Pogroms & Genocide • the Open Siddur Project ✍ פְּרוֺיֶּקט הַסִּדּוּר הַפָּתוּחַ

This is an archive of prayers composed in response to, or anxious anticipation of, a pogrom or a genocidal atrocity.
Click here to contribute a prayer you have written, or a transcription and translation of a historical prayer.
Looking for something else?
For prayers offered in the event of imminent communal danger and distress, go here.
For prayers offered in the event of hateful intolerance, prejudice, and bigotry, go here.
For prayers offered in the event of attack intended to invoke communal terror, go here.
For prayers offered in response to conflicts over sovereignty and dispossession, go here.
For prayers composed for social justice, peace, and liberty, go here.

זָכוֹר אֵת אֲשֶׁר־עָשָׂה לְךָ חָמָאס | Remember That Which Hamas Did, an adaptation on the liturgical reminder to obliterate Amaleq by Aryeh Barukh (2024)

Contributor(s):

Aryeh Baruch

Categories:

Pogroms & Genocide, Slavery & Captivity, Terror

Tags:

21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., vengeance, זכירות zekhirot, 2023 Israel–Hamas war, addenda

A riff on the mitsvah to obliterate Amaleq in Parashat Zakhor, adapted to the horrors committed by HAMA”S and its allies on 7 October 2023. . . .

קִינָת בְּאֵרִי | Qinat Be’eri (a Lamentation for Be’eri), by Yagel Haroush

Contributor(s):

Yosef Goldman and Yagel Haroush

Categories:

Mourning, Pogroms & Genocide

Tags:

2023 Israel–Hamas war, קינות Ḳinnot, 21st century C.E., 58th century A.M.

Qinat Be’eri was written by Yagel Haroush in the month of Marḥeshban after the massacres on 7 October and disseminated on social media. . . .

An Infinity of Amens, by Rabbi Hanna Yerushalmi (15 October 2023)

Contributor(s):

Hanna Yerushalmi

Categories:

Mourning, Pogroms & Genocide

Tags:

21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., Prayers as poems, English vernacular prayer, 2023 Israel–Hamas war, קינות Ḳinnot

“An infinity of amens” was written by Hanna Yerushalmi on 15 October 2023 in the aftermath of the massacres on Shemini Atseret 5784. . . .

[Prayer for] the Ninth of Aḇ, by Rabbi Abraham Cronbach (1924)

Contributor(s):

Aharon N. Varady (transcription) and Abraham Cronbach

Categories:

Congregation & Community, Tishah b'Av, Pogroms & Genocide, Terror

Tags:

20th century C.E., 57th century A.M., English vernacular prayer, prophetic revelation

This prayer for “The Ninth of Ab” by Rabbi Abraham Cronbach is found in his, Prayers of the Jewish Advance (1924), on pages 60-65. . . .

אָב הָרַחֲמִים שׁוֹכֵן מְרוֹמִים | Av haRaḥamim Shokhein Meromim, a prayer for the martyred during the First Crusade & Rhineland massacres

Contributor(s):

Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (translation) and Unknown Author(s)

Categories:

Shavuot, After the Aliyot, Tishah b'Av, Pogroms & Genocide

Tags:

prayers following pogroms, 11th century C.E., 49th century A.M., First Crusade, People's Crusade, Rhineland Massacres

A prayer for those martyred in the First Crusade and Rhineland Massacres, and by extension, all subsequent pogroms up until and including the Holocaust. . . .

ליקוטי תפילות ב:נג | Prayer of Peace from War, for Rainfall, and for Excellence in Torah Study (Liqutei Tefilot Ⅱ:53), by Reb Noson of Nemyriv adapted from the teachings of Rebbe Naḥman (ca. 1820s)

Contributor(s):

Aharon N. Varady (transcription) and Noson Sternhartz of Nemyriv

Categories:

Imminent Communal Danger & Distress, Mass Shootings & Gun Violence, Pogroms & Genocide, War

Tags:

19th century C.E., 56th century A.M., חסידי ברצלב Ḥasidei Bratslav (Breslov)

Often, when people refer to “Rebbe Naḥman’s Prayer for Peace,” they are referring to a more recent prayer combining portions of a number of prayers of Reb Noson of Nemyriv, including this one Liqutei Tefilot Ⅱ:53. In addition to a prayer for peace and the eradication of war, the prayer requests rain in its due time, excellence in Torah study, and protection from unworthy students of Torah. Reb Noson of Nemirov adapted his teḥinot from the teachings of Rebbe Naḥman of Bratslav in Liqutei Moharan Ⅱ:60. . . .