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🖖︎ Prayers & Praxes // 📅︎ Prayers for Civic Days on Civil Calendars // International Civil Calendar // International Holocaust Remembrance Day (January 27th)
International Holocaust Remembrance Day (January 27th)
![]() ![]() ![]() An alternate text from the period during, or just after the Holocaust, recognizing those nations and people who sought to aid and rescue European Jewry. . . . אֶפְתַּח פִּי לְךָ אָדוֹן | Eftaḥ Pi L’kha Adōn, a seliḥah for Kristallnacht by Isaac Gantwerk Mayer![]() ![]() ![]() There’s a lot of controversy over Yom haShoah as a date. One of the key issues is this: traditionally, the ways Jews mourn communal tragedies is through establishing a fast day. It’s forbidden to fast during the month of Nisan. It’s hard to pick any specific date to commemorate a tragedy as enormous as the Shoah, but one which seems appropriate to me would be 16 Marḥeshvan, the anniversary of Kristallnacht, the November Pogrom. This piyyut is a seliḥah for Kristallnacht, to be recited on 16 Marḥeshvan (or 15 Marḥeshvan on years like 5782 where the sixteenth falls on a Thursday). . . . Prayer of the Guest Chaplain of the U.S. House of Representatives: Rabbi Romi Cohn on 29 January 2020![]() ![]() ![]() The Opening Prayer given in the U.S. House of Representatives on 29 January 2020. . . . ![]() ![]() ![]() The most traumatic event in recent Jewish history is the Holocaust. At this time, the survivors of the camps are aging, and in the lifespan of people alive today it is likely that the last survivor will die. We say we must never forget what happened during the Holocaust, but if we think of it as a tragedy that happened to our ancestors we will forget. But it has been 3000 years since the Exodus from Egypt, and the Haggadah keeps its history vivid and alive. We are taught that in each and every generation we are to think of ourselves as having been slaves in Egypt. May it be that just as we never forgot the wonders of the Exodus, so too we never forget the horrors of the Holocaust, and continue to strive that such horrors may never happen again until all live in freedom and peace. . . . אֵל מָלֵא רַחֲמִים תְפִילָה לַנִּסְפִּים בַּשּׁוֹאָה | El Malé Raḥamim Prayer for the Victims of the Shoah, by Rabbi Yehoyada Amir![]() ![]() ![]() A prayer for the victims of the Holocaust in Hebrew with English, Romanian, and Ukrainian translations. . . . על השואה ועל התפלתה | Prayer in the Shoah, an essay and a prayer by Rabbi Dr. David Weiss Halivni (2000)![]() ![]() ![]() A meditation on a unique prayer heard by Rabbi Dr. David Weiss Halivni at the Rosh Hashanah services at the Wolfsberg Labor Camp in 1944. . . . ![]() ![]() ![]() A ḳinnah composed by a concentration camp survivor. . . . ![]() ![]() ![]() The Yiddish resistance song, “Partisaner Lid” (The Partisan Song) was composed by Hirsh Glick in the Vilna Ghetto in 1943. . . . ![]() ![]() ![]() This is a vocalized transcription and translation of the World War Ⅱ era song, “Shir haGe’ulah (Song of Redemption)” from the source images shared in A Tribute to Rabbi Mordechai Meir Hakohen Bryski v”g Bryski (Rabbi Mordechai A. Katz, 2017), pp. 19-20. The song is also known by its incipit, “Heḥayyeinu El.” . . . Prayer for a Service of Intercession [for European Jewry during the Holocaust], by Lilian Helen Montagu (ca. 1940)![]() ![]() ![]() This undated “Special prayer for Service of Intercession” by the Hon. Lily H. Montagu (1873-1963) from the archives of the Liberal Jewish Synagogue, London, was published in, Lily Montagu: Sermons, Addresses, Letters, and Prayers (ed. Ellen M. Umansky, 1985), pp. 356-357. From the contents, it reads as if it was composed in response to the terrifying news of the tortuous treatment of European Jews during the Holocaust. In 1940, other “intercession” services were offered with comparative prayers; for example, this one by the chief rabbi J.H. Hertz included in the Prayer Book for H.M. Forces. . . . Prayer of Intercession [for Britain in the War against Nazi Germany], by Rabbi Joseph H. Hertz (Office of the Chief Rabbi of the British Empire 1940)![]() ![]() ![]() “Prayer for Intercession,” almost certainly written by Rabbi Joseph H. Hertz, was published in the Prayer Book of Jewish Members of H.M. Forces (Office of the Chief Rabbi 1940), pp. 18-19. . . . Prayer on the Declaration of War [against Nazi Germany], by Rabbi Joseph H. Hertz (Office of the Chief Rabbi of the British Empire 1940)![]() ![]() ![]() This prayer for victory and deliverance in the war against Nazi Germany, simply titled “War Prayer,” appears in the Prayer Book of Jewish Members of H.M. Forces (Office of the Chief Rabbi 1940), pp. 16-17. Sections of the prayer were adapted from the prayer on the declaration of war by Rabbi Hertz in 1914 at the outset of World War I. In the preface to the payer book, Rabbi Joseph H. Hertz specifically mentions this prayer, among others, as having been newly revised for this publication. The initial version of the prayer, likely to have been written by Rabbi Hertz, was published by the Office of the Chief Rabbi for a 17 Tammuz service in July 1938. A revision was disseminated after Kristallnacht (9-10 November 1938). This is the third version of the prayer. . . . תפילה לעזרת היהודים תושבי גרמניה | Prayer for German Jewry under Nazi oppression before and after Kristallnacht (Office of the Chief Rabbi of the British Empire 1938)![]() ![]() ![]() An untitled prayer on behalf of German Jewry under Nazi oppression disseminated in Bombay, likely after Kristallnacht (9-10 November 1938). . . . |