Imminent Communal Danger & Distress • the Open Siddur Project ✍ פְּרוֺיֶקְט הַסִּדּוּר הַפָּתוּחַ

This is an archive of prayers composed in response to, or anxious anticipation of, imminent communal danger and distress.
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 a pogrom or other genocidal atrocity, 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.

תפלה לכל תענית צבור ועל כל צרה (שלא תבא על הציבור!) | Amidah for Any Communal Fast and On Account of Troubles (Nusaḥ Italki)

Contributor(s):

Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (transcription & naqdanut), Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (translation) and Unknown Author(s)

The Italian rite, unique among Jewish rites, has preserved up until very recently the custom recorded in the Talmud, Masekhet Tagnanith, for communally declared fast days. In this rite, sometimes referred to as the Twenty-Four Blessings, six more blessings are added to the liturgy — the Zikhronot and Shofrot portions more commonly recited on Rosh haShanah, and four different psalms, all interspaced with a poetic litany on behalf of the ancestors’ merit and shofar blasts. It’s a fascinatng service! . . .

Dans un temps de calamité publique | [Prayer] in a time of public calamity, by Jonas Ennery & Rabbi Arnaud Aron (1852)

Contributor(s):

Aharon N. Varady (translation), Jonas Ennery and Arnaud Aron

A prayer during an event of immanent communal danger and distress. . . .

תפילה לשלום באירופה | Prayer for Peace in Europe during the Italian War of Independence (ca. 19th c.)

Contributor(s):

Aharon N. Varady (translation) and Unknown Author(s)

This is a transcription, vocalization, and translation of a manuscript of a prayer for peace in Europe held in the collection of the Columbia University Library. The prayer is undated but the language of the prayer and the use of Italian indicate to me that this was a prayer made by an Italian Jewish community during either the first Italian War of Independence 1848-9, or one of the two succeeding wars in 1860 and 1870. . . .

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 (editing/transcription) and Noson Sternhartz of Nemyriv

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. . . .

אֱלֹהִים בְּיִשְׂרָאֵל | Elohim b’Yisrael :: A piyyut containing the 42 Letter Name, recorded in Sefer haPeliah

Contributor(s):

Aharon N. Varady (translation), Nir Krakauer (translation) and Unknown Author(s)

The earliest recorded prayer or piyyut providing an acrostic for the 42 letter divine name. . . .

תהלים ע״ט | Psalms 79, translated by Isaac Gantwerk Mayer

Contributor(s):

Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (translation), the Masoretic Text and Asaph ben Berechiah

A translation of Psalms 79 in response to the hostage taking at Beth Elohim in Colleyville, Texas. . . .

Stable Link: https://opensiddur.org/index.php?cat=3466

Associated Image:

Still frame from image of video taken by ABC7 of the hostage crisis at Beth Elohim (Colleyville, Texas)

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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