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🖖︎ Prayers & Praxes // 📅︎ Prayers for Civic Days on Civil Calendars // United States Civil Calendar // Lincoln's Birthday (February 12th) 📁 Lincoln’s Birthday (February 12th)
Contributor(s): “Prayer for National Holiday” by Rabbi Morrison David Bial was first published in his anthology, An Offering of Prayer (1962), p. 71, from where this prayer was transcribed. . . . Opening Prayer on the Significance of Lincoln’s Birthday, by Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan, J. Paul Williams, and Eugene Kohn (1951) Contributor(s): This opening prayer-essay for Lincoln’s Birthday, “The Significance of the Day,” was first published in The Faith of America: Readings, Songs, and Prayers for the Celebration of American Holidays (Jewish Reconstructionist Foundation 1951) — as preface to a number of readings selected by Mordecai Kaplan, Eugene Kohn, and J. Paul Williams for the day. . . . Prayer of the Guest Chaplain of the U.S. House of Representatives: Rabbi Dr. Leo Baeck on 12 February 1948 Contributor(s): The Opening Prayer given in the U.S. House of Representatives on Lincoln’s Birthday, 12 February 1948. . . . Contributor(s): A civic prayer for the Sabbath occurring during Brotherhood Week (February 19th-28th) in the United States. . . . Contributor(s): “That Religion Be Not a Cloak for Hypocrisy,” by Rabbi Mordecai Menaḥem Kaplan can be found on p. 435-5 of his The Sabbath Prayer Book (New York: The Jewish Reconstructionist Foundation, 1945). . . . Contributor(s): This prayer by Stephen Vincent Benét (1898-1943) was first publicly read in 1942 in the course of a United Nations Day speech by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. . . . Needed Prophets for Our Day, a prayer-poem by Mordecai Kaplan (1942) adapted from “The Divinity School Address” by Ralph Waldo Emerson (1838) Contributor(s): This prayer by Rabbi Mordecai M. Kaplan, first penned in his diary for 23 August 1942, was first published in The Radical American Judaism of Mordecai M. Kaplan, by Mel Scult (1990). Although the prayer was not included in Kaplan’s Sabbath Prayer Book (New York: The Jewish Reconstructionist Foundation, 1945), it was added to the loose-leaf prayerbook he kept at the Society for the Advancement of Judaism synagogue. . . . זֶה הֶעָפָר הָיָה פַּעַם הָאִישׁ | This Dust was Once the Man, an elegy for President Abraham Lincoln by Walt Whitman (1871), Hebrew translation by Shimon Halkin (1952) Contributor(s): An elegy by Walt Whitman for President Abraham Lincoln after his assassination, in English with Hebrew translation. . . . הוֹ קְבַרְנִיט! קְבַרְנִיטִי! | O Captain! My Captain!, an elegy for President Abraham Lincoln by Walt Whitman (1865), Hebrew translation by Shimon Halkin (1952) Contributor(s): Walt Whitman’s famous poem eulogizing President Abraham Lincoln after his assassination, in English with Hebrew translation. . . . אָ, קאפּיטאן! מײַן קאפּיטאן! | O Captain! My Captain!, an elegy for President Abraham Lincoln by Walt Whitman (1865), Yiddish translation by Eliezer Meler (1940) Contributor(s): Walt Whitman’s famous poem eulogizing President Abraham Lincoln after his assassination, in English with Yiddish translation. . . . אָ, קאפּיטאן! מײַן קאפּיטאן! | O Captain! My Captain!, an elegy for President Abraham Lincoln by Walt Whitman (1865), Yiddish translation by Avrom Valt-Lyessin (1913) Contributor(s): Walt Whitman’s famous poem eulogizing President Abraham Lincoln after his assassination, in English with Yiddish translation. . . . Contributor(s): Exalted are you Lincoln. Who is like you! You were highly respected among Kings and Princes. All that you accomplished you did with a humble spirit. You are singular and cannot be compared to anyone else. Who among the great are like Lincoln? Who can be praised like you? . . . Contributor(s): This prayer by Rabbi Sabato Morais was offered in conclusion to a sermon delivered at some point days after the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln on 15 April 1865, and reprinted in The Philadelphia Inquirer on 20 November 1865. The time of the assassination corresponded to motsei shabbat and the beginning of the 6th day of Passover 5625, and so we can imagine this prayer having been delivered at some point over the remaining two festival days of Pesaḥ, on April 17th or 18th. The prayer was preserved by Rabbi Morais in his ledger (page 24, clipping 029), an archive of newsclippings recording material he contributed to the press, among other announcements. (Many thanks to the Library of the University of Pennsylvania for helping to make this resource accessible.) Next to the clipping, Rabbi Sabato has written, “Andrew Johnson proved anything but a worthy successor to the sainted Abraham Lincoln.” . . . Contributor(s): A hymn by the abolitionist Harriet Beecher Stowe, included in the hymnal of Congregation Adath Jeshurun in Philadelphia in 1926. . . . Contributor(s): This prayer by Rabbi Sabato Morais (1828-1897), of Congregation Mikveh Israel in Philadelphia, was initially delivered on 15 April 1862 (the first day of Passover) at the conclusion of a sermon later printed in The Philadelphia Inquirer on 23 April 1862. A copy of that sermon was preserved in the Sabato Morais Ledger (p. 22, clip no. 23). (The prayer was also read by President Abraham Lincoln, who sent Rabbi Morais an acknowledgment). The letter was read into the congressional record on 29 February 1944 by Arthur G. Klein (1904-1968, D-NY) after it was brought to light by Moshe Davis at the 44th annual meeting of the American Jewish Historical Society on 12-13 February 1944 (Lincoln’s Birthday). . . . Contributor(s): A hymn for peace and the end of war. . . .
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The Open Siddur Project is a volunteer-driven, non-profit, non-commercial, non-denominational, non-prescriptive, gratis & libre Open Access archive of contemplative praxes, liturgical readings, and Jewish prayer literature (historic and contemporary, familiar and obscure) composed in every era, region, and language Jews have ever prayed. Our goal is to provide a platform for sharing open-source resources, tools, and content for individuals and communities crafting their own prayerbook (siddur). Through this we hope to empower personal autonomy, preserve customs, and foster creativity in religious culture.
ויהי נעם אדני אלהינו עלינו ומעשה ידינו כוננה עלינו ומעשה ידינו כוננהו "May the pleasantness of אדֹני our elo’ah be upon us; may our handiwork be established for us — our handiwork, may it be established." –Psalms 90:17
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