תשלום לקדושה דסידרא ליחיד (סדר רב עמרם) | Replacement for the Qədushah d-Sidra for an individual praying alone or without a minyan, from Seder Rav ȝAmram

In Jewish liturgy, some passages are dəvarim she-bi-qdushah, passages that require public communal prayer. Most famous among these are the Qaddish, Barkhu, and Qədushah. But people are not always able to pray in a community! In liturgical history both ancient and modern many different tashlumim (replacements) for these texts when praying individually have been suggested. The following is the Qədusha d-Sidra for an individual from Seder Rav ȝAmram, the oldest known full siddur. (The Qədusha d-Sidra is no longer considered dəvarim she-biqdushah, although Baladi-rite Yemenites replace “קדוש קדוש קודש” with one “קדושת.”) Much of the content is from the hekhalot literature or the Gemara, often demonstrating girsaot not otherwise known. . . .

Categories: Before the Aliyot

Tags: English Translation, geonic period, Geonic prayers, קדושה Qedushah, Without a Minyan, Solo, תשלומים tashlumim

Contributor(s): Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (transcription & naqdanut), Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (translation) and Amram ben Rav Sheshna

📄 סדר עתיק לקריאות מהתנ״ך לפי מסכת סופרים | A Service for Scriptural Readings from Antiquity, reconstructed from Masekhet Soferim by Isaac Gantwerk Mayer

The “minor tractate” Soferim is one of our best sources for early liturgical practice. It is the oldest known source for multiple practices still followed today, such as the blessing for the haftarah. Such luminaries as the Vilna Gaon considered it a vital work. But some of its practices are… well, odd. There are customs in Tractate Soferim which are found nowhere else in classical rabbinics — blessings for the recitation of books in Writings other than the scrolls, a three-year cycle of Torah readings, and a custom to divide the scrolls in half when reading them. This service is constructed based on the descriptions and passages of Tractate Soferim, mostly following the Gra’s edition. In some ways it may be very familiar, especially to Ashkenazim, but in others it is a fascinating glimpse into a heretofore lost practice of Judaism. . . .

Categories: Before the Aliyot

Tags: 46th century A.M., 8th century C.E., Geonic prayers, Masekhet Soferim, Nusaḥ Erets Yisrael, reconstructed text

Contributor(s): Eliyahu ben Shlomo Zalman and Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (translation)

בְּרִיךְ שְׁמֵהּ דְּמָרֵא עָלְמָא | B’rikh Shmeih d’Marei Alma (Bendito sea Tu nombre, Senyor del Mundo), Ladino translation from the siddur El Nuevo Avodat haShanah (1904)

A Ladino translation of Brikh Shmei d’Marei Alma. . . .

Categories: Before the Aliyot

Tags: 13th century C.E., 51st century A.M., Aramaic, Ladino Translation, הוצאת ספר תורה Removal of the Torah from the Ark, Zoharic prayers

Contributor(s): Yaaqov Mosheh Ḥai Altarats (translation), Unknown Author(s) and Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (translation)

כתובה לחג השבועות | Ketubah for Shavuot, by Yisrael Najara (ca. 16th c.)

In many eastern Sephardic and Mizraḥi communities, there is a custom that a poetic “ketubah,” or marriage-contract, is recited before the Torah service on Shavuot. This custom, based on the midrashic idea that the Torah is the ketubah for the marriage between the bride Israel and the groom God, is beloved by the ḳabbalists. By far the most commonly used Shavuot ketubah is that of the great paytan and meḳubal Yisrael ben Moshe Najara, who wrote the following some time in the sixteenth century. This is a new translation of Najara’s poem. . . .

Categories: Before the Aliyot, Shavuot

Tags: 16th century C.E., 54th century A.M., Har Sinai, כתובה ketubbah, Mizraḥi Jewry, פיוטים piyyuṭim, הוצאת ספר תורה Removal of the Torah from the Ark, theophany, wedding

Contributor(s): Yisrael Najara, Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (transcription & naqdanut) and Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (translation)