A Prayer for Today (US Election Day 2020), by Rabbi Shai Held

Contributor(s): Shai Held and Shoshana Michael Zucker (translation)

Shared on: 3 November 2020 under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike (CC BY-SA) 4.0 International copyleft license

Categories: 🇺🇸 Election Day (1st Tuesday after November 1st), Elections & Voting

Tags: 21st century C.E., 45th President of the United States, 58th century A.M., Donald Trump, United States General Election 2020

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Source (Hebrew)	Translation (English)
יְהִי רָצוֹן מִלְּפָנֶיךָ יְיָ אֱלֹהֵינוּ וֵאלֹהֵי אֲבוֹתֵינוּ שֶׁהַטּוֹב יִנְצַח אֶת הָרַע, שֶׁהָאוֹר יִנְצַח אֶת הַחֹשֶׂךְ, וְשֶׁהָאַהֲבָה וְהַחֶסֶד יְנַצְּחוּ אֶת הַשִּׂנְאָה וְהָאַכְזָרִיּוּת.	May it be Your will, YHVH our god and god of our ancestors, that good triumph over evil, light triumph over darkness, and that love and kindness triumph over hatred and cruelty.
אֱלֹהֵי עוֹלָם, הֶיֵה עִמָּנוּ וְהֶיֵה עוֹזֵר לָנוּ בְּמַאֲבָקֵנוּ לְהַעֲבִיר מֶמְשֶׁלֶת זָדוֹן מִן הָאָרֶץ.	God of the universe, be with us and aid us in our struggle to remove the government of malice from the world.
תֵּן בְּיוֹשְׁבֵי אַרְצֵנוּ לֵב בָּשָׂר, וְנִלְמַד כֻּלָּנוּ כְּאֶחָד לְאַהֵב אֶת הַחֶסֶד וּלְרַדֵּף אֶת הַצֶּדֶק; תֵּן בָּנוּ אֶת הָאֹמֶץ לְאַהֵב אֶת הַגֵּר, הַיָּתוֹם, וְהָאַלְמָנָה, וּלְהָגֵן עַל הָעֲנִיִּים וְהַמְדֻכָּאִים.	Grant residents of our land a heart of flesh, and teach us all, as one, to love loving kindness and pursue justice; give us the courage to love the migrant, the orphan and the widow, and to protect the poor and downtrodden.
אָנָּא תֵּן בָּנוּ אֶת הַכֹּחַ וְהָרָצוֹן לְהַתְחִיל מִבְּרֵאשִׁית.	Please, give us the power and desire to start again from the beginning.
יִהְיוּ לְרָצוֹן אִמְרֵי פִינוּ, הֶגְּיוֹן לִבֵּנוּ, וּמַעֲשֵׂי יָדֵינוּ לְפָנֶיךָ יְיָ צוּרֵינוּ וְגוֹאֲלֵינוּ.	May the words of our mouths, the meditations of our hearts and the work of our hands^[1] Cf. Psalms 90:17. find favor in your sight YHVH, our Rock and our Redeemer.^[2] Cf. Psalms 19:15.
אָמֵן אָמֵן.	Amen amen.

A Prayer for Today (US Election Day 2020) by Rabbi Shai Held ש״י הלד was first published in Hebrew on his Facebook page. English translation by Shoshana Michael Zucker. Niqqud added by Aharon Varady.

Notes[+]

Notes
1	Cf. Psalms 90:17.
2	Cf. Psalms 19:15.

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“A Prayer for Today (US Election Day 2020), by Rabbi Shai Held” is shared through the Open Siddur Project with a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International copyleft license.

Shai Held

Rabbi Shai Held is Co-Founder, Dean and Chair in Jewish Thought at Mechon Hadar. Before that, he served for six years as Scholar-in-Residence at Kehilat Hadar in New York City, and taught both theology and Halakha at the Jewish Theological Seminary. He also served as Director of Education at Harvard Hillel. A renowned lecturer and educator, Shai is a 2011 recipient of the Covenant Award for excellence in Jewish education. He has taught for institutions such as Drisha, Me'ah, Combined Jewish Philanthropies, and the Rabbinic Training Institute, and currently serves on the faculty of the Wexner Heritage program. Shai has a PhD in religion from Harvard; his main academic interests are in modern Jewish and Christian thought and in the history of Zionism. His book, Abraham Joshua Heschel: The Call of Transcendence was published by Indiana University Press in the fall of 2013

Shoshana Michael Zucker (translation)

Shoshana Michael Zucker was first fascinated by the boundaries and history of Jewish liturgy as a teenager in NFTY in the early 1970s, the waning days of the Union Prayer Book. Since then, she has moved to Israel, raised a family and launched them into adulthood, while praying from varied siddurim with countless notes in the margin and extra notes stuck between the pages. A translator and editor by profession, she would rather study and teach Torah.

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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