Kristallnacht • the Open Siddur Project ✍ פְּרוֺיֶּקט הַסִּדּוּר הַפָּתוּחַ

This is an archive of prayers composed for, or relevant to, Kristallnacht (16 Marḥeshvan, or 15 Marḥeshvan on years where 16 Marḥeshvan falls on a Thursday). Kristallnacht or the Night of Broken Glass, also called the November pogrom, was a pogrom against Jews carried out by the Nazi Party’s Sturmabteilung (SA) paramilitary and Schutzstaffel (SS) paramilitary forces along with some participation from the Hitler Youth and German civilians throughout Nazi Germany on 9–10 November 1938. Historians view Kristallnacht as a prelude to the Final Solution and the murder of six million Jews during the Holocaust.
If you have composed a prayer or prayer-poem for Kristallnacht, please share it here.
Looking for something else?
For prayers composed for the International Holocaust Remembrance Day, please visit here.
For prayers composed for Yom haShoah in the State of Israel (27 Nisan), please visit here.
For prayers composed for the United States commemoration: Days of Remembrance of the Victims of the Holocaust, please visit here.
For public readings selected for Holocaust & Genocide Memorial Days, go here.

אֶפְתַּח פִּי לְךָ אָדוֹן | Eftaḥ Pi L’kha Adōn, a seliḥah for Kristallnacht by Isaac Gantwerk Mayer

Contributor(s):

Isaac Gantwerk Mayer

Categories:

International Holocaust Remembrance Day (January 27th), Kristallnacht, Yom haShoah (27 Nisan), Days of Remembrance of the Victims of the Holocaust

Tags:

השואה the Shoah, 21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., Alphabetic Acrostic, Third Reich, פיוטים piyyutim, acronym, קינות Ḳinnot

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). . . .

סֵדֶר לְיוֹם הַשׁוֹאָה | Seder for Yom haSho’ah, by Isaac Gantwerk Mayer

Contributor(s):

Isaac Gantwerk Mayer

Categories:

International Holocaust Remembrance Day (January 27th), Kristallnacht, Yom haShoah (27 Nisan)

Tags:

Mourning this Broken World, השואה the Shoah, 21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., the Holocaust, כ״ז ניסן Nisan 27, speaking truth to power, North America, symbolic foods

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

Contributor(s):

Mona Lantz Levi (translation), Lada Moskalets (translation), Aharon N. Varady (translation) and Yehoyada Amir

Categories:

International Holocaust Remembrance Day (January 27th), Kristallnacht, Yom haShoah (27 Nisan), Days of Remembrance of the Victims of the Holocaust

Tags:

21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., the Holocaust, Romanian translation, Ukrainian translation, mourning, השואה the Shoah, אל מלא רחמים El Malé Raḥamim

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)

Contributor(s):

Aharon N. Varady (transcription), Peter W. Ochs (translation) and David Weiss Halivni

Categories:

Holocaust & Genocide Memorial Day Readings, International Holocaust Remembrance Day (January 27th), Kristallnacht, Yom haShoah (27 Nisan), Davvening, Pedagogical Essays on Jewish Prayer

Tags:

Days of Remembrance of the Victims of the Holocaust (DRVH), 20th century C.E., 58th century A.M., the Holocaust, non-dual theology

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. . . .

קִינָה עַל חֻרְבָּן הָאַחֲרוֹן | Lamentation on the Holocaust, by Shimon Zuker (1980)

Contributor(s):

Aharon N. Varady (transcription), Len Fellman (translation), Gertrude Hirschler (translation) and Simon Zuker

Categories:

International Holocaust Remembrance Day (January 27th), Kristallnacht, Yom haShoah (27 Nisan), Days of Remembrance of the Victims of the Holocaust

Tags:

20th century C.E., קינות Ḳinnot, 58th century A.M., the Holocaust, Cantillated readings in English

A ḳinnah composed by a concentration camp survivor. . . .

שְׁפוֹךְ אֲהָבָתֵךְ | Shfokh Ahavatekh (Pour Out Your Love), by Rabbi Ḥayyim Bloch (1948)

Contributor(s):

Aharon N. Varady (transcription) and Mosheh Ḥayyim ben Avraham Abba Bloch

Categories:

International Holocaust Remembrance Day (January 27th), Kristallnacht, Yom haShoah (27 Nisan), Barekh, Days of Remembrance of the Victims of the Holocaust

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שפוך חמתך shfokh ḥamatekha, 20th century C.E., paraliturgical shfokh hamatekha, 58th century A.M., righteous gentiles, World War Ⅱ, the Holocaust, post-Holocaust liturgical adaptations

A paraliturgical adaptation of the prayer/curse, “Shfokh Ḥamatekha,” this prayer, likely written during, or just after the Holocaust, recognizes those nations and righteous gentiles who fought and risked their lives to aid and rescue European Jewry. . . .

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

Contributor(s):

Aharon N. Varady (translation), Aharon N. Varady (transcription), Unknown Translator(s) and Unknown Author(s)

Categories:

International Holocaust Remembrance Day (January 27th), Kristallnacht, Yom haShoah (27 Nisan), Days of Remembrance of the Victims of the Holocaust

Tags:

58th century A.M., Netherlandish Jewry, the Holocaust, נעילה‎ neilah, 20th century C.E., Dutch Jewry, השואה the Shoah, אל מלא רחמים El Malé Raḥamim

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. . . .

שִׁיר הַגְאוּלָה (החיינו אל) | Shir ha-Ge’ulah (Song of Redemption), by an anonymous author (1940)

Contributor(s):

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

Categories:

International Holocaust Remembrance Day (January 27th), Kristallnacht, Yom haShoah (27 Nisan), Days of Remembrance of the Victims of the Holocaust, Se'udah haShlishit

Tags:

חבּ״ד ḤaBaD Lubavitch, 20th century C.E., משיח Moshiaḥ, זמירות zemirot, acrostic, 58th century A.M., World War Ⅱ, the Holocaust

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.” . . .

מי שברך לשבויים | Mi sheBerakh for the Captives, after Kristallnacht (Hamburg, November 1938)

Contributor(s):

Elie Kaunfer and Unknown Author(s)

Categories:

Kristallnacht

Tags:

20th century C.E., מי שברך mi sheberakh, 57th century A.M., captives, Needing Vocalization

This is a prayer for captives, written in November 1938 in Hamburg, following Kristallnacht (my translation following the Hebrew). “May each and every one of them return to their family…who are worrying about them.” . . .

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)

Contributor(s):

Aharon N. Varady (transcription), Joseph Herman Hertz and Office of the Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth

Categories:

Kristallnacht, International Holocaust Remembrance Day (January 27th), Yom haShoah (27 Nisan), Shiv'ah Asar b'Tamuz, Days of Remembrance of the Victims of the Holocaust

Tags:

Jews of India, 57th century A.M., Third Reich, British Empire, German Jewry, World War Ⅱ, the Holocaust, anti-fascist, 20th century C.E.

An untitled prayer on behalf of German Jewry under Nazi oppression disseminated in Bombay, likely after Kristallnacht (9-10 November 1938). . . .

[Prayer on] the German Crisis, by Rabbi Norman M. Goldburg (3 April 1933)

Contributor(s):

Aharon N. Varady (transcription) and Norman Michael Goldburg

Categories:

International Holocaust Remembrance Day (January 27th), Kristallnacht, Yom haShoah (27 Nisan), Opening Prayers for Legislative Bodies, Days of Remembrance of the Victims of the Holocaust, International Day of Democracy (September 15th)

Tags:

1933 in Germany, 57th century A.M., Reichstag Fire Decree, English vernacular prayer, Prayers of Guest Chaplains, 20th century C.E., California State Legislature, United States

“The German Crisis” by Rabbi Norman Michael Goldburg, was offered before the California state legislature on 3 April 1933, and published in California Legislature 50th Session 1933: Prayers Offered at the Daily Sessions of the Assembly, pp. 59-60. . . .