It is somewhat well known that in the Italian rite, there are alternative texts for the first and third blessings of the evening Shemaˁ liturgy on Shabbat, texts which were rejected by Ashkenazi practice out of fear the community could become confused and recite them on weekdays. But these Shabbat-specific blessings, derived from the old Erets Yisrael rite and preserved in the siddur of Rav Saˁadia Gaon (RaSaG), are not alone! All the blessings of the Shabbat evening Shemaˁ service — as well as all the blessings of the Saturday night Motsaei Shabbat Shemaˁ service! — have unique poetic forms in RaSaG’s siddur. This part, the Saturday night rite, is part two of a two-part series posting these liturgical texts found in the siddur of — and approved of by — the gaon. . . .

Categories:

Motsaei Shabbat

Tags:

Geonic prayers, Nusaḥ Erets Yisrael, Nusaḥ Italḳi

Contributor(s):

Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (transcription & naqdanut), Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (translation) and Saadiah ben Yosef Gaon

הַמַּבְדִּיל בֵּין קֹדֶשׁ לְחֹל | Hamavdil Bein Ḳodesh l’Ḥol (abridged), a piyyut attributed to Yitsḥak ben Yehudah Ibn Ghayyāth HaLevi (ca. 11th c.)

The short form of the piyyut for motsei shabbat, with English translation. . . .

Categories:

Motsaei Shabbat

Tags:

11th century C.E., 49th century A.M., acrostic, Acrostic signature, Angelic Protection, המבדיל בין קדש לחל Hamavdil Bein Ḳodesh l'Ḥol, הבדלות havdalot, זמירות zemirot

Contributor(s):

Akiva Sanders (translation) and Yitsḥak ben Yehudah Ibn Ghayyāth HaLevi

הַמַּבְדִּיל בֵּין קֹדֶשׁ לְחֹל | Hamavdil Ben Ḳodesh l’Ḥol, a piyyut attributed to Yitsḥaq ben Yehudah ibn Ghayyat (rhymed translation by Alice Lucas, 1898)

A rhymed translation of the piyyut sung following the Havdallah ritual. . . .

Categories:

Yom Kippur, Motsaei Shabbat

Tags:

11th century C.E., 49th century A.M., Acrostic signature, המבדיל בין קדש לחל Hamavdil Bein Ḳodesh l'Ḥol, הבדלות havdalot, נעילה‎ neilah, פיוטים piyyuṭim, rhyming translation

Contributor(s):

Alice Lucas (translation), Yitsḥak ben Yehudah Ibn Ghayyāth HaLevi and Aharon N. Varady (transcription)

יָהּ, אָנָה אֶמְצָאֶךָּ | Yah, Where shall I find you?, a piyyut by Yehudah haLevi (ca. early 12th c.)

A piyyut that expresses the paradox of a divinity that is both “Beyond” and “Present.” . . .

Categories:

Purim Qatan, 🤦︎ Taḥanun (Nefilat Apayim), Motsaei Shabbat

Tags:

12th century C.E., 49th century A.M., alienation, אנה אמצאך ana emtsaeka, dveykut

Contributor(s):

Nina Davis Salaman (translation), the Ben Yehuda Project (transcription), Yehudah ben Shmuel haLevi and Aharon N. Varady (translation)

אֱלֹהִים יִסְעָדֵנוּ | Elohim Yisadenu, a piyyut by Avraham ibn Ezra (trans. Rabbi David Aaron de Sola, 1857)

This translation by Rabbi David Aaron de Sola of “Elohim Yisadenu” by a paytan named Avraham (possibly Avraham ibn Ezra) was first published in his Ancient Melodies of the Spanish and Portuguese Jews (1857). . . .

Categories:

Se'udah haShlishit, Motsaei Shabbat

Tags:

12th century C.E., 50th century A.M., acrostic, Acrostic signature, פיוטים piyyuṭim, זמירות zemirot

Contributor(s):

David de Aaron de Sola (translation), Avraham ibn Ezra and Aharon N. Varady (transcription)

🆕 איל דייו אלטו | El Dio Alto — a Ladino pizmon for Havdalah, Motsei Shabbat (transcribed and translated by Isaac Gantwerk Mayer)

There are many different versions of this beloved Ladino pizmon for Havdalah. This one is found in Tefilat Imanuel, published in Vienna in 1924. . . .

Categories:

Labor, Fulfillment, and Parnasah, Motsaei Shabbat

Tags:

Angelic Protection, הבדלות havdalot, Ladino vernacular prayer, paraliturgical havdalah, פזמונים pizmonim, זמירות zemirot

Contributor(s):

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

א דוּדעלע (אַיֵּה אֶמְצָאֶךָּ)‏ | A Dudele (Where shall I seek you?), by Rabbi Levi Yitsḥaq of Berditchev (ca. 18th c.)

A profound song invoking divine presence. . . .

Categories:

Rosh haShanah (l’Maaseh Bereshit), Yom Kippur, Purim Qatan, 🤦︎ Taḥanun (Nefilat Apayim), Motsaei Shabbat

Tags:

18th century C.E., 56th century A.M., אנה אמצאך ana emtsaeka, creator within creation, חסידות Ḥasidut, הבדלות havdalot, Hebrew translation, non-dual theology, panentheism, תשובה teshuvah, Yiddish songs, זמירות zemirot

Contributor(s):

Levi Yitsḥaq Derbarmdiger Rosakov of Berditchev and Aharon N. Varady (translation)

גאָט פון אַבְרָהָם | Tkhine before Havdalah and Bakashe for the End of Shabbat (Got fin Avrum)

Master of all realms! You hear from all worlds. You look with love and grace upon all of your creations for whose sake you created Your world. Seize and fulfill the pure request from Your servant who comes before You after a full week, having shown her heart is full and her mood somber. The beloved Shabbes koidesh is already going away, and with our Shabbes, our rest has also disappeared. A new week comes up to meet us, against us, Master of the universe. We are people who know, just like You know, the heavy and difficult life of Your people Yisruel: their bitter mood, how difficulty and bitterly each Jew acquires his meager piece of bread through worry and heartache, the fear and hardship with which each Jew scrapes together his seemingly hopeless living. . . .

Categories:

Motsaei Shabbat

Tags:

gut vokh, Needing Source Images, תחינות tkhines, Yiddish vernacular prayer

Contributor(s):

Unknown, Yudis Retig (translation), Yocheved Retig (translation) and Levi Yitsḥaq Derbarmdiger Rosakov of Berditchev

[Prayer for] Saturday night, by Grace Aguilar (24 December 1836)

“Saturday night, Dec. 24, 1836” (17th of Tevet, 5597) by Grace Aguilar was published posthumously by her mother Sarah Aguilar in Essays and Miscellanies (1853), in the section “Sacred Communings,” pp. 192-195. In the UK edition of Sacred Communings (1853) the prayer appears with small variations of spelling and punctuation on pages 110-112. . . .

Categories:

Motsaei Shabbat

Tags:

19th century C.E., 56th century A.M., English vernacular prayer, תחינות teḥinot, teḥinot in English

Contributor(s):

Grace Aguilar and Aharon N. Varady (transcription)

[Prayer for] Saturday night [on New Year’s Eve], by Grace Aguilar (31 December 1836)

“Saturday night, Dec. 31, 1836” by Grace Aguilar was published posthumously by her mother Sarah Aguilar in Essays and Miscellanies (1853), in the section “Sacred Communings,” pp. 196-199. In the UK edition of Sacred Communings (1853) the prayer appears with small variations of spelling and punctuation on pages 112-115. . . .

Categories:

🌐 Gregorian New Year's Day (January 1st), Motsaei Shabbat

Tags:

19th century C.E., 56th century A.M., English vernacular prayer, תחינות teḥinot, teḥinot in English

Contributor(s):

Grace Aguilar and Aharon N. Varady (transcription)

[Prayer for] Saturday night, by Grace Aguilar (14 January 1837)

“Meditations—Saturday night, Jan. 14, 1837” by Grace Aguilar was published posthumously by her mother Sarah Aguilar in Essays and Miscellanies (1853), in the section “Sacred Communings,” pp. 200-202. In the UK edition of Sacred Communings (1853) the prayer appears with small variations of spelling and punctuation on pages 123-124. . . .

Categories:

Motsaei Shabbat

Tags:

19th century C.E., 56th century A.M., English vernacular prayer, תחינות teḥinot, teḥinot in English

Contributor(s):

Grace Aguilar and Aharon N. Varady (transcription)

Prayer for the Close of the Sabbath, by Rabbi Moritz Mayer (1866)

“Prayer for the Close of the Sabbath” is one of thirty prayers appearing in Rabbi Moritz Mayer’s collection of tehinot, Hours of Devotion (1866), of uncertain provenance and which he may have written. . . .

Categories:

Motsaei Shabbat

Tags:

19th century C.E., 57th century A.M., English vernacular prayer, Jewish Women's Prayers, תחינות teḥinot

Contributor(s):

Moritz Mayer and Aharon N. Varady (transcription)

Habdalah, a paraliturgical prayer by Jessie Ethel Sampter (1919)

This paraliturgical prayer for the end of Shabbat havdalah was made by Jessie Ethel Sampter and published in her Around the Year in Rhymes for the Jewish Child (1920), p. 64. . . .

Categories:

Motsaei Shabbat

Tags:

20th century C.E., 57th century A.M., children's prayers, paraliturgical havdalah, rhyming translation

Contributor(s):

Jessie Ethel Sampter and Aharon N. Varady (transcription)

אָכֵן ה׳ | Akhen Hashem, a baqashah of Rabbi Kalonymus Kalman Shapira (ca. 1920s)

This is a prayer offered by the Piacezna Rebbe, Rabbi Kalonymus Kalman Shapira (1889-1943) and likely written down sometime in the 1920s before it was printed among other letters and writings in his sefer Derekh haMelekh (1931). The prayer, vocalized from the 2011 Feldheim edition and translated into English, was circulated online via the Lost Princess Initiative of Rabbi Yaakov Klein (Eilecha) beginning 25 May 2023. . . .

Categories:

Purim Qatan, Motsaei Shabbat, 🤦︎ Taḥanun (Nefilat Apayim)

Tags:

20th century C.E., 57th century A.M., אנה אמצאך ana emtsaeka, בקשות Baqashot, חסידות Ḥasidut, panentheism

Contributor(s):

Yaakov Klein (translation), Kalonymus Kalman Shapira and Aharon N. Varady (transcription)

הִנֵּה שָׁם אֶמְצָאֶךָּ | Where We Can Find Yah, a prayer-poem by Eugene Kohn (1945) inspired by Rabindranath Tagore’s Gitanjali (Song Offerings, 1912)

“Where We Can Find God,” a prayer-poem inspired by passages appearing in David Frishman’s Hebrew translation of Rabindranath Tagore’s Gitanjali. . . .

Categories:

Purim Qatan, 🤦︎ Taḥanun (Nefilat Apayim), Motsaei Shabbat

Tags:

20th century C.E., 58th century A.M., אנה אמצאך ana emtsaeka, cosmic religion, is it Sikh or Hassidic?, Prayers as poems, universalist prayers

Contributor(s):

Eugene Kohn, David Frischmann (translation), Rabindranath Tagore and Aharon N. Varady (transcription)

Hashem is Everywhere! — a song by Rabbi Yosef Goldstein (1972)

The pedagogical song “Hashem is Everywhere!” by Rabbi Yosef Goldstein (1928-2013) can be found in the context of his story, “Where is Hashem?,” the second track on his album מדות טובות Jewish Ethics Through Story and Song (Menorah Records 1972). In the instructions to reciting the lyrics, the singer points first to the six cardinal directions and lastly, by pointing inward towards one’s self. In so doing, one explicitly affirms the idea of the divine within ourselves and implicitly, in each other. . . .

Categories:

🇺🇸 National Brotherhood Week, Purim Qatan, 🤦︎ Taḥanun (Nefilat Apayim), Motsaei Shabbat

Tags:

20th century C.E., 58th century A.M., affirmations, אנה אמצאך ana emtsaeka, children's education, circle drawing, English vernacular prayer, חבּ״ד ḤaBaD Lubavitch, panentheism, Pedagogical songs, Yiddish translation, זמירות zemirot

Contributor(s):

Yosef Goldstein and Aharon N. Varady (transcription)

מִרְיָם הַנְּבִיאָה | Miryam haNevi’ah, by rabbis Leila Gal Berner & Arthur Waskow (ca. 1994)

These are the lyrics of the song, Miryam haNevi’ah, written by rabbis Leila Gal Berner and Arthur Waskow (with Hebrew by Leila Gal Berner) as found published in My People’s Prayer Book, vol. 7: Shabbat at Home, (ed. L. Hoffman, 1997), section 3, p. 189. The English lyrics are from an article published several years earlier — “Memories of a Jewish Lesbian Evening” by Roger McDougle appearing in Bridges (vol. 4:1, Winter/Spring 1994), on the top of page 58. No specific date is given for the havdalah program described in the article, alas. If you know the earliest reference for the publication or use of Miryam haNevi’ah, please contact us. . . .

Categories:

Parashat b'Shalaḥ, 7th Day of Pesaḥ, Motsaei Shabbat

Tags:

20th century C.E., 58th century A.M., הבדלות havdalot, Miriam, שירת הים Shirat haYam, זמירות zemirot

Contributor(s):

Leila Gal Berner, Arthur Waskow and Aharon N. Varady (transcription)

Havdalah: Three Meditations on Holy Separations, by Trisha Arlin

Three short havdallah meditations that culminate in a havdallah prayer/blessing. . . .

Categories:

Motsaei Shabbat

Tags:

21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., English vernacular prayer, first person, הבדלות havdalot, Kolot Chayeinu, paraliturgical havdalah

Contributor(s):

Trisha Arlin

Distinctions (Havdalah) for the end of Shabbat, by Rabbi Rachel Barenblat

A prayer-poem inspired by the ritual Havdallah, preparing a separation between Shabbat and weekday time. . . .

Categories:

Motsaei Shabbat

Tags:

21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., English poetry, English vernacular prayer, הבדלות havdalot, paraliturgical havdalah, paraliturgical teḥinot, Prayers as poems, תחינות teḥinot

Contributor(s):

Rachel Barenblat

Stable Link: https://opensiddur.org/index.php?cat=1506

Associated Image:

An illustration of Seraḥ later titled (on postcards) "Shirat bat Tsiyon," originally published at the beginning of the chapter "Lieder des Lebens" (Songs of Life) in Lieder des Ghetto (1902) by Ephraim Moses Lilien

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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

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