Prayer for a Widow at the Grave of Her Husband, by Marcus Heinrich Bresslau (1852)

Contributor(s):

Aharon N. Varady (editing/transcription) and Marcus Heinrich Bresslau

Shared on:

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

Categories:

Mourning

Tags:

19th century C.E., תחינות teḥinot, 57th century A.M., Jewish Women's Prayers, English vernacular prayer, cemetery prayers

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)

Flow unimpeded ye my tears, unload thyself, O sorrowful breast! Father! let me weep, let me now, alas, a widow, find relief and comfort in Thee. Dead and motionless, lies here one who but recently was joined to me; from me has departed he who was so truly and affectionately attached to me; O God, I could wish that animation and vitality, were again infused in this corpse, that it might rise from the grave, and waking again recognise me, as was granted through Thee in the days of Elisha and Ezekiel. All-just God Thou hast ceased pouring out upon me the cup of earthly happiness, and Thou makest me drink of one filled with wormwood. Give me strength O Father, that I do not sink; grant that the hope of resurrection may keep me erect. Assist me, O God, Thou who art the “Judge of the Widows,” and be my staff and my stay. And thou dear departed, walk sorrowless in yonder regions where no night will follow thy day, and no grief thy joy. For an endless joyful union now hopes my mourning heart, as the ties which bind sympathising soul to soul, death cannot sever; yea, I shall meet thee again, as soon as upon my night also eternal day shall follow. Amen.

“Prayer for a Widow at the Grave of Her Husband” was first published in Marcus Heinrich Bresslau’s collection of teḥinot, Teḥinot Banot Yisrael: Devotions for the Daughters of Israel (1852).

Source(s)

Notes[+]

Notes
1	Psalms 68:5.

. Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication . 1.0 . Universal .

“Prayer for a Widow at the Grave of Her Husband, by Marcus Heinrich Bresslau (1852)” is shared through the Open Siddur Project with a Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication 1.0 Universal 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.)

Marcus Heinrich Bresslau

Marcus Heinrich (also Mordecai Ḥayyim/Hyman/Heyman) Bresslau (ca. 1808-15 May 1864) was a Hebraist and newspaper editor. Born in Hamburg, he settled in England when young. For some time from 1834 he was Baal Ḳoreh (reader) at the Western Synagogue. He then taught Hebrew at the Westminster Jews’ Free School and went on to tutor privately. A maskil, he became involved with M. J. Raphall’s Hebrew Review and Magazine of Rabbinical Literature (1834-6). In October 1844 he was appointed editor of the relaunched Jewish Chronicle by proprietor Joseph Mitchell. Prickly and quarrelsome, he resigned in July 1848 but returned in around September. He remained until about October 1850. After Mitchell’s death in June 1854 he became proprietor (his middle name appearing as Heyman) and edited it until February 1855 when new proprietor Abraham Benisch succeeded him. Bresslau, who tried vainly to revive the Hebrew Review, wrote Hebrew poetry, produced a Hebrew grammar and a Hebrew dictionary, and translated various Hebrew manuscripts in the Bodleian Library. Bresslau compiled (we think) the first compilation of teḥinot in English for women. (Much of this information via Bresslau's entry in The Palgrave Dictionary of Anglo-Jewish History)

Pocket Pinterest Reddit 𝕏 Facebook Telegram WhatsApp SMS Email

Works of related interest:

Detail of Marcus Heinrich Bresslau's Prayer of a Mother on the Grave of Her Child

Prayer of a Mother on the Grave of Her Child, by Marcus Heinrich Bresslau (1852)

Detail of Marcus Heinrich Bresslau's
Prayer on the Grave of a Brother

Prayer on the Grave of a Brother, by Marcus Heinrich Bresslau (1852)

Detail of Marcus Heinrich Bresslau's
Prayer on the Grave of a Sister

Prayer on the Grave of a Sister, by Marcus Heinrich Bresslau (1852)

Detail of Marcus Heinrich Bresslau's Prayer of a Wife for a Sick Husband

Prayer of a Wife for a Sick Husband, by Marcus Heinrich Bresslau (1852)

Prayer of a Wife for her Husband (Marcus Heinrich Bresslau 1852)

Prayer of a Wife for her Husband, by Marcus Heinrich Bresslau (1852)

Detail of Marcus Heinrich Bresslau's Prayer of an Orphan

Prayer of an Orphan, by Marcus Heinrich Bresslau (1852)

prayer for departed souls (Marcus Heinrich Bresslau 1852) - cropped

Prayer in Memory of Departed Souls (הזכרת נשמות), by Marcus Heinrich Bresslau (1852)

prev next

Comments, Corrections, and QueriesCancel reply

Stable Link: https://opensiddur.org/?p=32183

Associated Image:

Detail of Marcus Heinrich Bresslau’s Prayer for a Widow at the Grave of Her Husband

(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 Marcus Heinrich Bresslau.
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=32183>.
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