A bilingual Hebrew-English maḥzor for the festival of Sukkot, Shemini Atseret and Simḥat Torah, nusaḥ sefarad, with a translation for Rabbi David de Aaron de Sola, revised and edited by Moses Gaster.

The Opening Prayer given in the U.S. House of Representatives on 16 February 1905.

The prayer-poem, “Take Me Under Your Wing” (1905) by Ḥayyim Naḥman Bialik.

The poem, Ayekh (Where are you?), by Ḥayyim Naḥman Bialik.

This is Joseph Magil’s linear bilingual Hebrew-Yiddish siddur containing two volumes: the first for weekdays and the second for shabbat and festival days. The second volume appears immediately after the first volume ends on page 192, and uses its own separate pagination.

A bilingual Hebrew-English maḥzor for Yom Kippur prepared from Hebrew text fixed by Wolf Heidenheim, arranged and translated by Arthur Davis and Herbert Adler.

A bilingual Hebrew-English maḥzor for Yom Kippur, nusaḥ sefarad, with a translation for Rabbi David de Aaron de Sola, revised and edited by Moses Gaster, amended by Rabbi David Bueno de Mesquita.

This translation of Ḥayyim Naḥman Bialik’s “Shabbat ha-Malkah” by Israel Meir Lask can be found on pages 280-281 in the Sabbath Prayer Book (Jewish Reconstructionist Foundation, 1945) where it appears as “Greeting to Queen Sabbath.” The poem is based on the shabbat song, “Shalom Alekhem” and first published in the poetry collection, Hazamir, in 1903. I have made a faithful transcription of the Hebrew and its English translation as it appears in the Sabbath Prayer Book. The first stanza of Lask’s translation was adapted from an earlier translation made by Angie Irma Cohon and published in 1920 in Song and Praise for Sabbath Eve (1920), p. 87. (Cohon’s translation of Bialik’s second stanza of “Shabbat ha-Malkah” does not appear to have been adapted by Lask.)

The poem, “Im Shamesh” (At Sunrise) by Ḥayyim Naḥman Bialik in June 1903.

A Selection of Prayers, Psalms, and Other Scriptural Passages, and Hymns… (Jewish Religious Union 1903) is the expanded second, revised provisional edition of the nascent Jewish Religious Union of London, the pioneering Liberal (Reform movement) congregation in the United Kingdom.

A prayerbook compiled for Rodeph Shalom, a Reform movement congregation in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

A Selection of Prayers, Psalms, and Other Scriptural Passages, and Hymns for Use at the Services of the Jewish Religious Union, London (1902) is the original “provisional” edition of the nascent Jewish Religious Union of London, the pioneering Liberal (Reform movement) congregation in the United Kingdom.

תפלות ישראל Izraelitički Molitvenik is a bilingual Hebrew-Croatian everyday prayerbook in the liturgical custom of Ashkenaz, compiled and translated in 1891 by Rabbi Dr. Gavro Schwarz z”l (1872-1942).

A popular 20th century piyyut.

A bilingual Hebrew-English siddur, nusaḥ sefarad, with a translation for Rabbi David de Aaron de Sola, revised and edited by Moses Gaster.

The poem “Tsafririm” (1900) by Ḥayyim Naḥman Bialik with an English translation by Ben Aronin.

The piyyut, Ma Navu Alei, in Hebrew with an English translation.

A piyyut in honor of the Torah.

The popular table song calling for the redemption of the Messianic age in Tsiyon.

A digital reproduction of a Shiviti held in the Royal Library of Denmark’s Simonsen Manuscripts Collection.

The piyyut, Refa Tsiri, in Hebrew with an English translation.

The 7th of Adar is the traditional date for the yahrzeit of Moshe Rabbeinu and it is also remembered as the day of his birth 120 years earlier. This variation of of the piyyut, Hanenu Yah Hanenu (Forgive Us Yah, Forgive Us), sung on 7 Adar, is attributed to Rabbi Yosef Ḥayyim of Baghdad (the Ben Ish Ḥai, 1832-1909). The earliest published version we could find appears in בקשות: ונוסף עוד פתיחות ופיוטים הנוהגים לומר בזמה הזה (1912) containing piyyutim by Israel ben Moses Najara (1555-1625), a Jewish liturgical poet, preacher, Biblical commentator, kabbalist, and rabbi of Gaza. The contemporary audio recording of the Iraqi nusaḥ presented here was made by משה חבושה (Moshe Ḥavusha).

The project page for the transcription and translation of the Seder al-Tawḥid for Rosh Ḥodesh Nissan.

A piyyut and table song for Shabbat by the chief rabbi of the Ottoman Empire.

An original poem composed by Alice Julia Lucas and selected for the 19th Shabbat (i.e., Parashat Terumah) in the cycle of annual readings of the Torah portion in her anthology of poetry and translated piyyutim, The Jewish Year (1898), pp. 42-43.

A Prayer for American Victory in the Spanish-American War by Rabbi Joshua Seigel (1846-1910), New York: Eliakum Zunser, [1898].

Birkonim (bentschers) with table songs sung on the Sabbath with accompanying translations are now commonplace, but they not always were. The first major collection with accompanying translations was Dr. Leo Hirschfeld’s בזמרות נריע לו Die häuslichen Sabbathgesänge für Freitag⸗Abend, Sabbath⸗Tag und Sabbath⸗Ausgang (1898), an anthology of Sabbath table songs organized according to their traditional feast (Sabbath night, day, and Sabbath afternoon) in the Ashkenazi tradition.

The first edition of the Union Hymnal by the Central Conference of American Rabbis.

Siddur Qorban Minḥah, a Jewish prayerbook collecting the customs of the school of the ARI z”l, accompanied by tkhines and translations in Yiddish.

On 13 May 18967, Joseph Ezekiel Rajpurkar offered this prayer in Hebrew with translations in Marathi and English, on behalf of the congregation of the Gates of Prayer Synagogue (Bombay/Mumbai), for the 100th anniversary of the synagogue’s founding in 1796.

On 20 June 1897, Joseph Ezekiel Rajpurkar offered this civic prayer in Hebrew with translations in Marathi and English, on behalf of the congregation of the Gates of Prayer Synagogue (Bombay/Mumbai), for the 50th anniversary of the reign of Queen Victoria over the British Empire.

A desperate plea offered during the outbreak of the bubonic plague in Bombay (Mumbai) in 1896.

This is Rabbi Emil Hirsch’s 1896 translation and adaption of Rabbi David Einhorn’s original German volumes of עלת תמיד Olath Tamid. (This edition followed after the first English translation that was published in 1872.) Besides his adapted translation, Hirsch also introduced a number of other changes which he summarized in his preface.

On Tisha be’Av, Jewish communities all over the world add a paragraph called Tefilat Naḥem (the prayer of comfort) to the standard daily Amidah (either for the afternoon service or for all services) praying for a return to Jerusalem. The traditional text discusses Jerusalem being defiled, in the hands of the idol worshipers, putting our people to the sword. But post-1967, Jerusalem has been under Israeli control, and this text has, to many people, felt no longer appropriate in the face of a Jerusalem being rebuilt. Many have written their own versions of a new Tefilat Naḥem for a Jerusalem under Israeli control, but I have felt dissatisfied with a lot of these. Some treat Jerusalem as already fully redeemed, which any glance at the news tells you isn’t the case. Others treat the major step in redeeming Jerusalem as building the Temple, but this seems to me to be only one eschatological part of a larger hope for Jerusalem. Jews have often considered the peace of Jerusalem to be a microcosm of the peace of all the earth. Thus for the Shabbat and Yom Tov Hashkivenu we pray for God to “spread the shelter of peace over us, all Israel, and Jerusalem.” The name Jerusalem, ירושלים, has been analyzed as “they will see peace” יראו שלום, since the peace of Jerusalem means all will see peace. But it’s clear that the peace of Jerusalem is not final or eternal, and it remains a city on the edge of a knife. So my version of Tefilat Naḥem prays not for a return, nor for a Temple, but for the peace of Jerusalem. It can be used at the same time as the standard Tefilat Naḥem (as an extension of the Birkat Yerushalayim in the Shmoneh Esreh for Tisha b’Av) or on its own. Thus I used four asterisks (a tetrapuncta) instead of God’s name, for those who would prefer to avoid a b’rakhah levatalah. Those who would prefer to use this blessing in the Amidah itself could replace the tetrapuncta with the name itself.

The first edition of the Union Prayer Book (part one), the official prayerbook of the Reform Movement in the United States of America until its revision.

Before HaTikvah was chosen, Ḥayyim Naḥman Bialik’s “People’s Blessing” (בִּרְכַּת עָם, also known by its incipit תֶחֱזַֽקְנָה Teḥezaqnah) was once considered for the State of Israel’s national anthem. Bialik was 21 years old when he composed the work in 1894. It later was chosen as the anthem of the Labor Zionist movement. We hereby present the first ever complete English translation of this poem.

The poem “Gamodei Layil” (Gnomes of the Night) by Ḥayyim Naḥman Bialik, ca. 1894.

The first edition of the Union Prayer Book (part two), a maḥzor for Rosh haShanah and Yom Kippur.

A prayerbook compiled for Beth Ahaḇa, a Reform movement congregation in Richmond, Virginia.

A prayer for the end of a cholera epidemic written by Rabbi Dr. Moses Gaster in 1892.

A bilingual Hebrew-Ladino Sefaradi siddur from the Ottoman Empire.

Before the Koren-Sacks Siddur (2009), there was the Authorised Daily Prayer Book first published in 1890 and used by Jews throughout the British Empire, while there was a British Empire. It was originally published under the authorization of Great Britain’s first Chief Rabbi, Rabbi Nathan Marcus Adler with a Hebrew liturgy based on Isaac Seligman Baer’s Seder Avodat Yisroel (1868). The translation by Rabbi Simeon Singer (1846-1906) was the most extensive English translation of the Siddur ever published, and for this reason most editions are simply referred colloquially as The Singer Siddur. The Standard Prayer Book, published by Bloch in 1915, was an American reprint of The Authorized Daily Prayer Book.

The proclamation and prayer of chief rabbi Yaakov Yosef, on the centennial of President George Washington’s Inauguration

This “Shir Mizmor l’Purim” by Rabbi Sabato Morais (we think) was first published in The Jewish Exponent on 15 March 1889. It was preserved by Rabbi Sabato Morais in his ledger, an archive of newsclippings recording material he contributed to the press, among other announcements.

A comprehensive (“kol bo”) siddur in the liturgical tradition of the eastern Sefaradim, prepared for the Bene Israel community in India.

This prayer by chief rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the British Empire Nathan Marcus Adler is found in an order of service prepared for the celebration of Queen Victoria’s jubilee in 1887.

“God Save the Queen” is an adaptation of “God Save the King,” a work by an unknown author, first circulated in three stanzas during the reign of Britain’s King George Ⅱ, circa 1745. This Hebrew translation was published in a pamphlet circulated by New Road (Whitechapel) Synagogue in 1892 “on the 73rd Birthday of Her Majesty Queen Victoria,” an event attended by then chief rabbi of the British Empire, Rabbi Dr. Hermann Adler​.

This prayer for the well-being of Her Majesty’s military forces in the Sudan, was offered by chief rabbi Nathan Marcus Adler for use by the United Hebrew Congregations of the British Empire in the context of British involvement in the Mahdist War, and specifically after news reached Britain of the Battle of Abu Klea in January 1885.

A prayerbook prepared by Rabbi Edward B.M. Browne according to the Reform movement custom of Temple Gates of Hope (now Prospect Park Synagogue) in 1885.

This is Rabbi Max Landsberg’s public repetition of the weekday amidah as found in his Ritual for Jewish Prayer (1884), pp. 21-28 with adaptations of the traditional blessings found on pp. 52-54.