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With kavod (honor) to “all whose hearts were stirred to share” (kol asher nasa libam, cf. Exodus 36:2-3), this is a searchable index of all liturgists, translators, transcribers, etc. whose work on Jewish prayer, on prayer books, and on public readings is being shared through the Open Siddur Project. After ten years, the total number of project contributors is nearly 800. A little over half have shared their work either directly with the project with an Open Content license, or indirectly by contributing their work into the Public Domain as a contributor to a government publication. Nearly fifty are institutional copyright stewards (operating or defunct for-profit and non-profit entities). The remaining contributors have had their works transcribed from material that has passed into the Public Domain after their deaths. Some transcribed works shared through the Open Siddur project remain unattributed due to unknown authorship. If you find an uncredited or improperly attributed work, please contact us.
To join this community of contributors, please share your work. Making prayers and related religious works available for creative reuse and republication through Open Content licenses is crucial for keeping Jewish culture cross-pollinating, vital, and relevant under the current climate of denominationally identified silos and proprietary-by-default copyright strictures. Prospective contributors should read our Mission Statement, Terms of Use, and Copyleft Policy. The Open Siddur is a non-prescriptive, non-denominational project and invites participation without prejudice towards ethnic heritage, skin color, nationality, belief or non-belief, sex, gender, sexuality or any other consideration.
Rabbi Walter Jacob (b. 1930) in Augsburg, Germany, is a prominent Reform movement rabbi in the United States and Germany. Rabbi Jacob founded and was the first chairperson of the Solomon B. Freehof Institute for Progressive Halakhah and of the Associated American Jewish Museums, which organizes free art exhibits for synagogues and Jewish centers. He emigrated to the United States in 1940, narrowly avoiding the Holocaust in Europe. He received his BA from Drury College (Springfield, Missouri, 1950) and ordination and an M.H.L. from Hebrew Union College in 1955. Immediately following, he was named assistant rabbi at Rodef Shalom Congregation in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, under Rabbi Solomon Freehof. He served as a chaplain in the U.S. Air Force in the Philippines during the years 1955–57. He earned his D.H.L. in 1961 from HUC-JIR. In 1966, Jacob succeeded Freehof as senior rabbi, becoming emeritus in 1997. He was adjunct professor at the Pittsburgh Theological Seminary (1968–74). He took a leading role in interfaith dialogue with his book Christianity through Jewish Eyes (1974, 2007) which brought him into a close friendship with Cardinal John Wright and Cardinal Donald W. Wuerl. He was president of the Religious Education Association of America (1981–85) Jacob served the Reform movement in the United States as president of CCAR (1991–93). His interest and expertise in Jewish law led him to serve as chairman of the Responsa Committee of the CCAR (1974–1990). and chairman of the International Responsa Committee of the World Union for Progressive Judaism (WUPJ). He served as president of the Religious Education Association of the United States (1981–85). He and his wife (Irène Jacob) established the largest Biblical Botanical Garden in North America in 1986 and published in that field. He also wrote on interfaith issues. Jacob served as overseer of HUC-JIR, Vice-President of the World Union for Progressive Judaism (1990–94), and chairman of the Publications Committee of Hebrew Union College Press (1976–1999). As CCAR president, he emphasized a broader Reform interpretation of the halakhah. As the sixteenth generation of rabbis, he has continued the work of Benno Jacob's biblical commentaries. Jacob has published 43 books and more than twelve hundred essays, sermons, and monographs on a range of topics which include responsa, Jewish theology, biblical studies, interfaith dialogue, modern Jewish problems, and gardening together with his wife, Irene Jacob. He received a D.D. from Drury College in 1990. Also in 1990, he along with a small group re-established Liberal Judaism in Germany. For several years he served as the Honorary Liberal Rabbi of Munich, Germany and in 1998 was co-founder of the Abraham Geiger College, the first rabbinic seminary in Central Europe since the Holocaust in Berlin/Potsdam. He continues as its President and has ordained six classes. He was made a Knight Commander of the Federal Republic of Germany in 1999 and received the Commander of the Equestrian Order of St. Gregory the Great from Pope John Paul II in 2004. The city of Augsburg honored him with a special award in 2014.
Rabbi Cheryl Jacobs is Director of ISH, a spiritual source and service that provides comfort, community, education, celebration and growth rooted in Jewish wisdom. She also serves as the as well as a Chaplain for the Hollywood, Florida Police Department. Rabbi Jacobs served Director of the Jewish Healing Center at Jewish Family Service of Broward County and Assistant Rabbi at Temple Kol Ami Emanu-El in Plantation, Florida. Rabbi Cheryl was ordained as a Rabbi by The Jewish Theological Seminary and holds an MA from Yale University and a BA from Hobart-William Smith.
Rabbi Jill Jacobs is the Executive Director of T’ruah. She is the author of Where Justice Dwells: A Hands-On Guide to Doing Social Justice in Your Jewish Community and There Shall Be No Needy: Pursuing Social Justice through Jewish Law and Tradition, both published by Jewish Lights. Rabbi Jacobs has been named three times to the Forward’s list of 50 influential American Jews, to Newsweek’s list of the 50 Most Influential Rabbis in America, and to the Jerusalem Post’s 2013 list of “Women to Watch.” She holds rabbinic ordination and an MA in Talmud from the Jewish Theological Seminary, where she was a Wexner Fellow; an MS in Urban Affairs from Hunter College, and a BA from Columbia University. She is also a graduate of the Mandel Institute Jerusalem Fellows Program.
Mark X. Jacobs was the Founding Executive Director of the Coalition on the Environment and Jewish Life (COEJL, from 1994 to 2003). Under his leadership, COEJL grew from a short-term project of the National Religious Partnership for the Environment into a permanent coalition of 29 national Jewish agencies with affiliated institutions across North America. Mark X. Jacobs currently serves as a Senior Mediator and Program Manager at the Meridian Institute, where he designs and facilitates collaborative processes that help diverse parties identify critical issues, build relationships and trust, construct innovative solutions, and implement durable decisions. Mark is currently focused on multistakeholder efforts to address challenges at the intersection of agriculture, environment, and public policy.
Rabbi Abby Jacobson serves the community of Emmanuel Synagogue in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
Rabbanit Bracha Jaffe is a proud graduate of Yeshivat Maharat, following her soul after a career in hi-tech. Equally at home in Israel and in the US, she feels honored to be a member of the clergy team at the Bayit.
Rabbi Marisa Elana James is a graduate of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College and a long-time member of the CBST community. Before rabbinical school, Marisa was a college English teacher, competitive ballroom dancer, insurance broker, student pilot, bookstore manager, and professional Torah reader. As a teenager growing up in Connecticut, she was a co-founder of her high school’s GSA, the second to be founded in the state. While living in Jerusalem for more than five years, Marisa worked for Encounter Programs, taught Introduction to Judaism classes in Jerusalem and Bethlehem, studied at a wide variety of schools (including Reform, Conservative, Orthodox, secular, and non-Jewish settings), and helped create and lead the rabbinical student program for T’ruah: The Rabbinic Call for Human Rights, where she most recently worked. Marisa has also taught English at the University of Connecticut and Rutgers, and acted as cantor for communities in Israel and America.
Marcus Jastrow (June 5, 1829, Rogoźno – October 13, 1903) was a Polish-born American Talmudic scholar, most famously known for his authorship of the popular and comprehensive A Dictionary of the Targumim, Talmud Babli, Talmud Yerushalmi and Midrashic Literature. He was also a progressive, early reformist rabbi in America. Along with Benjamin Szold and Frederick de Sola Mendes, Marcus Jastrow was characterized by Jewish historian Jacob Rader Marcus as being on the right-wing of early American Reform. His translation of Rabbi Benjamin Szold's prayerbook into English offered a more traditional alternative to the Minhag America prayerbook of Isaac M. Wise. He opposed the 1885 Pittsburgh Platform, but consented for an organ to be installed in his Rodeph Shalom synagogue in Philadelphia.
Thomas Jefferson (April 13, 1743 – July 4, 1826) was an American statesman, diplomat, lawyer, architect, and Founding Father who served as the third president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. Previously, he had served as the second vice president of the United States from 1797 to 1801. The principal author of the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson was a proponent of democracy, republicanism, and individual rights, motivating American colonists to break from the Kingdom of Great Britain and form a new nation; he produced formative documents and decisions at both the state and national level.During the American Revolution, he represented Virginia in the Continental Congress that adopted the Declaration, drafted the law for religious freedom as a Virginia legislator, and served as the second Governor of Virginia from 1779 to 1781, during the American Revolutionary War. He became the United States Minister to France in May 1785, and subsequently the nation's first secretary of state under President George Washington from 1790 to 1793. Jefferson and James Madison organized the Democratic-Republican Party to oppose the Federalist Party during the formation of the First Party System. With Madison, he anonymously wrote the controversial Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions in 1798 and 1799, which sought to strengthen states' rights by nullifying the federal Alien and Sedition Acts.As president, Jefferson pursued the nation's shipping and trade interests against Barbary pirates and aggressive British trade policies. He also organized the Louisiana Purchase, almost doubling the country's territory. As a result of peace negotiations with France, his administration reduced military forces. He was reelected in 1804. Jefferson's second term was beset with difficulties at home, including the trial of former vice president Aaron Burr. American foreign trade was diminished when Jefferson implemented the Embargo Act of 1807, responding to British threats to U.S. shipping. In 1803, Jefferson began a controversial process of Indian tribe removal to the newly organized Louisiana Territory, and he signed the Act Prohibiting Importation of Slaves in 1807. After retiring from public office, Jefferson founded the University of Virginia.Jefferson, while primarily a planter, lawyer and politician, mastered many disciplines, which ranged from surveying and mathematics to horticulture and mechanics. He was an architect in the classical tradition. Jefferson's keen interest in religion and philosophy led to his presidency of the American Philosophical Society; he shunned organized religion but was influenced by both Christianity and deism. A philologist, Jefferson knew several languages. He was a prolific letter writer and corresponded with many prominent people. His only full-length book is Notes on the State of Virginia (1785), considered perhaps the most important American book published before 1800.Although regarded as a leading spokesman for democracy and republicanism in the era of the Enlightenment, Jefferson's historical legacy is mixed. Some modern scholarship has been critical of Jefferson's private life, pointing out the contradiction between his ownership of the large numbers of slaves that worked his plantations and his famous declaration that "all men are created equal". Another point of controversy stems from the evidence that after his wife Martha died in 1782, Jefferson fathered children with Martha's half-sister, Sally Hemings, who was his slave. Despite this, presidential scholars and historians generally praise his public achievements, including his advocacy of religious freedom and tolerance in Virginia. Jefferson continues to rank highly among U.S. presidents.
Jewish Democratic Women for Action (JDWA), founded in 2021, is a large, diverse network of Jewish women in the United States volunteering to help the Biden-Harris administration build back better.
The Jewish Labor Committee was formed in February, 1934, by Yiddish-speaking immigrant trade union leaders. In the beginning the purpose was to rescue Jews and Trade Unionists from certain death at the hands of Nazis. The JLC’s leadership helped secure U.S. visas for 2000 union leaders and their families in Eastern Europe, France, Germany, Italy, Austria and Belgium. The JLC also raised almost $300,000 to buy weapons that were smuggled into the Warsaw Ghetto. Following the war, the Jewish Labor Committee helped settle refugees and helped them find jobs and set up a Holocaust education program. In 1951 the Jewish Labor Committee, through the Jewish Council for Public Affairs (JCPA), became the official the voice of labor in the Jewish community, speaking in the name of 500,000 North American workers. It was also the voice of the Jewish community in the labor community. After World War II, the JLC focused more on domestic issues, such as anti-discrimination, desegregation and civil rights, the Grape boycott, and the development of trade union human rights programs. It has also worked to protect Soviet Jewry. The JLC organizes support for Israel among the labor community.More recently the National Jewish Labor Committee has focused on the Hyatt Hotel Boycott, supporting Walmart workers as they demand respect and decent working conditions, and immigration reform.
The Jewish Language Project, an initiative of HUC-JIR, promotes research on, awareness about, and engagement surrounding the many languages spoken and written by Jews throughout history and around the world. They accomplish this by recording interviews and songs by native speakers, sharing unique content on social media, and producing high-quality online events that both teach about and celebrate Jewish languages. They convene the Jewish Language Consortium, a group of ten partner organizations with the shared mission of Jewish language preservation and education.
Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan saw no need to start a separate movement to achieve his goal of creating a unified American Judaism without denominational factionalism. However, his followers believed that, if Kaplan’s visions were to be realized, a separate movement was needed. Therefore, in 1940, the Jewish Reconstructionist Foundation was established to support the works that promoted the Reconstructionist program.
The Jewish Religious Union of London was founded in 1902 by it principal organizer, Lily Montagu, with Claude Montefiore as its most visible leader serving as its president. The members of the initial leadership committee, besides Montagu and Montefiore, were: Oswald Simon, Henrietta Franklin (Lily Montagu's eldest sister), Rabbi Simeon Singer and Rabbi A. A. Green (both Orthodox rabbis), Morris Joseph, Albert Jessel (an honorary officer of the United Synagogue), N.S. Joseph, and Isidore Spielman (President of the Jewish Historical Society, an ex-warden of the New West End Synagogue. (Jessel and, Spielman were also cousins of Lily Montagu.) Simeon Singer and Albert Jesel served as vice-presidents. The group's activities ultimately gave rise a decade later to the Liberal Jewish Synagogue of London.
The Jewish War Veterans of the United States of America (also referred to as the Jewish War Veterans of the U.S.A., the Jewish War Veterans, or JWV) is an American Jewish veterans' organization created in 1896 by American Civil War veterans to raise awareness of contributions made by Jewish service members. (JWV holds a Congressional charter under Title 36 of the United States Code.) The organization has an estimated 15,000 members, ranging from World War Ⅱ to current conflicts and active duty personnel. It is the oldest active national veterans' service organization in America.
Rabbi Morris David Joseph (28 May 1848, in London – 17 April 1930) studied at Jews' College, London, and in 1868 was appointed rabbi of the North London Synagogue; in 1874 he went to the Old Hebrew Congregation of Liverpool, where he officiated as preacher until 1882. He became delegate senior minister of the West London Synagogue in 1893, when David Woolf Marks retired from active service. Joseph published a collection of sermons, The Ideal in Judaism, London, 1893, and a valuable popular work on Jewish theology, Judaism as Creed and Life, in 1903.
Yaaqov Yosef (also, Jacob Joseph, יעקב יוסף 1840 –July 28, 1902) served as chief rabbi of New York City's Association of American Orthodox Hebrew Congregations, a federation of Eastern European Jewish synagogues. Born in Krozhe, a province of Kovno, he studied in the Nevyozer Kloiz under Rabbi Yisrael Salanter and in the Volozhin yeshiva under the Netziv. In Volozhin, he was known as "Rav Yaakov Charif" (Rabbi Jacob Sharp) because of his sharp mind. He became successively rabbi of Vilon in 1868, Yurburg in 1870, Zhagory and then Kovno. His fame as a preacher spread, so that in 1883 the community of Vilna selected him as its maggid.In the 1880s, the mainly Orthodox and Eastern European Ashkenazi Jewish community of New York wanted to be united under a common religious authority and founded the Association of American Orthodox Hebrew Congregations—comprising 18 congregations and headed by Beth Hamedrash Hagadol. They sent a circular offering the post throughout Eastern Europe. Rabbi Yaaqov Yosef was among those offered the position and, in 1888, accepted it. The Association attempted to create one central rabbinic authority in America. Without the support of other factions of the Jewish community and hostility from anti-religious groups, their idea ultimately failed. Although Joseph fought a losing battle in the kosher meat and poultry industry, he managed to achieve some notable accomplishments, including the hiring of qualified shoḥtim, introducing irremovable seals ("plumba") to identify kosher birds, and setting up Mashgiḥim to oversee slaughter houses. He also took an active role in establishing the Etz Chaim Yeshiva—the first yeshiva on the Lower East Side, which was founded in 1886. (adapted from the article, "Jacob Joseph" on wikipedia.)
Rabbi Leo Jung (June 20, 1892 in Uherský Brod, Moravia – December 19, 1987 in New York City, United States) was one of the major architects of American Orthodox Judaism.
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