Chaplain (Col) Jacob Z. Goldstein (Ret.) was born in a Displaced Persons camp in Paris shortly after WWII. He attended the Rabbinical College of Canada, where he received a degree in Religious Education, and the Lubavich Rabbinical Seminary, where he received a Master of Divinity degree and was ordained as a Rabbi. Beginning his military career in March 1977 as a 1st Lieutenant with the 101st Signal Battalion, he is the longest serving Jewish Chaplain in the US Military. He also serves as a Chaplain for the United States Secret Service, is an Assistant Commissioner of Housing for the State of New York, and sits on many boards and institutions. A brief partial listing of Chaplain Goldstein’s service over the course of 38 years of active duty includes Operation Urgent Fury in Grenada, Operation Desert Storm in Iraq (where he read the Purim Megillah in one of Saddam Hussein’s palaces), and the JTF Patriot Defender Task Force in Israel. He also served several deployments to Afghanistan, Iraq and Kuwait, served at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, was Joint Task Force Katrina Staff Chaplain and was Senior Chaplain at “Ground Zero” for all military branches assigned to the World Trade Center. He is the recipient of numerous medals and awards, and retired with honors in April of 2015.

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.)