Jews use the Kaddish to mourn the dead, though it has in it only one word — “nechamata,” consolations – which hints at mourning. And this word itself is used in a puzzling way, once we look at it with care. As we will see below, it may be especially appropriate in time of war. The interpretive English translation below may also be appropriate for prayers of mourning and hope in wartime by other spiritual and religious communities. In this version, changes in the traditional last line of the Hebrew text specifically include not only peace for the people Israel (as in the traditional version) but also for the children of Abraham and Hagar through Ishmael (Arabs and Muslims) and for all the life-forms who dwell upon this planet.

What the Rabbis taught about teaching and learning was that all Torah study should begin and end with blessings, just as eating does. Often, in liberal Jewish circles today, these blessings are not done. But without them, it is easier for Torah study to feel like a mere academic discussion, devoid of spirit. And where the blessings are said but only by rote, it is easier for Torah study to feel merely antiquarian and automatic. In Jewish-renewal style, how can we bring new kavvanah — spiritual meaning, intention, focus, intensity — to these blessings — and therefore to the process of Torah study itself?

Almost two years ago my best friend passed away and I had the honour of chanting this malé raḥamim for him. In mid-May this year another friend approached me and said he really liked the way I did it at the time and could I record it for him because he was going to do it too for an unrelated unveiling. So, I recorded it on May 18, 2011. I didn’t compose it. It’s a traditional tune, but it’s my voice and I hope someone else can perhaps learn it with this material. The more resource there are out there through means such as Open Siddur the better we can learn and share.

A prayer written by a son upon the death of his mother.

Based on a traditional form, this is just a personal petition I drew up to remind myself of a few important things. Anyone is free to use it, alter it for their own circumstances, change the translation, etc. No attribution required.

A paraliturgical Amidah (standing mediation) for Rosh haShanah.

Trisha Arlin shares “Motzi”, a kavanah (intention) for the blessing, Hamotzi Lehem Min Ha’aretz, over challah. Describing the kavanah she writes that it’s, “based on Rabbi Ellen Lippmann’s tradition on having us create a chain of touch around room that leads to and from the challah, which she then explains as both exemplifying the connection created when people eat together and the chain of work that went to creating the challah itself.”

Hashem, as I open my Siddur, let me pray with proper kavanah. Let me pray with sincerity, paying careful attention to every word I utter. Hashem, let me concentrate with my whole being on the meaning of each and every word, sentence and prayer. Keep my mind from wandering to other subjects, and keep me from neglecting to put my heart and soul in to each and every prayer, praise and blessing. May my prayer come before You, O Hashem, at a time of grace, and may it be accepted favorably by You. Amen.

Yakov Green shares a short kavvanah (intention, meditation) which he wrote in Hebrew one morning at Beit Midrash Elul in Jerusalem. He later translated it into English. תפילת דרך משולשת | Triple Prayer for the Road

As חז”ל [Ḥazal] taught us, on ראש השנה [Rosh Hashanah] we elevate puns from the lowest form of humor to the highest religious experience. The foods suggested by our Sages had names in Aramaic or Hebrew that symbolized hopes for the new year — here is a list of foods with English names for those of us for whom English is our vernacular.

Through eating those fruits that our sages of blessed memory identified as the fruit of the tree of knowledge, we recall the best of creation, in its beauty and completeness. We remember that every human being, by virtue of being a human being, is the pinnacle of creation. Our task as caretakers is to preserve the world, to work it, and to repair it. Our task is to make the State of Israel more just, so that she will be a blessing to all of her inhabitants and those who love her.

‘Life Sentence’ is a poetic exploration of solitary authorship — interpreting the old-world literary tradition and archetypes for the ‘ADD’ generation. This is a boundary and genre-crossing work that exists at the intersection of Radical Jewish, Indy and Hip-Hop culture.

This prayer for Tu biShvat, derived from the prayer included with the seder for Tu biShvat, the Pri Ets Hadar, are based on the Ḳabbalah of the four worlds and the ancient idea that everything physical is an image of the spiritual.

Traditional Judaism offers a confessional prayer, or vidui, to be recited during a time of serious illness or near death. If the patient is unable to recite the prayer, others may do so on his or her behalf. This modern adaptation [of vidui] places less emphasis on atonement for sins, and more on the bonds connecting the patient to his or her loved ones. It can be recited by a friend, family member, or chaplain on behalf of a person who is very ill, especially when life and death are hanging in the balance.

Avi Dolgin shares his mindful practice for maintaining “tashlikh consciousness” in the days leading up to Rosh Hashanah.

The formulation for giving thanks for entering wakefulness innovated by Moshe ibn Makhir, as translated by Andrew Shaw.

Language is simultaneously a portal and a barrier to prayer. Jews have prayed in Hebrew for millennia, yet our oldest sources also speak of prayer in other languages. Come explore the history of the language of prayer, how our linguistic preferences define what prayer is about, and how we might approach this issue today.

An original liturgical poem inspired by the Modah|Modeh Ani prayer.

The prayer/songsheet used for the Avodat Lev dawn prayer service of the farmers in the Adamah Fellowship on the campus of the Isabella Freedman Retreat Center in Falls Village, Connecticut.

Noam Raye Lerman and I were co-teachers in the Fall 2011 season at Kolot Chayeinu‘s children’s learning program in Park Slope Brooklyn, and as a Ḥanukkah present we made a Ḥanukkah Madrikh for our Kittah Gimmel class. I’m certain there are Jewish educators all over the world preparing curricular resources for Ḥanukkah right about now. We hope that by sharing this they can take it and improve on it, or else we’ll save them some energy so they’ll be able to do even more mitsvot.

As the month of Elul wanes, we are preparing. We prepare for the new moon, we prepare for Rosh Hashanah, and we prepare for the zombie invasion. I have it on good authority, as do you, that the onslaught is imminent. The alarm blares every morning — a shofar blast and a warning…

In the wake of the continued uprooting of fruit trees and human settlements in the Land of Israel, T’ruah: The Rabbinic Call for Human Rights shared the following petitionary prayer.

A song in English with Arabic translation, addressed from a Jew living in Jerusalem to his Arab neighbors, locally and regionally during the Arab Spring.

We are hereby ready to fulfill our obligation of K’vod Habriot, respect for the dignity of every human being. We pray that our fellow citizens shall not be the source of suffering in others. We commit ourselves to raise our voices in support of universal human rights, to know the heart of the stranger, and to feel compassion for those whose humanity is denied. May our compassion lead us to fight for justice.

Blessed is the Source of Life, who redeemed our ancestors from Egypt and brought us together this night of Passover to tell the story of freedom. May God bring us security and peace, enabling us to celebrate together year after year. Praised are you, Source of Righteousness, who redeems the world and loves justice and freedom.

Some rabbinic sourcetexts related to the topic of how to write in your siddur, shared with translations by Rabbi Mordechai Torczyner.

A prayer on the tenth anniversary of the attacks on 11 September 2001

How good are you playing this amazing, venerable role-playing game called Judaism? Playing your whole life? Grand. So is it fun? Is it worthwhile? Would you recommend it to your friends? No. All right… so why not? Oh. Yeah. Oh… true. Ok, yeah, those are all good reasons. But what if I told you there was a way to play it better. Not everyone will catch on at first, but it should satisfy the most conservative players AND the most innovative. The geeks will love it and it will lower the bar for entry to even the most simple of players. Ok, it does sound too good to be true. But hey, what’s the point of playing the game if you’re not willing to suspend the physics of the familiar and try on a new set of rules. Embrace the illusion. Try on a new reality. Help create a new one, together. I just want players to use their imagination, feel appreciated instead of alienated, and just improve the game for everyone. So what is it? I’ll tell you.

When works are printed bearing shemot, any one of the ten divine names sacred to Judaism, they are cared for with love. If a page or bound work bearing shemot falls to the ground it’s a Jewish custom to draw up the page or book and kiss it. Just as loved ones are cared for after they’ve fallen and passed away, when the binding fails and leaves fall from siddurim and other seforim they are collected in boxes and bins and brought for burial, where their holy words can decompose back into the earth from which their constituent elements once grew, and were once harvested to become paper and books, and ink, string, glue. While teaching at the Teva Learning Center last Fall 2010, I collected all our shemot that we had intentionally or unintentionally made on our copy machine, or which we had collected from the itinerant teachers who pass through the Isabella Freedman Retreat Center on so many beautiful weekend shabbatonim. While leafing through the pages, I found one and kept it from the darkness of the genizah.

A Passover Haggadah compiled by Jewish Boston and the Jewish Women’s Archive containing numerous haggadah supplements.

We are pleased to announce that the first copyleft licensed haggadah

This post continues the series of advocacy posts directed at Jewish content creators and aggregators. Other parts of the series discussed the global communal benefit of free primary data resources and issues of copyright license compatibility and the connection between copyright licensing and remixability. While my previous post briefly mentioned the non-free Creative Commons licenses, this post details why you should choose a free culture license. In particular, it urges you to avoid the licenses with the non-commercial-use only (NC) terms.

In this article, the authors introduce the concept of sharing in a free culture context as a model for the future of online Jewish educational resources, presenting a new resource-sharing/creating project that they hope will revolutionize the study of the siddur.

A prayer offered by Rabbi Arnold Resnicoff at the Presidential signing ceremony for the repeal of the “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” (DADT) law on December 22, 2010, in Washington, D.C.

The Opening Prayer given in the U.S. House of Representatives on 16 June 2010.

The Opening Prayer given in the U.S. House of Representatives on 5 May 2010.

The Opening Prayer given in the U.S. House of Representatives on 27 January 2010.

Rabbi Seidenberg’s Prayer for the Earth is focused on global climate disruption (aka “global warming”), healing the skies, and the original blessing of creation. The liturgy is closely based upon the sun-blessing liturgy we used April 8th 2009. It is partly based on the Sefaradi liturgy for the Ushpizin on Sukkot, and on “Pri Ets Hadar” (The Fruit of the Majestic Tree) — the first ever Tu biShvat seder, included in the 17th century mystical work, Ḥemdat Yamim (ed. Rabeinu Yakov Ben Yom Tov Algazi). The prayer was first posted at neohasid.org, here. The prayer is based on the Pri Ets Hadar, Birkat Hachodesh, Sefaradi liturgy for Sukkot, and Malakhi 4, Genesis 9:14; Psalms 36, 78, 146; Deuteronomy 32:11, 11:12.

A prayer following the Israel Land Administration’s 2010 eviction and demolition of Al-Araqeeb, a Bedouin village in the Negev. The prayer was written with the intention that its recitation is made “on behalf of justice and the rededication of Israel to the ideals of her Declaration of Independence.”

An authentic siddur of Ashkenazic holy congregations without the changes made by later grammarians and maskilim, prepared by Rabbi Rallis Wiesenthal according to the minhag of Bad Homburg.

Geshem and tal: rain and dew. We pray for each in its season, geshem all winter and tal as summer approaches…not everywhere, necessarily, but in the land of Israel where our prayers have their roots. In a desert climate, water is clearly a gift from God. It’s easy for us to forget that, here with all of this rain and snow. But our liturgy reminds us. Through the winter months, during our daily amidah we’ve prayed “mashiv ha-ruach u-morid ha-gashem” — You cause the winds to blow and the rains to fall! We only pray for rain during the rainy season, because it is frustrating both to us and to God when we pray for impossibilities.

In place of the blood of the slaughtered bulls from the covenantal ceremony in Exodus, we looked for another substance to effect the covenant ceremony. Amalya was born right after Shavuot, on which we have a tradition to eat dairy. In fact, milk itself is associated with the acceptance of Torah, as described in the following Midrash which quotes a verse from Song of Songs (4:11): “Sweetness drops from your lips, O bride; honey and milk are under your tongue and the scent of your robes is like the scent of Lebanon.”

A pun filled ditty by the Fall 2010 Jewish environmental educators of the Teva Learning Center.

Three short havdallah meditations that culminate in a havdallah prayer/blessing.

This is a prayer for parents to say for safe sleep for their newborn children. It is based almost entirely on the longer form of the traditional prayers before sleep. Because of gender there are two forms, for a boy and for a girl. I wrote this as part of my daughter’s naming ceremony in January 2001. I used it again in 2006 when my second daughter was born.

Just in time for Ḥanukkah, Chajm Guski shares a חנוכה מדריך (Ḥanukkah Madrikh), Handbook for Ḥanukkah, with a Deutsch translation and transliteration of the blessings on lighting the Ḥanukiah, the kavanah, HaNerot HaLalu, and the piyyut, Maoz Tzur.

A Tu biShvat seder supplement recognizing the Israeli-Jewish settler violence and land theft under the State of Israel’s military occupation of the West Bank.

A Jewish Prayer for Graduation and an Interfaith Meditation on Wisdom and Learning, by Rabbi Jonah Rank (2010)

A haggadah for the Pesaḥ seder with an Esperanto translation.

We are grateful to the Vilna Shul in Boston and their Ḥavurah on the Hill program for preparing “Siddur on the Hill,” (2011) a beautiful siddur for Shabbat Friday night services and sharing it with free-culture compatible, open content licensing. The siddur includes original translations in English from Rabbi Sam Seicol, interpretive writings by Rabbi Rami Shapiro, and illustrations by Georgi Vogel Rosen, as well as contributions from numerous others. Thank you for sharing your siddur, open source!

An interview with Jonah Lowenfeld of the Jewish Journal on the values of sharing Torah learning as practiced by the Open Siddur Project.