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O Master of the Universe:
We invoke Thy blessing
this day,
upon these young men and women
who,
having completed their appointed courses of study,
are embarking
upon the noblest career
open
to citizens of a free land:
that of
informing the mind of our people’s youth
with the laws of Nature,
and with an understanding of their fellow man
and his ways;
Be Thou with them
that
they may augment
the bread of information
with
the ointment of affection
and character,
that
the spirit of their young charges
may be so fashioned
as to turn their minds
into an earnest
and loving desire
to move in harmony
with the laws of nature
and of a democratic society.
Guide them,
O Father,
thru the labyrinths of constricting trivia
that strangle a teacher’s soul,
that
their eyes may see the world
each day
as fresh
as it appeared to Adam
at Creation’s dawn,
and in each child,
Thy Divine Spark,
O Lord,
who madest man
in Thine own image.
Amen.
Rabbi Abraham Soltes’s “[Prayer for a] Teachers’ Commencement” can be found in his collection of prayers, תפלה Invocation: A Sheaf Of Prayers (Bloch 1959). Their he indicates that this prayer was offered on June 14, 1951, at the New Jersey State Teachers College in Newark (currently Kean University).
Rabbi Avraham Soltes (1917-1983) was a Reform Jewish rabbi, the Jewish chaplain at the United States Military Academy in West Point, an author and a leading figure in Jewish cultural affairs. He was born in New York City. He graduated from the City College of New York in 1937 and received a master's degree from Columbia University in 1938. After being ordained in 1942 by the Jewish Institute of Religion (now HUC-JIR), he served as chaplain at Cornell and McGill Universities and then was assistant rabbi at Congregation Rodeph Sholom in Manhattan from 1946 to 1949. He subsequently served as rabbi at Temple Sharey Tefilo in East Orange and Temple Emanuel in Great Neck. He began his service at West Point as a voluntary chaplain in 1963 and was made a permanent member of the staff in 1981. His interests also took him into commerce, and from 1969 to 1974, he was vice president for community affairs of the Glen Alden Corporation, which in 1972 was merged into the Rapid America Corporation. From 1974 to 1977, he was assistant to the president of Tel Aviv University. He was credited with a key role in the establishment of the New York medical division at the university. In 1981, Rabbi Soltes received the Jabotinsky Award from Prime Minister Menachim Begin for his service to Israel. From 1977 until his death Rabbi Soltes had been the spiritual leader of Congregation Beth Chavairuth of Bergen County, in Tenafly, N.J. He participated in many cultural and educational activities that interpreted Jewish art, music and literature. He was chairman of the National Jewish Music Council from 1963 to 1969 and a member of the board of the National Jewish Book Council from 1967 to 1972. Rabbi Soltes, a commentator on Jewish music for American listeners, was the host of a radio program, ''The Music of Israel,'' on WQXR from 1974-1983. Among his writings were Palestine in Poetry and Song of the Jewish Diaspora (Master's thesis HUC-JIR 1942) and Off The Willows: The Rebirth of Modern Jewish Music (1970).
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 naqeniשְׁגִיאוֹת 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.)
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