Standing for MiSheBerachs and certain other communal Tefilloth

Question

In many congregations (especially the YU/OU/Young Israel affiliated) it is customary - sometimes even announced from the podium - to stand for the prayer for the State of Israel and the Israeli armed forces. In my current Shul, the prayer for the U.S. is also recited at the same interval and everyone stands throughout. But in the Shul I attended my entire childhood through adolescence, all of these were recited by the rabbi while the Torah was on the Bimah, immediately following the MiSheBerach(s) for the sick.

It is almost universal (with one notable exception that I can think of) that nobody is asked to stand, and that nobody specifically rises, for the MiSheBerachs for the sick. Hence, in my childhood Shul, nobody rose for any of these Tefilloth.

Why is it so commonly accepted that one must rise for the former but not for the latter type of communal Tefillah?

Answer 1

Asking the congregation to stand for prayer X accomplishes two things:

• It highlights that we believe in saying prayer X, and the value of X. (Such as a government.)

• It [hopefully] helps with synagogue decorum. I've seen shuls institute standing for the Mi SheBerach for the ill to help cut down on the chitchat that goes on while reciting a long list of names.

Answer 2

Many (but not all) prayer customs are just that - customs. Customs develop organically, without a conscious "Authorized Halakhic Rationale" serving as the reason why they should be enacted. They just develop - for sociological, or impromptu, or it-just-feels-right-and-makes-spiritual-sense reasibs - and if they organically catch on, well, then its a custom!

We can certainly guess as to the sociological reasons why standing for these mishebareich's developed and spread (way of expressing these prayers' particular spiritual importance in the lives of the congregation). But we would BE NAIVE to assume that one day someone got up and said: "For this particular reason and that particular reason we should now start doing X."

The same can be said for standing/sitting for kaddish, or answering Amen vs/ Brich Hu, or standing up during the end of Tachanun. Unless you have good reason to think that early on someone got up and gave a guiding reason, the minhag probably just developed organically.

After the fact, we can and should "read" these customs for the values they express. After all, these customs express the holy "Intuition of the Masses" of the Jewish people. No one got up and gave an explicit reason to start things off, but the community as a whole were attracted to some grammatical/spiritual/liturgical/halakhic truth which made them - as an organic mass - develop a given practice.

So too with standing/sitting for MiSheBareich's. Without any direct Halakhic order from above, the Jewish people are organically sensing certain liturgical/spiritual truths which make standing up obvious and appropriate for at some times, and less necessary at other times. If the custom really spreads and solidifies, then in a few centuries, expect Rabbis to look back and try to "read" these customs for the values they express.