The words of Avinu Malkeinu are a little different from the standard translation. It doesn’t say in Hebrew, “we have no good deeds” (ein lanu ma’asim tovim), but rather, “there are no deeds in us” (ein banu ma’asim). The p’shat (literal meaning) implies that whatever we have done in the past does not have to live inside of us — we can release our deeds and be released from them, fully, to start over, like a newborn, to become whoever we need to become.
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It says, no deeds
not good-bad, not beautiful-ugly
no trace of the past in us to
constrain, condone, condemn
our forward path,
not regret, not mistakes, not strife, nor failure
or triumph, ki ein banu ma’asim.
What-for-ever in us is is the now, the aha
of one instant — just!
So here, bring your lovely-most self
nothing else
to meet-greet the unladen year.
Clear the channel; become hollow
as a bone.
What you are
becoming now here, for the Source of Life:
a wellspring of tsedaqah and ḥesed, of righteous love,
a fountain of blessing.
“Avinu Malkeinu” by Rabbi David Seidenberg, versified paraliturgical commentary on the prayer Avinu Malkenu, was first offered on Shabbat Tshuva in 2022 (5783).
Rabbi David Seidenberg, founder of NeoHasid.org, teaches text and music, Jewish thought and spirituality, in their own right and in relation to ecology and the environment. With smikhah (ordination) from the Jewish Theological Seminary and from Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, he has taught at over 100 synagogues, communities, retreats and conferences across North America (and a few in Europe and Israel). Rabbi Seidenberg's teaching empowers learners to become creators of Judaism through deep study and communion with texts and tradition. Areas of specialty include Kabbalah and Ḥasidut, Talmud, davenning, evolution and cosmology, sustainability, Maimonides, Buber, and more. Rabbi Seidenberg has published widely on ecology and Judaism and is the author of Kabbalah and Ecology: God's Image in the More-Than-Human World (Cambridge University Press, 2015).
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“Avinu Malkeinu,” dvar tefillah by Rabbi David Seidenberg (neohasid.org)
not good-bad, not beautiful-ugly
no trace of the past in us to
constrain, condone, condemn
our forward path,
not regret, not mistakes, not strife, nor failure
or triumph,
ki ein banu ma’asim.
of one instant — just!
nothing else
to meet-greet the unladen year.
as a bone.
becoming now here, for the Source of Life:
a wellspring of tsedaqah and
ḥesed, of righteous love,
a fountain of blessing.
“Avinu Malkeinu” by Rabbi David Seidenberg, versified paraliturgical commentary on the prayer Avinu Malkenu, was first offered on Shabbat Tshuva in 2022 (5783).
““Avinu Malkeinu,” dvar tefillah by Rabbi David Seidenberg (neohasid.org)” is shared through the Open Siddur Project with a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International copyleft license.
David Seidenberg
Rabbi David Seidenberg, founder of NeoHasid.org, teaches text and music, Jewish thought and spirituality, in their own right and in relation to ecology and the environment. With smikhah (ordination) from the Jewish Theological Seminary and from Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, he has taught at over 100 synagogues, communities, retreats and conferences across North America (and a few in Europe and Israel). Rabbi Seidenberg's teaching empowers learners to become creators of Judaism through deep study and communion with texts and tradition. Areas of specialty include Kabbalah and Ḥasidut, Talmud, davenning, evolution and cosmology, sustainability, Maimonides, Buber, and more. Rabbi Seidenberg has published widely on ecology and Judaism and is the author of Kabbalah and Ecology: God's Image in the More-Than-Human World (Cambridge University Press, 2015).
Works of related interest:
בָּתֵּי תּוֹסֶפֶת לְ”אָבִינוּ מַלְכֵּנוּ“ לְמִלְחֶמֶת ”חַרְבוֹת בַּרְזֶל“ | Additional Stanzas of ‘Avinu Malkeinu’ for the Ḥarvot Barzel War, by Yael Levine
Blessings and Ethics: The Spiritual Life of Justice, a dvar tefillah on berakhot by Rabbi Dr. Joshua Gutoff (1997)
Additions to Piyyutim on the High Holidays for the Shemitah Year, by Rabbi David Seidenberg (neohasid.org)
מוריד הטל | Morid Hatal — to the One who settles the dew, post-October 7 — by Rabbi David Mevorach Seidenberg (neohasid.org 2024)
ביעור חמץ | Kavvanah for Returning Our Ḥametz to the Earth by Rabbi David Seidenberg (neohasid.org)
תפילה ליום הודו על חנוכּה | Prayer for when Thanksgiving Day falls during Ḥanukkah, by Rabbi David Seidenberg (neohasid.org)
Kavvanah and prayer for Zōt Ḥanukkah, the last night and day of Ḥanukkah 5784, by Rabbi David Seidenberg (neohasid.org)