Rif Brachot 24a

24a

{Brachot 34a}
Gemara:
The Sages learnt {in a brayta}: If one is asked to pass before the Ark, he ought to refuse, and if he does not refuse he resembles a dish without salt; but if he persists too much in refusing he resembles a dish which is over-salted. How should he act? The first time he should refuse; the second time he should hesitate; the third time he should stretch out his legs and go down.

Rav Huna said: If he erred in first three blessings, he goes back to the beginning; if in the middle blessings, he goes back to Ata Chonein; if in the last blessings, he goes back to the Avoda {=Retzei}
And Rav Asi said: in the middle ones have no {required} the order. {which would imply that for the middle blessings, he should not have to go back to Ata Chonein}

In this matter, they ruled that the halacha is like Rav Asi, and even though {in the gemara} they ask on Rav Huna from this that it says in the Mishna: "WHERE SHOULD HE COMMENCE? AT THE BEGINNING OF THE BENEDICTION IN WHICH THE OTHER WENT WRONG" {which suggests he would not go back to Ata Chonein} and they answer in the gemara "What to they mean 'the beginning of the blessing that he erred' - the beginning of Ata Chonein, etc., for they {the middle blessings} are all considered a single blessing" - this is just a pro forma answer, and we do not rely on this perfunctory answer and take the Mishna out of its plain meaning - certainly this is the meaning of the matter.

However, we see the Gaon who says that if he errs in the middle ones such that he forgot and omitted a blessing from the middles ones, and remembered after he had passed its place {in the sequence of middle blessings}, since Rav Asi said that they have no {required} order, he may say it in the place that he remembered it, and it is sufficient.

And for us, this saying of the Gaon is difficult, for we explicitly learnt earlier {Brachot daf 28b} that Shimon the Pekuli {=cotton seller} arranged the 18 blessings before Rabban Gamliel in their order in Yavneh. And we learn in Megilla {17a} in the matter of one who redas the Megilla out of order {lemafreia'} does not fulfill his obligation, and we learn {tana - in this case a reference to the Tosefta}: and so for Hallel, and so for reading Shema, and so for prayer {Shemoneh Esrei}. Prayer, from where {do we know}? For we learnt {in a brayta}: Shimon the Pekuli {=cotton seller} arranged the 18 blessings before Rabban Gamliel in their order. And we deduce from here that if one did not recite them in their order does not fulfill hisd obligation. And if so, how can we say that if he forgot a blessing in its place {among the middle blessings} and already recited the next blessing, and afterwards recalls that he erred, that he may say it in the place that he remembered and it is sufficient? Does he not thus nullify the order of the blessings and thus recites them out of order {lemafreia'}? And further, we learn {tnei} explicitly in the Tosefta, for it says there: "One who reads the Megilla and erred and omitted one pasuk should not return and read only that pasuk by itself, but should begin from that pasuk and read until the end. And so too in Hallel, and so too in prayer, and so to in reading Shema." And if you say that Rav Asi said that if he omitted a blessing and later remembered it, that he says it in the place that he remembered, and it is sufficient, then if so, Rav Asi argues on the brayta {in Megilla}, and they would have conclusively disproven him from it, and from the fact that do not conclusively disprove him from it, we deduce that Rav Asi does NOT argue of the brayta, but rather, Rav Asi's opinion deals with one issue and the brayta with another. And this that Rav Asi said "they have no order" is not to say that they have no order at all, but rather that they are not like the first three and last three {blessings}. For in the first three, if he erred in one of them, even the third one, he returns to the head {of the first blessing}, and so too for the last three {that he would return to the first of the last three}, but in the middle ones, if he erred and remembered it after he had passed its place, he does not return to Ata Chonein {the first of the middle blessings}, but rather to the beginning of that specific blessing that he erred in. And Rav Huna holds that in the middle ones, he returns to Ata Chonein, for the middle ones are all like a single blessing, and the halacha is not like him {Rav Huna}.

MISHNA: {We do not have this as a Mishna, and Bach eliminates the Mishna and Gemara designations here and changes it to Tno Rabanan, the Sges learnt [in a brayta]}

These are the blessings in which one bows [in the Tefillah]: In the {blessing of the} patriarchs, beginning and end, and the thanksgiving, beginning and end. If one wants to bow down at the end of each benediction and at the beginning of each benediction, he is instructed not to do so

Gemara: {As noted above, the Bach eliminates this designation}
{Brachot 38b}
Rabbi Tanchum cited Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi: One who prays needs to bow until all the vertebrae of the spine are loosened.
Ulla said: Until an issar {of flesh} is visible {=bulges} opposite his heart.
Rabbi Chanina says: If he simply bows his head, he is not required to do more.
Rava said: And that is when it hurts him {to bow} and shows he would like to bow down. {alternatively, perhaps: And that is when he takes pains to make it appear as if he is bowing - thus, a head motion that appears like he has started to bow}

Yerushalmi Perek MeiEimatai: all bow together with the shliach tzibur in Hoda'a {Modim}.
Rabbi Ze'eira said: And specifically in Modim.
{Brachot 34b}
They learnt {in a brayta}: One who bows in the Hoda'a of Hallel and the Hoda'a of Birchat HaMazon, this is disgraceful.

We learn in perek Hotzi`u lo et haKaf veEt haMachta {Yoma perek 5, daf 53b}: Rabbi Alexandri cited Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi: One who prays needs to take 3 steps backwards