Opening Prayer on the Significance of Flag Day, by Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan, J. Paul Williams, and Eugene Kohn (1951)

Contributor(s):

Aharon N. Varady (transcription), Mordecai Kaplan, Eugene Kohn and John Paul Williams

Shared on:

14 June 2023 under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike (CC BY-SA) 4.0 International copyleft license

Categories:

Flag Day (June 14)

Tags:

United States, 58th century A.M., English vernacular prayer, civic prayers, American Jewry of the United States, 20th century C.E., ecumenical prayers

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Contribute a translation	Source (English)
	On the fourteenth day of June in the year 1780, the flag of our nation was born. On that day the Congress of the United States resolved “that the flag of the thirteen United States be thirteen stripes, alternate red and white; that the Union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field, representing a new constellation.”^[1] As stated in the “Flag Resolution” passed by the Second Continental Congress on 14 June 1777.
	Today we celebrate the anniversary of that event. Today, over a vast territory and over the hearts of many millions of people that emblem holds sway, a symbol endowed with immeasurable potency to evoke loyalty, heroism, and self-sacrifice.
	We are assembled to renew our allegiance to the flag and to all that it symbolizes. We are not idolaters. Our homage is not to the flag as a piece of colored cloth. It is to what the flag means in our life and the life of mankind; to the land, the persons, the institutions, the laws, the ideals, the human relationships that the flag betokens. To these our loyalty is directed, and upon these we invoke the blessing of God.
	Grant, O God, that the display of our national emblem move us so to live that we may never disgrace it, but always reflect honor upon it. May our flag forever remain the symbol of a nation dedicated to freedom, justice, and the well-being of all mankind.

This opening prayer for Flag Day, “The Significance of the Day,” was first published in The Faith of America: Readings, Songs, and Prayers for the Celebration of American Holidays (Jewish Reconstructionist Foundation 1951), p. 117

Source(s)

Notes[+]

Notes
1	As stated in the “Flag Resolution” passed by the Second Continental Congress on 14 June 1777.

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“Opening Prayer on the Significance of Flag Day, by Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan, J. Paul Williams, and Eugene Kohn (1951)” is shared through the Open Siddur Project with a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International copyleft license.

Aharon N. Varady (transcription)

Aharon Varady (M.A.J.Ed./JTSA Davidson) is a volunteer transcriber for the Open Siddur Project. If you find any mistakes in his transcriptions, please let him know. Shgiyot mi yavin; Ministarot naqeni שְׁגִיאוֹת מִי־יָבִין; מִנִּסְתָּרוֹת נַקֵּנִי "Who can know all one's flaws? From hidden errors, correct me" (Psalms 19:13). If you'd like to directly support his work, please consider donating via his Patreon account. (Varady also translates prayers and contributes his own original work besides serving as the primary shammes of the Open Siddur Project and its website, opensiddur.org.)

Mordecai Kaplan

Mordecai Menahem Kaplan (June 11, 1881 – November 8, 1983), was a rabbi, essayist and Jewish educator and the co-founder of Reconstructionist Judaism along with his son-in-law Ira Eisenstein.

Eugene Kohn

Eugene Kohn (January 26, 1887 - April 1, 1977) was an American Reconstructionist rabbi, writer and editor. Born in Newark, New Jersey he attended the Jewish Theological Seminary of America and in 1912 received ordination. It was here that he met Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan who taught him homiletics. Between 1912 and 1939 he served as a congregational rabbi in Conservative synagogues in the U.S. states of Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Wisconsin and Ohio. He also served as the president of the Rabbinical Assembly 1936-1937. He played a central role in the Reconstructionist movement. He edited its journal The Reconstructionist and, alongside Kaplan and Ira Eisenstein, edited The New Haggadah (1941), The Sabbath Prayer Book (1945) and The Reconstructionist Prayer Book (1948). Alongside Jack Cohen, Eisenstein and Milton Steinberg he was one of Kaplan's main disciples.

John Paul Williams

Dr. John Paul Williams (1900-1973) was chairman of the department of religion at Mount Holyoke College. In 1946, he served as president of the National Association of Biblical Instructors (now known as the American Academy of Religion). He wrote What Americans Believe and How They Worship (1952, revised 1962) containing the chapter "Judaism -- the Mother Institution." Together with Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan and Eugene Kohn he co-authored the anthology of civic prayers, Faith in America (1951).

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ויהי נעם אדני אלהינו עלינו ומעשה ידינו כוננה עלינו ומעשה ידינו כוננהו "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