A Prayer for Game Day [Super Bowl ⅬⅩ], by Rabbi Menachem Creditor

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2 February 2026 under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike (CC BY-SA) 4.0 International copyleft license

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21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., athletics, English vernacular prayer, gridiron football

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	Ribbono shel Olam, On this day when many hearts beat in unison and many voices practice the ancient art of hopeful shouting, we thank You for the gift of community, for strangers in the same colors becoming family for an afternoon.
	As once a shepherd ran toward a giant with courage larger than his equipment, may our team play with heart, grit, and a touch of holy chutzpah. As one ancestor wrestled through the night and emerged changed, may there be struggle that brings out blessing, not injury, not bitterness.
	Teach us, as our sages hinted, that true strength is not only in muscle or speed but in restraint, teamwork, and knowing when to pass the ball. Let joy be loud, losses be humane, and tomorrow’s conversations kind.
	And when the final whistle sounds, remind us to breathe, to rest, and to remember that win or lose, we are still on the same team learning how to show up for one another. Amen.

“A Prayer for Game Day” was offered by Rabbi Menachem Creditor and shared through the Open Siddur Project via our discussion group on Facebook, 3 February 2026, in the week preceding “Super Bowl ⅬⅩ” (8 February 2026). The “Super Bowl” is the premiere contest between competing teams in the game of gridiron football, played predominantly in North America, in the United States.

Menachem Creditor

Rabbi Menachem Creditor serves as the Pearl and Ira Meyer Scholar in Residence at UJA-Federation New York and was the founder of Rabbis Against Gun Violence. A frequent speaker in communities and campuses around the United States and Israel with over 1 million views of his online videos and essays, he was named by Newsweek as one of the fifty most influential rabbis in America. His 22 books and 6 albums of original music include the global anthem "Olam Chesed Yibaneh" and the anthologies When We Turned Within and None Shall Make Them Afraid. He has been involved in the leadership of American Jewish World Service, AIPAC, the Rabbinical Assembly, and the One America Movement, an organization dedicated to bringing together Americans of different faiths and opinions. He and his wife Neshama Carlebach live in New York, where they are raising their five children.

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Levi’s Stadium on the day of a 2015 pre-season game between the San Francisco 49ers and Dallas Cowboys (credit: Robert Hernandez Villalta, license: CC0)

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ויהי נעם אדני אלהינו עלינו ומעשה ידינו כוננה עלינו ומעשה ידינו כוננהו׃ (תהלים צ:יז) · "May the pleasantness of אדֹני our elo’ah be upon us; may our handiwork be established for us — our handiwork, may it be established." (Psalms 90:17)

A Prayer for Game Day [Super Bowl ⅬⅩ], by Rabbi Menachem Creditor

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