Thanksgiving Day Prayer, by Rabbi Max Klein (1954)

Contributor(s):

Aharon N. Varady (editing/transcription) and Max D. Klein

Shared on:

25 May 2020 under the Creative Commons Zero (CC 0) Universal license a Public Domain dedication

Categories:

Thanksgiving Day (4th Thursday of November)

Tags:

58th century A.M., Philadelphia, English vernacular prayer, American Jewry of the United States, thanksgiving, 20th century C.E., United States

TOGGLE COLUMNS (on/off):

ADJUST COLUMN POSITIONS: select the column header cell and drag it where you want. show me!

COPY INDIVIDUAL COLUMN(S): use CopyTables, a browser extension.

TABLE HELP

Contribute a translation	Source (English)
	Prayer to be recited on Thanksgiving Day or on the Sabbath nearest thereto (May be read by several members of the Congregation)
	I
	In these days of Thanksgiving, God and Father, we unite with our countrymen to express our homage to thee, Creator of the universe and Arbiter of the destiny of nations.
	We thank thee for the riches of nature stored away in the depths of the earth and for the bounties of the field with which thou hast blessed our land.
	Grant that we, in thankfulness, may feel impelled to share with others at home and abroad the blessings we have so abundantly received from thee. May humility in the midst of our blessings lead us ever to recognize in thee the Giver of our blessings. Amen.
	II
	We thank thee today also for the blessings in the realm of the spirit. May we foster the values of kindness and love, of devotion to Torah and Worship. Grant us, in the midst of our material blessings, the realization that “not by bread alone does man live but by everything that comes from thee.”
	We pray thee, therefore, to bless our synagogues and all houses of worship, our schools and all our institutions devoted to humanitarian service. May we give to them, of our material and spiritual support, with such love and understanding, that our spiritual roots in this land may bring forth fruits worthy of thy divine blessing. Amen.
	III
	And we thank thee for the laws of our country and for the humane spirit which guided the Founders of our Government. We pray that we may show our thankfulness for the laws and institutions of our land through our loyalty to the justice and humanity they seek to achieve.
	We pray that those who make our laws and those who administer them may ever think and act in the desire to honor the memory of the Founders and to hallow thy name through their thoughts and deeds in our day.
	May we all be inspired to keep the name of America free from stain and to make it shine with a glorious light as the hope for the down-trodden to the uttermost ends of the earth. Amen.
	IV
	Bless, we pray thee, the President of our country and his counselors and all to whom the government of our land has been entrusted. Bless them with well-being, with moral courage and with the insight to guide our land along the paths of justice, humanity, and peace to the end that liberty and happiness may dwell among us at home and through our use of thy blessings lead to greater peace in all the world. Amen.
	V
	Congregation For all our blessings, from thee, both in the realm of nature and in the realm of the spirit we say with the Psalmist: “Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; Yea, his kindness is ever-enduring.” Amen.

Source(s)

. Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike . 4.0 . International .

“Thanksgiving Day Prayer, by Rabbi Max Klein (1954)” is shared through the Open Siddur Project with a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International copyleft license.

Aharon N. Varady (editing/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.)

Max D. Klein

Rabbi Max Klein was born in New York City in 1885 and was ordained by the Jewish Theological Seminary in 1911. Soon afterward, he began serving as rabbi for Congregation Adath Jeshurun in Philadelphia. Formerly a Reform synagogue, under Rabbi Klein's leadership it became one of the initial congregations affiliated with the United Synagogue of America (now called the United Synagogue for Conservative Judaism). In addition to serving as rabbi at Adath Jeshurun in Philadelphia until 1960, Rabbi Klein wrote, edited, and translated two prayer books: Seder Avodah for Sabbath, Festivals, and Weekdays (1951) and Seder Avodah for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur (1960). He died in 1973.

Pocket Pinterest Reddit 𝕏 Facebook Telegram WhatsApp SMS Email

Works of related interest:

📖 סדר עבודה ערבית לשבת ולשלוש רגלים (אשכנז)‏ | Seder Avodah Tefilat Arvit l’Shabbat u’l’Shalosh Regalim, arranged, translated, and transliterated by Rabbi Max D. Klein (1954)

"Jewish servicemen and women celebrate Passover" (credit: David I. Cederbaum, repository: Center for Jewish History, circa 1945, no copyright restrictions)

Prayer of Parents for a Son or Daughter in the Armed Forces, by Rabbi Max Klein (1951)

📖 סדר עבודה מחזור לימים נוראים (אשכנז)‏ | Seder Avodah Maḥzor l’Yamim Nora’im, arranged and translated by Rabbi Max D. Klein (1960)

📖 סדר עבודה תפלות לשבת לשלוש רגלים ולחול (אשכנז)‏ | Seder Avodah Tefilot l’Shabbat, l’Shalosh Regalim, u’l’Ḥol, arranged and translated by Rabbi Max Klein (1951)

West Point Museum display of World War I era uniforms (U.S. Army photo by West Point Museum/released.) (Photo Credit: (West Point Museum))

May Wars Cease, a hymn by Rabbi Max Klein (1926)

"You will help the NSPCC won't you!" (National Society For The Prevention Of Cruelty To Children [NSPCC], 1946)

תפילת הודיה לחברה למניעת אכזריות לילדים | Prayer of Thanksgiving for the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (1954)

📖 Hymns of Praise and Prayer, compiled by Rabbi Max D. Klein for Congregation Adath Jeshurun, Philadelphia (1926)

prev next

Comments, Corrections, and QueriesCancel reply

Stable Link: https://opensiddur.org/?p=31751

Associated Image:

(This image is set to automatically show as the "featured image" in shared links on social media.)

Source Data: XML | JSON

Re-formatted: HTML | ODT

Terms of Use: Be a mentsch (a conscientious, considerate person) and adhere to the following guidelines:

Properly attribute the work to Aharon N. Varady (editing/transcription) and Max D. Klein.
Clearly indicate the date you accessed the work and in what ways, if any, you modified it. (If you have adapted the work, let us know so that the contributor might consider endorsing your revision.)
Provide the stable link to this resource: <https://opensiddur.org/?p=31751>.
Indicate that the original work was shared under the Creative Commons Zero (CC 0) Universal license a Public Domain dedication. (To redistribute or remix this work in any format, modified or unmodified, you must refer to the terms of the license under which the work is shared.)

Additional Notes:

The views expressed in this work represent the views of their creator(s) and do not necessarily represent the views of the Open Siddur Project's developers, its diverse community of contributors, patrons, or institutional partners.
We strongly advise against printing sacred texts and art containing divine names as these copies must be regarded with reverence, complicating their casual treatment and disposal.
If you must dispose of a printed sacred text (one containing Divine Names), please locate the closest genizah (often established by a synagogue) and contact its custodians for further instructions. We also recommend using Morah Yehudis Fishman's Prayer for Adding a Work to the Genizah.

Support this work: The Open Siddur Project is a volunteer-driven, non-profit, non-denominational, non-prescriptive, gratis & libre Open Access archive of contemplative praxes, liturgical readings, and Jewish prayer literature (historic and contemporary, familiar and obscure) composed in every era, region, and language Jews have ever prayed. Our goal is to provide a platform for sharing open-source resources, tools, and content for individuals and communities crafting their own prayerbook (siddur). Through this we hope to empower personal autonomy, preserve customs, and foster creativity in religious culture. If you like what you've found here, please help keep our project alive and online with your financial contribution.

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