![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): An opening prayer offered by the guest chaplain before the Virginia House of Delegates (1849-1850 legislative session) in the week of January 15-18, 1850, and published in The Richmond Enquirer (25 January 1850), p. 1. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): This is a prayer for cattle afflicted by an epizootic contagion (in this case, Rinderpest, a/k/a cattle plague), and for the protection of human beings from cholera, prescribed by the Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of Great Britain, Nathan Marcus Adler, and published in The Hebrew Leader (24 November 1865), p. 1. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): The Opening Prayer given in the U.S. House of Representatives on 17 January 1962. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): The Opening Prayer given in the U.S. Senate on 26 January 1961. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): This “Synagogue Consecration Prayer ” by the Hon. Lily H. Montagu (1873-1963) was included by Rabbi Morrison David Bial in his anthology, An Offering of Prayer (1962), p. 50. Although the context is not provided by Rabbi Bial, we would like to imagine that the consecration was for the establishment of the West Central Liberal Jewish Synagogue in 1928 (destroyed by Nazi German bombardment of London in 1941). . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): This manual has been devised for the express purpose of giving the Rabbi, or anyone officiating at a Jewish ceremonial or ritual, a concise and practical aid that will facilitate the task of officiating , and will obviate the necessity of resorting to the voluminous literature pertaining thereto. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): Did you know that the great songwriter and activist Woody Guthrie wrote Ḥanukkah music? It’s true. Though Guthrie himself was not Jewish, Marjorie Greenblatt, his second wife and their children were, and he would write Ḥanukkah songs for the kids in his neighborhood in the 1940s. Two of these songs were recorded by Moses Asch, head of Folkways Records, in 1949 — a kid’s song called “Hanuka Dance,” and a twenty-verse ballad retelling the story of Ḥanukkah called “The Many and the Few.” Below is an original Hebrew translation of “The Many and the Few,” preserving the meter of the original. With a simple melody and a lot of historical research, it could certainly be sung at a Ḥanukkah event. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): A good preparation and a bridge for the next phase of prayer, as you enter into the world of B’riyah,[foot]i.e., the Shaḥarit service beginning with the blessings prededing the Shema[/foot] is Reb Ahrele Roth’s list of Mitsvot One Can Do With Consciousness Alone. Reb Ahrele Roth, a”h, wrote a list of 32 mitsvot whose fulfillment is completed in the brain, the heart and the mouth. (The Hebrew alphabetical equivalent of 32 is ל”ב, the letters of which spell the Hebrew word LEV for Heart.) –Reb Zalman . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): “That Religion Be Not a Cloak for Hypocrisy,” by Rabbi Mordecai Menaḥem Kaplan can be found on p. 435-5 of his The Sabbath Prayer Book (New York: The Jewish Reconstructionist Foundation, 1945). . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): This is the תפילת הנוטע (Prayer for Planting [trees]) by Rabbi Ben-Zion Meir Ḥai Uziel. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): A prayer pamphlet containing a Hallel service in Portuguese translation by Artur Carlos de Barros Basto under the auspices of the Insituto Teológico Israelita (Yeshiba Rosh-Pinah) in 1940. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): A prayer-pamphlet containing the bedtime prayer service in Portuguese translation by Artur Carlos de Barros Basto under the auspices of the Insituto Teológico Israelita (Yeshiba Rosh-Pinah) in 1940. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): A Friday night Sabbath evening prayer guide by Artur Carlos de Barros Basto under the auspices of the Insituto Teológico Israelita (Yeshiba Rosh-Pinah) in 1940. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): An essay on the praxis of prayer as contained in “Club Letter №3” (March 1939) written by the Hon. Lily H. Montagu (1873-1963) and found in the Private Collection of Hannah Feldman, London. The essay was published in, Lily Montagu: Sermons, Addresses, Letters, and Prayers (ed. Ellen M. Umansky, 1985), pp. 51-54. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): Abraham Joshua Heschel’s essay “Das Gebet Als Äußerung Und Einfühlung” published in Monatsschrift Für Geschichte Und Wissenschaft Des Judenthums, vol. 83 (1939). . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): A prayer for the success of the London Conference of 1939 which ultimately resulted in the publication of the 1939 White Paper. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): A Saturday morning Shabbat shaḥarit/Torah reading/musaf prayer guide by Artur Carlos de Barros Basto under the auspices of the Insituto Teológico Israelita (Yeshiba Rosh-Pinah) in 1939. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): A bilingual Hebrew-English maḥzor for Yom Kippur in the Sepharadic tradition compiled by David de Sola Pool in 1939. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): 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.” . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): An untitled prayer on behalf of German Jewry under Nazi oppression disseminated in Bombay, likely after Kristallnacht (9-10 November 1938). . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): The words of the prayer for Armistice Day 1938, “God Bless America” by Irving Berlin, in English and Yiddish. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): This prayer for the country is found in the Siddur Sephat Emeth, which was published by the venerable Rödelheim publishing house in Frankfurt in 1938. This was probably the last siddur ever published in pre-Holocaust Germany. This prayer is full of pathos and yearning, and in a time of rising government-sponsored antisemitism worldwide it’s worth keeping in mind. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): The experimental siddur, Prayers & Readings Selected and Arranged by Rabbi Solomon Goldman can be found appended to Harry Coopersmith’s songbook, Songs of My People (1938). The work, I believe, is an excellent reflection of the creative spirit of the nascent Reconstructionist movement. Goldman’s prayerbook is both traditional and expansive, seeking to bring into its pages both familiar liturgy along with additional works from all over Jewish literary history. The work represents what Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan would call a “Binder Siddur” — the siddur as a container of inspired works for collective reading and reflection in the synagogue. Perhaps even for personal use. With its good number of authors and translators expressing different voices appealing to Goldman, Prayers & Readings is also a kind of proto-Open Siddur. However, unlike the Open Siddur, Goldman only provides acknowledgement of the various authors and translators in his preface, and we are left uncertain as to which works should actually be attributed to each contributor. If you can tell which of the listed authors and translators contributed what, please leave a comment or contact us. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): A songster compiled by Harry Coopersmith. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): This is Rabbi Dr. Leo Beack’s prayer for his wife Natalie Baeck née Hamburger (1878-1937), dated 7 March 1937. Natalie had died two days prior on 5 March. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): This is the Kol Nidrei as offered by the Hannover Synagogue on Yom Kippur in 1937 according to the text provided in a poster, “Agende für Kol-nidre und Seelenfeier in der Synaogen-Gemeinde Hannover” (10 September 1937). Thank you to David Selis for providing digital images of the poster. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): Liberal Jewish Prayer Book vol. Ⅰ: Services for Weekdays, Sabbaths, etc. (1937) is the revised “new” edition edition of the communal prayerbook of the Liberal Jewish Synagogue (London) first published in 1926. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): A bilingual Hebrew-English maḥzor for Rosh haShanah in the Sepharadic tradition compiled by David de Sola Pool in 1937. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): A bilingual Hebrew-English prayerbook for weekdays and special occasions, compiled and edited by Rabbi Jacob Bosniak. This volume complements a second for Shabbat and the Shalosh Regalim (festivals). . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): A bilingual Hebrew-English prayerbook for Shabbat and the Shalosh Regalim (festivals), compiled and edited by Rabbi Jacob Bosniak. This volume (number 2) complements a second for weekdays and special occasions (vol. 1). . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s):
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): This is the prayer which Rabbi Dr. Leo Baeck had disseminated to Jewish communities throughout Germany to recite on Yom Kippur, 10 October 1935. The German text here is as found in the archival notes of Helmut Grünewald, Ein Judenjunge durfte kein Deutscher sein (Bristol, 1998), pp. 20-21 in the collection of the Leo Baeck Institute. The English translation is as published by Dr. Michael Meyer in Rabbi Leo Baeck: Living a Religious Imperative in Troubled Times (2020), pp. 106-107. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): “A Thanksgiving in Commemoration of Moses Maimonides” with its accompanying Hashkabah is found in the Service of Praise and Thanksgiving to Commemorate the 800th Anniversary of the Birth of Moses Maimonides prepared by Bevis Marks Synagogue in London on 27 May 1935. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): The Opening Prayer given in the U.S. House of Representatives on 26 March 1935. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): The Opening Prayer given in the U.S. House of Representatives on 25 March 1935. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): Rabbi Leo Baeck’s essay on prayer “Gebet im Judentum,” was published in the “Judentum und Gebet” issue of Bne Briss (September/October 1935), top of page 82. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): A bilingual Hebrew-English birkon (book of blessings), according to the liturgical custom of Ashkenaz, as compiled by Rabbi Simon Glazer and published by the Maimon Publishing Company in sometime between 1934 and 1938. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): This is סדר תפלת ישורון Book of prayers Tephilath Jeshurun: containing all the prayers for the year according to the custom of the holy congregations of the Sephardim in the Orient and elsewhere translated by Menaḥem ben Mosheh Yeḥezqel and published by the Hebrew Publishing Company in 1935. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): Based upon the Seder Teḥinot al Bet Almin, by Rabbi Yaaqov Sinna (ca. 1615), a collection of teḥinot for when visiting the graves of loved ones, as well as additional prayers for sick relatives and for women approaching childbirth. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): A brief explanation of the role of prayer in the Jewish Science movement of Rabbi Morris Lichtenstein and his wife Tehilla Lichtenstein, co-founders of the Society of Jewish Science, in Yiddish with an English translation. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): The first prayerbook compiled by Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan, published by the United Synagogue as a selection of supplemental readings on Rosh haShanah and Yom Kippur. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): This is סדור תפלת ישורון Siddur Tefilat Yeshurun, a comprehensive everyday, shabbat, and festival prayerbook compiled by Rabbi Simon Glazer from pages derived from סדור שׂפה ברורה Siddur Sefah Berurah (1928) with translations set against the Hebrew liturgy compiled by Dr. Max Emanuel (Mendel ben Yitsḥaq) Stern (1811-1873). . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): “On Education Week” by Rabbi Norman Michael Goldburg, was offered before the California state legislature on 24 April 1933, and published in California Legislature 50th Session 1933: Prayers Offered at the Daily Sessions of the Assembly, pp. 77-78. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): “On Abandoning the Gold Standard” by Rabbi Norman Michael Goldburg, was offered before the California state legislature on 21 April 1933, and published in California Legislature 50th Session 1933: Prayers Offered at the Daily Sessions of the Assembly, p. 74. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): “On the Disaster of the Akron” by Rabbi Norman Michael Goldburg, was offered before the California state legislature on 5 April 1933, and published in California Legislature 50th Session 1933: Prayers Offered at the Daily Sessions of the Assembly, pp. 61-63. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): “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. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): “On the Los Angeles Earthquake” by Rabbi Norman Michael Goldburg, was offered before the California state legislature on 12 March 1933, and published in California Legislature 50th Session 1933: Prayers Offered at the Daily Sessions of the Assembly, pp. 44-45. The earthquake, now known as the 1933 Long Beach earthquake, registered 6.4 on the Richter scale. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): “On the Inauguration of Franklin D. Roosevelt as President of the United States” by Rabbi Norman Michael Goldburg, was offered before the California state legislature on 4 March 1933, and published in California Legislature 50th Session 1933: Prayers Offered at the Daily Sessions of the Assembly, p. 37. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): “On the Eve of Inauguration” by Rabbi Norman Michael Goldburg, was offered before the California state legislature on 3 March 1933, and published in California Legislature 50th Session 1933: Prayers Offered at the Daily Sessions of the Assembly, p. 36. . . .
![](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E) Contributor(s): “On the Legalization of Beer” by Rabbi Norman Michael Goldburg, was offered before the California state legislature and published in California Legislature 50th Session 1933: Prayers Offered at the Daily Sessions of the Assembly, p. 32. . . .
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