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Unknown Translator(s)

Sometimes the best we can do in attributing a historical work is to indicate the period and place it was written, the first prayer book it may have been printed in, or the archival collection in which the manuscript was found. We invite the public to help to attribute all works to their original composers. If you know something not mentioned in the commentary offered, please let us know!

אֲדוֹן עוֹלָם (מנהג הספרדים במזרח) | Adōn Olam (Ladino translation from the Sidur Tefilat Kol Pe, 1891)

Contributed on: 17 Aug 2023 by Aharon N. Varady (transcription) | Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (transcription & naqdanut) | Unknown Translator(s) | Shlomo ibn Gabirol |

The Seder Tefilat Kol Peh was printed in 1891 in Vienna, and features a full Ladino translation of the entire siddur. The Ladino translation here is found on the left side of pagespread №145. Along with a full transcription of the Ladino text, Isaac Gantwerk Mayer has also prepared a full romanization of the Ladino. . . .


אֲגַדֶלְךָ | Agadelkha, a piyyut by Avraham ibn Ezra (ca. 12th c.) translation by Anonymous

Contributed on: 28 Jan 2020 by Aharon N. Varady (transcription) | Unknown Translator(s) | Avraham ibn Ezra |

A popular piyyut for all occasions by Avraham ibn Ezra. . . .


אֵין אַדִּיר כַּיְיָ (מִפִּי אֵל)‏ | Ayn Adir kAdonai | לָא קָאדִּר סַוָא אַלְלָה (There is none like Allah), minhag Cairo variation with a Judeo-Arabic translation

Contributed on: 09 Apr 2024 by Aharon N. Varady (translation) | Akiva Sanders (translation) | Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (transcription & naqdanut) | Aharon N. Varady (transcription) | Unknown Translator(s) | Unknown Author(s) |

This is a variation of Mipi El in Hebrew with a Judeo-Arabic translation found in the Seder al-Tawḥid for Rosh Ḥodesh Nissan, compiled by Mosheh Asher ibn Shmuel in 1887 in Alexandria. . . .


בַּחֹֽדֶשׁ הָֽרְבִיעִי | baḤodesh haRevi’i (In the fourth month), a ḳinah for the 17th of Tamuz attributed to Solomon ibn Gabirol (ca. 11th c.)

Contributed on: 27 Jun 2021 by Aharon N. Varady (transcription) | Isaac Leeser (translation) | Unknown Translator(s) | Shlomo ibn Gabirol |

The seliḥah with its English translation as found in Siddur Siftei Tsadiqim (The Form of Prayers) vol. 6: Seder haTefilot laTaaniyot (ed. Isaac Leeser 1838) p.107-109. . . .


בַּשָּׁנָה הַבָּאָה | baShanah haBa’ah (Next Year), an elegy by Ehud Manor for his brother killed during the War of Attrition (1968)

Contributed on: 26 Jun 2021 by Aharon N. Varady (transcription) | Unknown Translator(s) | Ehud Manor |

“baShanah haBa’ah” (Next Year) by Ehud Manor written in 1968 in memory of his brother Yehudah. . . .


קְי ווֹלְירַה קְי אְינטְינדְירַה | אֶחָד מִי יוֹדֵעַ | Che volera, che entendera — a Judeo-Sienese translation of Eḥad Mi Yodea

Contributed on: 13 Apr 2022 by Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (transcription & naqdanut) | Unknown Translator(s) | Unknown Author(s) |

Eḥad Mi Yodéa is a counting-song that is a beloved part of Seders the world over. Counting up to 13, it is mostly written in Hebrew, but there are versions that can be found in many different languages. This translation is in the Judeo-Italian dialect of Siena, based on Geremia Mario Castelnuovo’s 1956 recording from Leo Levi’s collection of Judeo-Italian ethnomusicological recordings. A link to the original recording can be found here. . . .


💬 De Rechten van den Menschen van den Burger | דברי הברית החקים והמשפטים אשר בין אדם לאדם | The Rights of Man and of the Citizen, after the Declaration of the Batavian Republic and the Emancipation of Dutch Jewry (1795/1798)

Contributed on: 15 Nov 2022 by Aharon N. Varady (transcription) | Unknown Translator(s) | Marie-Jean Hérault de Séchelles |

This is De Rechten van den Menschen van den Burger (“The Rights of Man and of the Citizen” 1795) and its Hebrew translation, דברי הברית החקים והמשפטים אשר בין אדם לאדם (1798), upon the establishment of the Batavian Republic and the ensuing emancipation of Dutch Jewry in the Netherlands. The text of the Declaration, with nineteen articles, follows after the French Republic’s much expanded Déclaration des droits de l’Homme et du citoyen de 1793 written by Marie-Jean Hérault de Séchelles. (The French Declaration, ratified by popular vote in July 1793, was a revision of the initial Declaration from 1789 written by the commission that included Hérault de Séchelles and Louis Antoine Léon de Saint-Just during the period of the French Revolution.) Declarations such as these enshrined the liberal values of the Enlightenment which changed the situation and status of Jews under their aegis. Ultimately, these values were largely enshrined under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by member states of the nascent United Nations in 1945. . . .


‎אַ דִין־תּוֹרָה מיט גאָט | A Lawsuit with God, the ḳaddish prayer of Rebbi Levi Yitsḥaq of Berditchev in Yiddish, Hebrew, and English (ca. 18th c.)

Contributed on: 01 Aug 2021 by Aharon N. Varady (transcription) | Unknown Translator(s) | Levi Yitsḥaq Derbarmdiger Rosakov of Berditchev |

The ḳaddish prayer of Rebbi Levi Yitsḥaq of Berditchev in Yiddish with Hebrew, and English translations. . . .


אֵל מָלֵא רַחֲמִים | El Malé Raḥamim for Victims of the Shoah (the Netherlands, ca. late 1940s)

Contributed on: 31 May 2023 by Aharon N. Varady (translation) | Aharon N. Varady (transcription) | Unknown Translator(s) | Unknown Author(s) |

This is an undated El Malé Raḥamim prayer for the victims of the Shoah translated into Dutch for a Yom Kippur ne’ilah service, likely sometime soon after the Holocaust had ended. To this I have added an English translation for those not fluent in Dutch or Hebrew. We are grateful to Shufra Judaica (Ellie Fisher and David Selis) for sharing a digital copy of this prayer. . . .


💬 הפטרת שבת חזון | Aftarát Shabbat Ḥazon, with verse-by-verse translation in Early Modern Spanish

Contributed on: 09 Jul 2023 by Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (transcription & naqdanut) | Unknown Translator(s) | Yeshayahu ben Amōts |

In the 18th century, the common practice among Western Sephardim was to read some or all of the aftarót recited in the three weeks before the fast of Aḇ with a verse-by-verse “Ladino” (in this case meaning standard Early Modern Spanish, not Judezmo) translation. According to Joseph Jesurun Pinto (ḥazzan of Shearith Israel in New York from 1759 to 1766), it was customary in Amsterdam for only the final of the three aftarót, the aftará of Shabbat Ḥazon, to be recited with this Spanish targum, while in London it was customary for all three to be recited. This practice fell out of common usage in the past few centuries, although the Western Sephardic community of Bayonne preserved it up until the Shoah. But to this day a unique cantillation system is used in most Western Sephardic communities for the three aftarót before the fast. Attached is a transcript of a Spanish verse-by-verse targum of the aftará for the Shabbat before 9 Aḇ, based on one found in a publication from Amsterdam in 1766. Each verse is included in Hebrew, as well as the original Spanish text, and a slightly modernized Spanish text underneath to clarify archaic forms or words that have fallen out of use. . . .


💬 הפטרת תשעה באב | Aftarát Tishŋa b’Aḇ, with verse-by-verse translation in Early Modern Spanish

Contributed on: 11 Jul 2023 by Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (transcription & naqdanut) | Unknown Translator(s) | Yeshayahu ben Amōts |

A common practice among Sephardim both eastern and western is to read the aftará for the morning of the fast of Aḇ with a verse-by-verse midrashic translation. Western Sephardim use an Early Modern Spanish text, while Eastern Sephardim use a Judezmo (or Judeo-Spanish proper) text. Attached is a transcript of a Western Sephardic verse-by-verse targum of the aftará for the Shabbat before 9 Aḇ, based on the text found in Isaac Leeser’s Siddur Siftei Tsadiqim, volume 6: Seder haTefilot laTaaniyot (1838), pp. 174-184. Each verse is included in Hebrew, as well as the original Spanish text, and a slightly modernized Spanish text underneath to clarify archaic forms or words that have fallen out of use. Also included are from-scratch English translations. . . .


In Celebration of the Coronation of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth Ⅱ (1953)

Contributed on: 28 Dec 2018 by Aharon N. Varady (transcription) | Unknown Translator(s) |

The service in 1953 by the S&P Synagogue (Bevis Marks, London) in celebration of the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom and British Commonwealth. . . .


כָּאנְדְרִי נְדְרִיהוּם | אֶחָד מִי יוֹדֵעַ | Kaanₔdri Nₔdrihom — a Judeo-Moroccan Arabic (Darija) adaptation of Eḥad Mi Yodeaȝ

Contributed on: 07 Feb 2024 by Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (translation) | Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (transcription & naqdanut) | Unknown Translator(s) | Unknown Author(s) |

A Judeo-Moroccan Arabic (Darija) adaptation of the Passover counting song Eḥad Mi Yodeaȝ, as found in Mahzor Moȝadé Hashem. . . .


Kuando el rey Nimrod (When Nimrod was King), a song relating the story of Avraham & the Furnace (ca. 1890)

Contributed on: 28 Jan 2020 by Aharon N. Varady (transcription) | Unknown Translator(s) | Unknown Author(s) |

The sephardic folk-song “Kuando el rey Nimrod” in Ladino with English translation. . . .


💬 מגילת יונה | Megillat Yonah with its Yevanic (Judeo-Greek) Targum ca. 14th c.

Contributed on: 23 Sep 2023 by Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (transcription & naqdanut) | Unknown Translator(s) | the Masoretic Text |

This is a 14th-century translation of the entire book of Jonah into Judeo-Greek or Yevanic, the traditional language of the Romaniote community of Byzantium. To quote the Judeo-Greek expert Julia G. Krivoruchko, it “exhibits a fusion of contemporary vernacular language with archaic elements” and “favors an extremely literal translation style.” This translation was first published in Greek transcription by the Dutch hellenist Dirk Christiaan Hesseling, who misdated it to the 12th-century based on a mixup between the Seleucid and common eras. Included as part of a Romaniote maḥzor (Bodleian Library MS. Oppenheim Add. 8° 19), this translation was almost certainly in use as a targum for the reading of Jonah as the Yom Kippur minḥa haftarah. In the original manuscript the majority of verses are preceded with a few words of the Hebrew, a common practice for written targumim. . . .


💬 Preamble and Introduction to the United Nations Charter (1945) | מבוא לאמנת האומות המאוחדות (Hebrew trans., 1949)

Contributed on: 07 Apr 2022 by Aharon N. Varady (transcription) | Unknown Translator(s) | Sol Bloom | Virginia Crocheron Gildersleeve | Jan Christian Smuts |

The Preamble (followed by the first article of the first chapter) of the Charter of the United Nations from 1945 translated into Hebrew by the State of Israel in 1949. . . .


ספר רפואת הנפש, פרק ב׳ — תפלה | Sefer Refuat haNefesh — chapter 2: Prayer, by Rabbi Morris Lichtenstein (Society of Jewish Science 1934)

Contributed on: 17 May 2023 by Aharon N. Varady (transcription) | Unknown Translator(s) | Morris Lichtenstein |

A brief explanation of the role of prayer in the Jewish Science movement of Rabbi Morris Lichtenstein and his wife Tehilla Lichtenstein, co-founders of the Society of Jewish Science, in Yiddish with an English translation. . . .


An die Freude | שִׁיר לְשִׂמְחָה | ode to Joy (Shir l’Simḥah), a Hebrew adaptation of the hymn by Friedrich Schiller (ca. late 18th c.)

Contributed on: 23 Feb 2016 by Aharon N. Varady (transcription) | Friedrich Schiller | Unknown Translator(s) |

In 1785 Friedrich Schiller wrote his ‘An die Freude an ode ‘To Joy’, describing his ideal of an equal society united in joy and friendship. Numerous copies and adaptations attest to its popularity at the time. The slightly altered 1803 edition was set to music not only by Ludwig van Beethoven in his Ninth Symphony but also by other composers such as Franz Schubert and Pyotr Tchaikovsky. Hs. Ros. PL B-57 contains a Hebrew translation of the first edition of the ode (apparently rendered before the 1803 alteration), revealing that the spirit of the age even managed to reach the Jewish community in the Netherlands. Whereas the imagery of Schiller’s original is drawn from Greek mythology, the author of the שִׁיר לְשִׂמְחָה relies on the Bible as a source. In fact, he not only utilises Biblical imagery, but successfully avoids any allusion to Hellenistic ideas whatsoever. . . .


💬 Universal Declaration of Human Rights | אַלװעלטלעכע דעקלאַראַציע פֿון מענטשנרעכט | הַכְרָזָה לְכׇל בָּאֵי עוֹלָם בִּדְבַר זְכֻיוֹת הָאָדָם | Deklarasion Universal de Derechos Umanos (1948)

Contributed on: 10 Apr 2022 by Aharon N. Varady (transcription) | Zackary Sholem Berger | Refoyl Finkl (translation) | Unknown Translator(s) | Peng Chun Chang | Charles Malik | René Cassin | John Peters Humphrey | United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights |

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights in English with its translations in Hebrew, Yiddish, and Ladino. . . .


וַאחְדְ אזְדִיוַא | وحد الجديوة | חַד גַּדְיָא (Waaḥₔd ₔZdiwa) — a Judeo-Moroccan Arabic (Darija) adaptation of Ḥad Gadya

Contributed on: 29 Feb 2024 by Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (translation) | Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (transcription & naqdanut) | Unknown Translator(s) | Unknown Author(s) |

A Judeo-Moroccan Arabic (Darija) adaptation of the Passover seder song, Ḥad Gadya, as found in Mahzor Moȝadé Hashem. . . .



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