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O Healing Spirit of the Universe:
We invoke Thy blessing
as we dedicate
this chapel of therapy
to the sacred service
of medicine.
For
we are eternally grateful
unto Thee,
O Lord,
that Thou hast fashioned us
not as puppets,
lacking in will or choice,
but as living beings,
endowed
with Thy creative spark.
Thou hast placed us
in a world that is imperfect
and incomplete
and hast charged us
with the responsibility
of perfecting and completmg
Thy handiwork.
We thank Thee,
Lord,
for the diseases
and the suffering
which keep us
from unwarranted pride
and unseeing selfishness,
the torments of body and mind
which make us ever conscious
of our need for each other’s help
and our aspirations
toward Thee.
We thank Thee,
also,
for endowing us
with the wisdom
and the skill
to face our problems
with courage and confidence,
knowing
that Thou art with us,
when we labor
to heal and help
our fellow men.
Be Thou
with the physicians and surgeons
whose dedicated hands
will make
of these bricks,
of this steel and glass
a sanctuary of grace
and a tabernacle of blessing,
lifting the spirit
as its strengthens the body.
Praised be Thou,
O Lord,
who doth entrust Thy healing wisdom
to the children of men. Amen.
“Dedication of Medical Research Clinic” was first published in Rabbi Avraham Soltes’ collection of prayers, תפלה Invocation: Sheaf of Prayers (Bloch 1959). The prayer is undated and lacks any further details. If you know which Medical Research Clinic was the subject of this prayer, please share this information in the comments below.
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.)
Avraham Samuel Soltes
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).
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