Draft. This siddur is waiting for a rav's review. For a halachic question, ask your rav.
Hebrew, then English. Open "What it means" under any line for the explanation.
When you are called up to the Torah, you say this out loud:
בָּרְכוּ אֶת יְיָ הַמְּבֹרָךְ.
Bless Hashem, the Blessed One.
Say Barchu and the blessings out loud. The Shulchan Aruch (the main code of Jewish law) says whispering them is a mistake. The Barchu prayer explains the call itself.
Shulchan Aruch, Orach Chaim 139:6The congregation answers. Then you say the same words yourself:
בָּרוּךְ יְיָ הַמְּבֹרָךְ לְעוֹלָם וָעֶד.
Blessed is Hashem, the Blessed One, forever and ever.
After the people answer, you say their answer yourself, to count yourself among those who bless. The Tur (a law code, Spain, 1300s) brings a view in the name of Rav Saadia Gaon (a leader in Babylonia, died 942): it is like the blessing after meals, where the leader says "let us bless" then says the group's answer. The Barchu prayer tells the whole argument.
Shulchan Aruch, Orach Chaim 139:7; Tur, Orach Chaim 139Then the person called up says the blessing before the reading:
בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יְיָ אֱלֺהֵינוּ מֶלֶךְ הָעוֹלָם אֲשֶׁר בָּחַר בָּנוּ מִכָּל הָעַמִּים וְנָתַן לָנוּ אֶת תּוֹרָתוֹ.
Blessed are You, Hashem, our God, King of the world, who chose us out of all the peoples and gave us His Torah.
You already said "who chose us" this morning in the Torah blessings. The Tur (a law code, Spain, 1300s) says saying it again is not a wasted blessing: it was set up to honor the Torah when it is read in public.
Tur, Orach Chaim 139בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יְיָ נוֹתֵן הַתּוֹרָה.
Blessed are You, Hashem, who gives the Torah.
After the reading, the person called up says the blessing after it:
בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יְיָ אֱלֺהֵינוּ מֶלֶךְ הָעוֹלָם אֲשֶׁר נָתַן לָנוּ תּוֹרַת אֱמֶת וְחַיֵּי עוֹלָם נָטַע בְּתוֹכֵנוּ.
Blessed are You, Hashem, our God, King of the world, who gave us the Torah of truth and eternal life planted within us.
Blessed are You, Hashem our God, King of the world, who gave us the Torah of truth and planted eternal life within us.
בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יְיָ נוֹתֵן הַתּוֹרָה.
Blessed are You, Hashem, who gives the Torah.
The Tur points out that the two blessings together have 40 words, matching the 40 days Moshe stayed on the mountain. Count them in this siddur: 20 in the blessing before, 20 in the blessing after.
Tur, Orach Chaim 139The Shulchan Aruch says: find where the reading starts, then hold the scroll as you bless. The Rema (Rabbi Moshe Isserles, who added Ashkenazi practice) adds: for the first blessing, turn your face aside, so it does not look as if you read the blessing from the scroll. Then read along quietly.
Shulchan Aruch and Rema, Orach Chaim 139:4, 139:11, 141:2Midrash Tanchuma (a collection of rabbinic teachings on the Torah) tells it. Rabbi Akiva (one of the greatest sages of the Mishnah) was called up in shul to read and would not go. In those days the person called up read the passage aloud himself. His students asked why. He had not gone over the passage two or three times alone first. He pointed to God, who looked the Torah over before giving it.
Midrash Tanchuma, Yitro 15The Mishnah (the core collection of the Sages' teachings, edited around the year 200) says the one who begins the Torah reading and the one who finishes it bless. The Gemara (the Talmud's long discussion of the Mishnah) explains: the first blessed before, the last blessed after, and the readers in between said no blessing. Later the Sages had everyone bless both times. Rashi (the classic Gemara commentator, France, 1000s) gives the reason: someone coming in late, or leaving early, would think there was none.
Mishnah Megillah 4:1; Megillah 21b; Rashi on Megillah 21bTwo Sages disagree. Rabbi Meir: find the place, roll the scroll closed, bless, then open it again, so no one thinks the blessing is written in the Torah. Rabbi Yehuda: bless with it open. The Yerushalmi (the Gemara of the Land of Israel) rules the second way. It points to Ezra (the scribe who read the Torah to the people after the exile in Babylon): when he opened the scroll everyone stood, and the next verse says he blessed. The Shulchan Aruch says to open it, find the verse, then bless.
Megillah 32a; Jerusalem Talmud Megillah 3:7; Nechemiah 8:5-6; Shulchan Aruch, Orach Chaim 139:4Rava bar Rav Huna (a sage of the Gemara) taught that once a Torah scroll is opened, you may not talk, even about Jewish law. His proof is the same verse about Ezra: when he opened it, all the people stood. He reads "stood" as "stood silent," because another verse uses the word that way: "they stood, they answered no more."
Sotah 39a; Nechemiah 8:5It does feel like a repeat. At the start of the morning you said the blessings on Torah study. Now you are called up and say a different pair. The Tur (a law code from Spain, 1300s) and the Shulchan Aruch (the main code of Jewish law) both say to bless again, even if you said the morning blessing a moment ago.
Their reason is short. This blessing was set up out of respect for the Torah when it is read in public. So it is tied to the public reading itself, not to whether you already blessed.
Abudarham (a commentary on the prayers, Spain, around 1340) quotes the Rosh (Rabbeinu Asher, a leading rabbi in Germany and Spain, who died in 1327). The Rosh compares it to two other blessings set for the public reading: the one after the Torah, and the one the person reading the haftarah (the passage from the Prophets) says.
The Tur then tells of a case his brother, Rabbi Yechiel, raised. A man comes late, finishes the morning Torah blessing, and is called up right away. Is it strange to say two Torah blessings back to back? Rabbi Yechiel first thought one of them must be wasted. Then he asked their father, the Rosh, who said: he blesses, because the Sages did not make a distinction.
The Shulchan Aruch rules the same way. Even if you blessed for yourself and they call you up right away, you say "who chose us" again.
Tur, Orach Chaim 139,Shulchan Aruch, Orach Chaim 139:8,Abudarham, Torah ReadingThe two blessings are not twins. Before you read, you say God chose us and gave us His Torah. After, you say God gave us "the Torah of truth" and "planted eternal life in us." Two classic writers explain the second blessing in different ways, and one of them also explains why it comes only after the reading.
One explanation is the Tur's. He reads the second blessing as naming two things. "The Torah of truth" is the Written Torah, the scroll you just heard. "Eternal life planted in us" is the Oral Torah, the teachings the Sages passed on. His proof is a verse in Kohelet: the words of the wise are like goads and like nails, planted firmly.
The Gemara has a related idea. Rabbi Yochanan says God made His covenant with Israel only for the sake of the oral teachings. He reads a verse as "on the mouth of these words I made a covenant with you."
Another explanation is Abudarham's. He knows the Tur's reading and records it, but starts somewhere else, with a verse in Mishlei: the Torah "is a tree of life to those who hold on to it." Before you read, you have not yet held it, so the first blessing does not say "eternal life." After you have held it and read from it, the blessing can. And since the verse calls the Torah a tree, the word "planted" fits.
That is also why Abudarham says each person called up should hold the scroll while blessing.
Tur, Orach Chaim 139,Kohelet 12:11,Gittin 60b,Mishlei 3:18,Abudarham, Torah ReadingIt was not always this way. Once, the person called up read the passage aloud himself. The Shulchan Aruch (the main code of Jewish law) still has a rule for places that keep that custom: if he has not gone over the passage two or three times first, he should not go up.
At some point one skilled reader started reading for everyone. Abudarham (a commentary on the prayers, Spain, around 1340) records a first explanation from the first-fruits offering. The Mishnah says that long ago those who could recite the declaration did, and those who could not were fed the words. People stopped bringing first fruits out of embarrassment, so the Sages decreed that everyone is fed the words. In the same way, the leader reads with the one called up, so no one is embarrassed.
The Rosh (Rabbeinu Asher, a leading rabbi in Germany and Spain) does not accept that comparison. With first fruits, people stopped bringing them at all. Here, he says, embarrassment would only push people to learn the reading. He gives a practical reason instead. Not everyone knows the reading's tune and marks, and the congregation does not fulfill its duty through someone who does not. So the one who knows how reads.
That leaves a question. If the leader reads, what is the person called up doing? The Shulchan Aruch says he still reads along with the leader, but quietly, so that his blessing is not for nothing.
The Arukh HaShulchan (a code of law by Rabbi Yechiel Michel Epstein, around 1900) adds a simple point. Where the leader reads, the person called up must still bless. Otherwise, how would anyone know who had been called up to the Torah?
Shulchan Aruch, Orach Chaim 139:1 and 141:2,Mishnah Bikkurim 3:7,Abudarham, Torah Reading,Arukh HaShulchan, Orach Chaim 139:11Short ideas from the Chassidic masters, the Kabbalah and the Mussar teachers.
Rabbi Shlomo of Radomsk (a Chassidic rebbe in Poland, died 1866) asks why the blessing before the reading says God "chose us from all the peoples," and the one after says He "gave us a Torah of truth." Before you go up, he says, you do not yet fully want Torah, so "chose" pushes you to choose the good. "From all the peoples" means from the world's cravings: once satisfied, a person is sick of them. Torah is the opposite: the more you learn, the more you want. After the reading, the Torah itself gives the desire, so you bless God who "gave" it.
קודם לימודו ועלייתו לתורה עודנו לא בא לשלימות הרצון והחשק להתורה... אחר הקריאה והלימוד שהתורה בעצמה נותנת בו חשק
Tiferet Shlomo, on the festivals, Birkat HaTorahRabbi Tzvi Elimelech of Dinov (a Chassidic master in Poland who died in 1841) notices the tenses in the blessing "who chose us," which we also say every morning. First we say God "gave" us His Torah, which is finished. Then we say "Giver of the Torah," which is still going on. He ties this to the great voice at Sinai, which the Aramaic translation of the Torah says "did not stop." So when you work to understand what was already given, even the plain laws, he says, new Torah comes out of you. Now read the first blessing again.
נותן התורה היינו נותן כעת בכל עידן ועידן
Bnei Yissaschar, Sivan, essay 5, section 7Rabbi Gershon Henoch Leiner of Radzin (a Chassidic rebbe in Poland who died in 1891) explains why there is also a blessing after the reading. The first blessing, he says, gets you ready to receive Torah and reminds you that God gives it all the time. Then you might start to think God depends on you being ready. So the last blessing says God "planted eternal life within us." The vessel you hold out to receive the Torah is itself from God, and he says that vessel is the "eternal life."
שהכלי קיבול בעצמו שמעמיד האדם הוא נמי מהשי"ת
Sod Yesharim, Simchat TorahThe Sefat Emet (Rabbi Yehudah Aryeh Leib Alter of Ger, a Chassidic leader who died in 1905) takes "eternal life planted within us" at its word. The root of Torah, he says, is already in every Jew. But it is buried in the heart, so you have to work to find it, as Mishlei says: "If you seek it like silver, and search for it like hidden treasure." He adds that mitzvot and good deeds are the tools for that digging. He means especially the Oral Torah, the Sages' teachings that explain the written text. Now read "planted within us" again.
שנמצא שורש התורה בכל איש ישראל כמ"ש חיי עולם נטע בתוכנו. רק שצריכין לייגע למצוא הנקודה טמונה בלב
Sefat Emet, Parashat VayigashThis prayer opens with "Bless Hashem," God's Name alone. When ten people say Birkat Hamazon (the blessing after meals), the call is "let us bless our God." The Tosafot Yom Tov (a commentary on the Mishnah from the 1600s) noticed the difference. Rabbi Tzadok of Lublin (a Chassidic thinker who died in 1900) answers in the Peri Tzadik. The Torah is called by God's Name, and the Name by itself takes no ending like "our." In the written Torah everyone is equal. But each person's bread is set aside just for them, so there you count yourself in.
ובברכת התורה שהוא על תורה שבכתב אומרים ברכו את ה׳ בשם הוי' שהוא בלא צירוף והיינו הכל בשוה
Peri Tzadik, Shavuot 25; Tosafot Yom Tov on Mishnah Berakhot 7:3The practical laws. For a final ruling, ask your rav.
Yes. The Shulchan Aruch (the main code of Jewish law) rules that the one called up must hold the Torah scroll while saying the blessing. The Rema (Rabbi Moshe Isserles, who added Ashkenazi practice to it) says this custom rests on Yehoshua 1:8, where the book of the Torah "will not leave your mouth." The Mishnah Berurah (a central commentary on the code, around 1900) says to hold the wooden handles, and that you hold on during the reading too. After the reading, the custom is to kiss the Torah.
Shulchan Aruch and Rema, Orach Chaim 139:11; Mishnah Berurah 139:35First, at the place. The Shulchan Aruch says to find the verse where the reading begins, and only then bless. The Mishnah Berurah gives the reason: so you know what you are blessing over. The Rema adds that during the first blessing you turn your head to the side (he says to your left), so it does not look as if the blessing is written in the Torah. The Mishnah Berurah also brings later authorities who say turning away looks like you are not blessing on the reading. They say it is better to close your eyes.
Shulchan Aruch and Rema, Orach Chaim 139:4; Mishnah Berurah 139:16 and 139:19Yes. The Shulchan Aruch rules that Barchu and the blessings are said out loud, and whoever whispers them is making a mistake. Some say he must go back and say them again out loud. The Rema gives the reason: so the people hear and answer. The Mishnah Berurah reads the Rema as holding that only Barchu must be repeated. If the blessings themselves were whispered, they still count, but out loud is right from the start.
Shulchan Aruch and Rema, Orach Chaim 139:6; Mishnah Berurah 139:25Yes, the one with the words "who chose us." The Shulchan Aruch rules that even if you just said the morning Torah blessing for yourself and are called up right away, you say "asher bachar banu" again. It was set up for the honor of the Torah when it is read in public. If you are called up before saying your own morning Torah blessings, you are already covered for that one. The Mishnah Berurah adds that you still say the rest of them later.
Shulchan Aruch, Orach Chaim 139:8-9; Mishnah Berurah 139:32The Shulchan Aruch says someone who cannot read should not go up, unless he is the only Kohen or Levi and can read each word from the scroll after the reader says it. The Mishnah Berurah says our custom is more lenient: the reader always reads aloud from the scroll, and hearing him counts as if you said it. (The reader always reads, he explains, so that no one who cannot read is embarrassed.) The Shulchan Aruch adds that the person called up must still read along quietly, so that his blessing is not for nothing.
Shulchan Aruch, Orach Chaim 139:2 and 141:2; Mishnah Berurah 139:12-13 and 141:8The Shulchan Aruch rules: go up to the reading platform by the shorter way from your seat, and come down by the longer way. If both are equal, go up on the right-hand side and down the opposite one. The Mishnah Berurah's reasons: the short way so the congregation does not wait, and to show the Torah is dear to you; the long way so leaving does not look like a burden. Go quickly when called, but do not run. A line added to the text, citing an older source, says not to go down until the next reader has come up.
Shulchan Aruch, Orach Chaim 141:7; Mishnah Berurah 141:22-26The Gemara says that in principle anyone counts toward the seven Shabbat aliyot, even a minor or a woman. But it goes on: the Sages said a woman should not read from the Torah in public, out of respect for the congregation. The Shulchan Aruch rules that way. A boy under 13 can count if he knows Who is being blessed. The Mishnah Berurah reports that today, boys under 13 are not called to any aliyah except maftir (the last one, which adds a reading from the Prophets).
Megillah 23a; Shulchan Aruch, Orach Chaim 282:3; Mishnah Berurah 282:12הַפּוֹתֵחַ וְהַחוֹתֵם בַּתּוֹרָה, מְבָרֵךְ לְפָנֶיהָ וּלְאַחֲרֶיהָ
The one who begins the Torah reading and the one who finishes it bless before it and after it.
והאידנא דכולהו מברכי לפניה ולאחריה היינו טעמא דתקינו רבנן גזירה משום הנכנסין ומשום היוצאין
And now that everyone blesses before and after, this is why the Sages set it up: a protective rule because of those coming in and those going out.
שאם יכנס אדם לבית הכנסת אחר שבירך ראשון ואם לא ישמע את האחרים מברכין יאמר אין ברכה בתורה לפניה
If a person comes into the synagogue after the first reader has blessed, and does not hear the others bless, he will say there is no blessing before the Torah.
הלכה כמי שהוא אומר פותח ורואה ומברך... וכפתחו עמדו כל העם ומה כתיב בתריה ויברך עזרא
The practice follows the one who says: he opens, looks, and blesses... "As he opened it, all the people stood." And what is written after it? "And Ezra blessed."
מַעֲשֵׂה בְּרַבִּי עֲקִיבָא שֶׁקְּרָאוֹ הַחַזָּן בָּרַבִּים לִקְרוֹת בְּסֵפֶר תּוֹרָה בַּצִּבּוּר, וְלֹא רָצָה לַעֲלוֹת
A story about Rabbi Akiva: the leader called him in public to read from the Torah scroll, and he did not want to go up.
נִמְנְעוּ מִלְּהָבִיא, הִתְקִינוּ שֶׁיְּהוּ מַקְרִין אֶת מִי שֶׁיּוֹדֵעַ וְאֶת מִי שֶׁאֵינוֹ יוֹדֵעַ
People stopped bringing, so they decreed that they would feed the words to those who know and to those who do not.
ואף על פי שכבר בירך על התורה בבוקר קודם פרשת הקרבנות חוזר ומברך אשר בחר בנו כשקורא בתורה ולא הוי ברכה לבטלה דמשום כבוד תורה נתקנה כשקורא בציבור
Even though he already blessed on the Torah in the morning, before the passage on the offerings, he blesses "who chose us" again when he reads from the Torah. It is not a wasted blessing, because it was set up out of respect for the Torah when read in public.
תורת אמת היא תורה שבכתב וחיי עולם נטע בתוכנו היא תורה שבע"פ... ושתי ברכות אלו יש בהם מ' תיבות כנגד מ' ימים שעמד משה בהר
"The Torah of truth" is the Written Torah, and "eternal life planted in us" is the Oral Torah... These two blessings have forty words, matching the forty days Moshe stood on the mountain.
לפי שאינה עץ חיים עד שיחזיק בה שנאמר עץ חיים היא למחזיקים בה אבל משהחזיק בה וקרא בה מברכין חיי עולם נטע בתוכנו
Because it is not a tree of life until he holds on to it, as it says, "It is a tree of life to those who hold on to it." But once he has held it and read from it, we bless: eternal life planted in us.
בהכרח שכל העולים יברכו, דאם לא כן במה ניכר שעולים לתורה
Necessarily everyone called up must bless, because otherwise how would anyone know they were called up to the Torah?
Torah Tech is a beit midrash in Tel Aviv built for personal and professional growth: Torah learning at the center of every day, and internships at Israeli startups. It is the year a future Jewish leader realizes who he can become, and chooses to become it.