Prayer Before Mingling with the World, by Grace Aguilar (ca. 1830s)

Contributor(s):

Aharon N. Varady (editing/transcription) and Grace Aguilar

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6 May 2023 under the Creative Commons Zero (CC 0) Universal license a Public Domain dedication

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Mixed Dancing, Well-being, health, and caregiving

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English vernacular prayer, teḥinot in English, social anxiety, עין הרע predatory gaze (ill will/evil eye), 19th century C.E., תחינות teḥinot, 56th century A.M.

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Contribute a translation	Source (English)
	Prayer before mingling with the world.
	O Mighty Father, may it please Thee to pour Thy blessing upon me, now that I am about to enter into a scene of more temptation than when I remain in my own home.
	Thou hast not commanded us to live entirely alone; Thou hast, in Thine infinite mercy, ordained that the happiness of this life should not be entirely centred in ourselves. Thou hast permitted a bond of brotherhood to unite Thy creatures; then in Thy mercy, O Lord, be with me this night. Let me feel that Thou art with me, that Thy spirit dwelleth within me, and permitteth me to pass this evening as innocently as if I were alone with Thee.
	Let me not, in thoughtless gaiety, forget myself, and do or say that to which hereafter I may look back with self-reproach and regret. Guard me from temptation and from sin. Permit me to behave in such a manner as will be acceptable to Thee, and pleasing to my fellow-creatures. O let my conduct shew forth Thy Glory O Lord, and raise my beloved and ancient Faith in the estimation of the strangers amongst whom it may be my lot to mingle; but O guard me in Thine infinite goodness from pride or self-conceit; make me humble, O Lord, that words of flattery may fall harmless on my ear, and that I may not feel pained or disappointed at any neglect or unkindness I may receive.
	O Mighty Father, do not forsake me now! Let my cry come up before Thee, and deign to shed Thy Holy Grace, Thy blessing on my soul.
	Let me but feel that Thou art with me, O my God, that Thy spirit dwelleth within me, and that virtue may be mine, whether alone with my God, or mingling with my fellow creatures.
	O my Heavenly Father, hear me, and vouchsafe to answer me. Let Thy wing encircle me, Thy blessing be upon me this night and evermore! Amen.

“Prayer before mingling with the world” by Grace Aguilar was published posthumously by her mother Sarah Aguilar in Sabbath Thoughts and Sacred Communings (1853), pp. 73-74. In Essays and Miscellanies (1853) the prayer appears on pages 191-192.

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“Prayer Before Mingling with the World, by Grace Aguilar (ca. 1830s)” 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.)

Grace Aguilar

Grace Aguilar (2 June 1816 – 16 September 1847) was an English novelist, poet and writer on Jewish history and religion. Although she had been writing since childhood, much of her work was published posthumously. Among those are her best known works, the novels Home Influence and A Mother's Recompense. Aguilar was the eldest child of Sephardic Jewish refugees from Portugal who settled in the London Borough of Hackney. An early illness resulted in her being educated by her parents, especially her mother, who taught her the tenets of Judaism. Later, her father taught the history of Spanish and Portuguese Jews during his own bout with tuberculosis which had led the family to move to the English coast. After surviving the measles at the age of 19, she began to embark on a serious writing career, even though her physical health never completely recovered. Aguilar's debut was an anonymous collection of poems, The Magic Wreath of Hidden Flowers. Three years later she translated Isaac Orobio de Castro's Israel Defended into English at her father's behest. Later her The Spirit of Judaism drew interest and sales in both Britain and the United States after being published in Philadelphia by Isaac Leeser. He added a preface to the work elucidating his differences with her, the first of many clashes her work would have with mainstream Jewish thought. In the 1840s her novels began to attract regular readers, and Aguilar moved back to London with her parents. Despite her success, she and her mother still had to operate a boys' Hebrew school to stay solvent, which she resented for the time and energy it took from her writing. In 1847, she became ill again with a spinal paralysis which she did not let prevent her from visiting her brother in Frankfurt. Her health worsened and she died there that September.

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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