This is an archive of prayers, prayer-poems, and songs for the festival of חֲנֻכָּה (Ḥanukkah), commemorating the crucial victory of the Jewish people in retaining its culture, lifeways, and Temple vis-à-vis the oppressive hegemony of the Seleucid Greek kingdom around 164 BCE. Click here to contribute a prayer you have written, or a transcription and/or translation of a historic Ḥanukkah prayer or song in any language, familiar or obscure. Filter resources by Collaborator Name Filter resources by Tag Filter resources by Category Filter resources by Language Filter resources by Date Range
For the purpose of the unification of the Holy One and His divine (feminine) Presence, with trepidation and love and love and trepidation, to unify the name Yud-Kay with Vav-Kay (the four letters of the Tetragrammaton) with a complete unity in the name of all Israel, behold I intend in the lighting of the Hanukkah candle to fulfill the command of my Creator as our wise men of blessed memory have commanded us to repair her root in a supernal abode. . . . “Für Chanuka” was translated/adapted by Yehoshua Heshil Miro and published in his anthology of teḥinot, בית יעקב (Beit Yaaqov) Allgemeines Gebetbuch für gebildete Frauen mosaicher Religion. It first appears in the 1829 edition, תחנות Teḥinot ein Gebetbuch für gebildete Frauenzimmer mosaicher Religion as teḥinah №54 on pp. 79-81. In the 1835 edition, it appears as teḥinah №56 pp. 101-103. In the 1842 edition, it appears as teḥinah №59 on pp. 106-108. . . . “Lights in the Temple” by Rev. John Keble (1792-1866) was initially published anonymously in The British Magazine and Monthly Register of Religious and Ecclesiastical Information (1 March 1834, vol. 5, p. 280), and a few years later republished under a pseudonym ‘γ’ in a collection of religious poetry, Lyrica Apostolica (1836) (under the section “Lighting of Lamps,” pp. 74-75). Keble’s authorship was clearly identified in Miscellaneous Poems, published posthumously in 1868. The poem was one of three by Keble included in the Standard Book of Jewish Verse (ed. Joseph Friedlander and George Alexander Kohut, 1917), pp. 72-73. . . . This is the “Prière Pour la Fête de Hanouka” as found in אמרי לב Prières D’un Cœur Israélite, a collection of paraliturgical prayers and teḥinot in French by Jonas Ennery & Rabbi Arnaud Aron (Consistoire central israélite de France 1848/53). In the 1848 edition, the prayer can be found on pages 158-160. In the 1852 edition, on pages 401-403. . . . A prayer for festival of Ḥanukkah. . . . This is “Gebet am Lichtfeste” by Fanny Neuda from her collection of teḥinot, Stunden der Andacht (1855/58). In the 1855 edition, it can be found on pages 68-69. In the Judeo-German (vaybertaytsh/mashkit) edition (1864), on pages 88-89. . . . “Arise! let the souls of the Hebrews rejoice,” by Cordelia Moïse Cohen (1809-1869), appears under the subject “Feast of Dedication” as Hymn 194 in Hymns Written for the Use of Hebrew Congregations (Penina Moïse et al., Ḳ.Ḳ. Beth Elohim, 1856), p. 189. . . . “God dwells in light!,” by Rabbi Moritz Mayer, published in 1856, appears under the subject “Feast of Dedication” (i.e. Ḥanukkah) as Hymn 193 in Hymns Written for the Use of Hebrew Congregations (Penina Moïse et al., Ḳ.Ḳ. Beth Elohim, 1856), pp. 188-189. . . . This Thanksgiving Day Prayer for 28 November 1861 was reprinted in The Jewish Messenger (vol. 10, no. 12, p. 91), on 13 December 1861. It was preserved by Rabbi Morais in his ledger (page 22, clipping 023), 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.) Unfortunately, that bit of clipping containing the prayer had disintegrated enough to make much of the prayer illegible. But thankfully, a microfilm copy of the The Jewish Messenger for the date of printing was available at the HUC-JIR Klau Library, Cincinnati. . . . “Feast of Lights,” from Poems of Emma Lazarus, vol. II (1888), pp. 18. . . . A poem on the meaning of the menorah. . . . “דיא חנוכה ליכט” by Morris Rosenfeld (1862-1923) p.132-134. It was translated from the Yiddish into English by Rose Pastor Stokes & Helena Frank and published under the title, “The Feast of Lights” in Songs of Labor and Other Poems (1914), p. 65-66. Another translation, by Helena Frank alone was published in Apples & Honey (ed. Nina Salaman 1921), p. 242-244. The German translation by Berthold Feiwel was published in Lieder des Ghetto (1902), p. 81-83, and illustrated by Efraim Moses Lilian. . . . |
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