Blessed Be the Name of His Glory

This line, "Blessed be the name of the glory of His kingdom for ever and ever", is said immediately after the first verse of the Shema, the declaration of God's oneness that stands at the centre of Jewish prayer. Unlike the verses of the Shema themselves, which are drawn from the Torah, this response is not biblical, and the tradition preserves a striking custom around it: it is normally said in an undertone, a practice the Talmud explains through a story in which the patriarch Jacob's sons affirm their faith to him and he responds with these words, so that Israel says quietly what was first spoken privately, except on the Day of Atonement, when it is proclaimed aloud, as the angels are said to praise God. The line functions as a congregation's affirmation of God's kingship, appended to the confession of his unity, and its hushed recitation is one of the small, distinctive gestures of the daily liturgy.