This is an untitled prayer offered in the Evening Service for the Sabbath from the Union Prayer Book Newly Revised (CCAR 1924), pp. 68-69, as a reading between the Shema and the Amidah. As a prayer for protection it fits as a paraliturgical haskivenu, and in New York City, it makes sense in the context of the terrifying news of mass-murder, rape, and genocide being reported from Ukraine at the time. (Find Nokhem Shtif’s “פּאָגראָמען אין אוקראַיִנע : די צײַט פֿון דער פֿרײַװיליקער אַרמײ (The Pogroms in Ukraine: the Period of the Volunteer Army)” (1923) offered in Yiddish and in English translation at In Geveb.) The Ukrainian context of this prayer is further underscored in that the prayer is not found in the 1918 revised Union Prayer Book, but in the later 1924 edition. It may have been unique to Congregation Emanu-El in New York City, who compiled this version of the Union Prayer Book for radio listeners joining their service. . . .

This prayer by an unknown author is first found in Evening Service for the Sabbath from the Union Prayer Book (Newly Revised) (1924), p. 45. (It also appears on the same page of the 1940 edition of the “newly revised” UPB.) The prayer is included as a third variation of a Reform synagogue’s Shabbat evening service, in the Amidah before the silent meditation. Rabbi Michael Satz of Temple B’nai Or (Morristown, New Jersey) affectionately refers to it as the “Coal Miner’s Prayer.” . . .

Evening Service for the Sabbath from the Union Prayer Book, Newly Revised (CCAR 1924), a Reform movement prayerbook disseminated by Congregation Emanu-El in New York City in 1924, was the first publication of the “Newly Revised” edition of the Union Prayerbook, published as a complete prayerbook in 1940. . . .

The second edition of the Union Hymnal for Jewish Worship by the Central Conference of American Rabbis. . . .

A “provisional edition” of the Reform movement’s Union Prayer Book for six morning services (containing additional material) for Reform Synagogues with daily morning services. . . .

The first edition of the Union Hymnal by the Central Conference of American Rabbis. . . .

A prayer for the government composed by the Central Conference of American Rabbis and included in their Union Prayer Book. . . .

The first edition of the Union Prayer Book (part one), the official prayerbook of the Reform Movement in the United States of America until its revision. . . .

The first edition of the Union Prayer Book (part two), a maḥzor for Rosh haShanah and Yom Kippur. . . .