. Furthermore, the Shema contains within it the power of all 248 mitzvot, and it can provide opportunities for the tikkun (rectification) of mitzvot that are not even possible to fulfill today.
 
Does the Healing Powers of Shema Apply to Women?
You may be wondering about women, who have four additional organs: the fallopian tubes and the ovaries. If there are 252, rather than 248 limbs in the female body, how would the healing power of the 248 words apply to women as well? The Minchat Elazar was asked this question and he replied, that since the idea is Zoharic, it follows that the reasoning is too. He suggests that the limbs to which the words correspond pertain to the spiritual realm. Therefore, even a woman, whose physical limbs aren’t equal to a male, can still recite the supplementary Shema words (R. Hamburger, Shorashei Minhag Ashkenaz vol. 2 pg. 58, citing ME vol. 2:28).

Additionally, according to a more literal approach: The female shares the same essential 248 limbs as the male – indeed a woman’s additional limbs do not generate impurity as they are enclosed in the body – and therefore it’s “perhaps good for her to recite the words too.” In this vein we find other examples of women doing/saying things that correspond to the 248 limbs. One notable example is the ‘Mi She’berach’ for an ill woman in which the accepted text is “for all her 248 limbs.” (R. Yitzchak Weiss of  Vrbové, Siach Yitzchak vol. 1:29).

The Shema – A Bridge between Worlds and Souls שַׁחֲרִית, מִנְחָה, מַעֲרִיב 

In Parashat Va’etchan, just after giving over the Ten Commandments, Moshe channeled the Shema Yisrael followed by the paragraph mentioning the mitzvah to love Hashem with our entire being. The second paragraph is mentioned in the following Parasha (Devarim 11:13-21), Whereas, the third paragraph was already mentioned in Bamidbar 15:37-41. 

:ספר דברים פרק ו פסוק ד שְׁמַע יִשְׂרָאֵל הָשֵׁם אֱלֹהֵינו הָשֵׁם אֶחָד

“Hear O Israel, Hashem is our G-d, Hashem is One” (Devarim 6:4). 

The Shema prayer is the centerpiece of spiritual healing, because it is a bridge between this physical world, and the spiritual, eternal world. The morning and evening recitations of the Shema can be likened to the morning and evening of our lives: birth and death. The Shema is our guide; we are greeted with it and sent off with it. This is not merely a custom, but an incredibly important gift, given to those traveling between worlds. Without it, their journey lacks focus and clarity. By greeting the new day with gratitude and recognizing Hashem in light, we are reconnecting with the blessings of birth. By saying the Shema in the evening, when the light is gone and faith is more challenging, we prepare for the ultimate challenge: death. The morning Shema is connected to Avraham, who instituted Shacharit, because the morning time relates to chesed (loving/kindness). The evening Shema is connected with Ya’acov, who taught us, through his dying process and death, about the tremendous opportunity for tikkun in death itself. Just as Ya’acov suffered tremendously in his life, but maintained faith in the oneness of Hashem’s plan, the evening Shema embodies the quality of emunah (faith) needed to believe that, despite apparent darkness, the light will return. 

The Shema Overcoming Negativity

The beginning of tefilah is to recognize Who we are praying to and try to grasp His Oneness. The Shema Yisrael calls us to hear and experience Hashem’s Oneness. Through internalizing Hashem’s unity, we have the ability to expel negativity and heal ourselves and others. If G-d is One, His Oneness must include all existence. Another central Jewish belief is, that G-d is good. Therefore, unifying G-d leaves no place for the existence of evil. “The root of the annihilation and removal of evil, as well as the perpetuation of good, in all creatures, is the revelation of Hashem’s unity. The ultimate rectification of all creation depends on this (Ramchal, Derech Hashem, Part 4, Chapter 4, The Shema and its Blessings). Believing that Hashem is One, and that all forces in the world are under His control, is our ultimate service of unifying Hashem. This emunah is our beacon of light, through the dark times of our lives. Ba’al Shem Tov says, that with every recital of Shema, we bring down Hashem’s light: “I heard an amazing secret from the secret of the great, powerful and awesome unification of the secret of “One” in the Shema prayer… All the thoughts and exterior existence of the other side will be completely nullified, for they will no longer have any vitality or light from any holy sparks, at all. Then, there will no longer be any death or sickness at all, in the secret of, “He will swallow up death forever” (Yesha’yahu 25:8; Ba’al Shem Tov, Parashat Va’etchanan). 

Shema – Igniting the Pilot Light of the Jewish Neshama

The Shema has the ability to call each of the lost ten tribes back to Israel, and each of us back from whatever blockage that may be separating us from our own soul and from connecting with Hashem in the highest way. The Shema contains the power to draw us back to our soul’s purpose: loving G-d, and sanctifying the Name as One, thus enabling the total healing of the world. During Operation Protective Edge in Israel, 2014, IDF soldiers had gone into a mosque in Gaza searching for tunnels and weapons, etc. A door opened, and a female suicide bomber walked into the room, ready to explode herself near the soldiers. One of the soldiers realized that their end was near and screamed “Shema Yisrael!” These words made the female suicide bomber tremble, unable to carry out her plan. After the army dismantled the bomb, they took her for questioning. They discovered that she was a Jewish woman, who had married an Arab and was taken to Gaza and beaten. Her two children were also suffering terribly. She told the army where her children were and gave them information about the whereabouts of additional terrorists, including the identity of the terrorist leader, who had sent her to bomb soldiers. The army brought her and her children to safety in Israel. This is a prime example of the power of Shema Yisrael to ignite the spark of Jewish Neshama. There is a spiritual pilot light, or Pintele Yid, in every Jew, that never is extinguished. The Shema is the spark that causes that hidden light to grow and strengthen. Every time we say the Shema, the light that is within us grows stronger, purifying us with the truth and connecting us to a wellspring of emunah. We suffer when we are not connected to this truth. Without understanding why there is always a feeling that there exists the presence of that pilot light, but it is being obscured by layers of worldly impurity that comes with exile, true exile: the distance from knowing HashemThe beginning of tefilah is to recognize Who we are praying to and try to grasp His Oneness (Based on an article by Tziona Achishena).