Rabbi Shelomo [of Karlin] as none other accepted as his own the Baal Shem’s doctrine that before praying [a person] should prepare to die, because the intention of prayer demands the staking of one’s entire self. For him prayer was a stupendous venture to which one must give one’s self up so completely that thought beyond that point is wholly impossible, that it is impossible to imagine what could take place afterwards.
Martin Buber, Tales of the Hasidim, Schocken Books, 1947, 52.
Image: “Jewish prayers on shabbat day,” Maksymilian Gierymski, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Matters of Interpretation 
