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a community-grown, libre Open Access archive of Jewish prayer and liturgical resources — for those crafting their own prayerbooks and sharing the content of their practice
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a community-grown, libre Open Access archive of Jewish prayer and liturgical resources — for those crafting their own prayerbooks and sharing the content of their practice
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acrostic —⟶ tag: acrostic Sorted Chronologically (old to new). Sort most recent first? Why is this coffee different from all other coffees? Because Maxwell House coffee is a deeply spiritual representation of the Diaspora experience. Categories: Tags: 20th century C.E., 58th century A.M., acrostic, diaspora, haggadah supplements, Maxwell House coffee, mnemonic, סגולות segulot, סימנים simanim, symbolic foods Contributor(s): After a brit milah meal, there are several poetic additions traditionally included in the Birkat haMazon. But for young daughters a brit milah isn’t going to happen. So this is a poetic Birkat haMazon to be recited after a Zeved haBat ceremony. Categories: Tags: 21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., acrostic, Alphabetic Acrostic, baby daughters, ברכת המזון birkat hamazon, infants, שמחת בת simḥat bat Contributor(s): This is an original piyyut, inspired by the structure of the beloved Yom Kippur Ne’ilah piyyut El Nora ‘Alila. In the era of the Sanhedrin, every fast day would have a Ne’ilah service between Minḥa and the conclusion of the fast. While these are no longer in practice for any days other than Yom Kippur, the editor personally feels like it could be worth bringing them back. As part of this idea, this piyyut is meant to be sung after the end of Tishah b’Av mincha but before the fast ends, as we prepare for the weeks of comfort. It is expressly *not* a qinah. Categories: Tags: Contributor(s): On Shemini Atseret, one is supposed to begin mentioning rain in the second blessing of their Amidah prayers (Ta’anit 2a). In many communities, this is liturgically marked by a poetic introduction in the repetition of the Amidah, called Geshem, specifically with the piyyut “Zekhor Av” written by Rabbi Eleezer BeRabbi Kalir, which alludes to the references of our forefathers’ relations to water. One feature of this poem is that it utilizes an alef-bet-ical acrostic, and while there are various modern adaptations that include biblical women, those break the acrostic. This is my attempt to compose a version including stanzas for our foremothers, while maintaining the acrostic by writing the women’s stanzas as a backwards acrostic (i.e. starting from tav and going to alef). This backwards acrostic containing the foremothers is then interspersed with Kalir’s original. Categories: Tags: 21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., acrostic, Alphabetic Acrostic, גשם geshem, אמהות Imahot, Matriarchs, Needing Translation (into English), North America, פיוטים piyyuṭim, Prayers for Precipitation, Rain, water, water cycle Contributor(s): This is a Hebrew adaptation of the poems traditionally recited by the Beta Israel community for the festival of Sigd, altered and adapted to fit the traditional qedushta form of poetic Amidah additions. The texts of the first few prayers were rewritten substantially and combined with relevant verses so as to fit in the strict form of the magen, mehaye, meshalesh, and El Na. After this, the qiqlar is slightly edited to fit a couplet rhyme scheme, while the silluq (the freest of the genres of qedusha piyyut) is almost entirely preserved — the only change being several verses whose placement is postponed so as to better lead into the qedusha as a silluq should. Regarding translations, the silluq largely uses my original translation with slight alterations (replacing the clunky use of ‘God’ as a pronoun with a gender-neutral THEIR, translating the Agaw passages into Latin rather than English to preserve general comprehensibility while clarifying that this is a different language), while the rest of the poems are different enough for their translation to largely be from scratch. These would be recited with the Ark open for all the piyyutim, as one would on the Yamim Noraim, ideally using melodies from the Sigd liturgy. A yotser for Pesaḥ Sheni. Each stanza is written with a threefold acrostic — the first two lines in atbash, the third spelling “Yitsḥaq Har’el Ḥazaq,” and the fourth a verse from Numbers 9. Categories: Tags: 21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., acrostic, Acrostic signature, Alphabetic Acrostic, אתבש atbash, פיוטים piyyuṭim, יוצר אור yotser ohr, יוצרות yotsrot Contributor(s): An ofan for Pesaḥ Sheni in tripartite stanzas. Each stanza begins with a citation of Numbers 9:12-14, then an acrostic spelling out “the son of Avraham the priest, ḥazaq.” Categories: Tags: Contributor(s): An ahavah for Pesaḥ Sheni. An acrostic spelling out “Yitsḥaq son of Avraham, the priest, ḥazaq,” with a refrain derived from Mishnah Pesaḥim 9:1. Categories: Tags: 21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., acrostic, Acrostic signature, אהבה רבה ahavah rabbah, פיוטים piyyuṭim, יוצרות yotsrot Contributor(s): A yotser for Tu b’Av, the first part of an intended cycle of yotsrot. A retelling of the list of reasons for Tu b’Av given in the Talmud, with repeated refrains from Psalm 45 for the alphabetical verses and the rest of the Tanakh for the name-acrostic choruses. Written in honor of my friend Eliran’s wedding. Categories: Tags: 21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., acrostic, Acrostic signature, Alphabetic Acrostic, אתבש atbash, פיוטים piyyuṭim, יוצר אור yotser ohr, יוצרות yotsrot Contributor(s): A new and original cycle of yotsrot in the style of the weekday yotsrot of the Cairo Geniza, for the day after Yom Kippur, referred to either as Yom Simḥat Kohen or Yom Shem ha-El depending on the custom. Categories: Tags: 21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., acrostic, Acrostic signature, Alphabetic Acrostic, פיוטים piyyuṭim, יוצרות yotsrot Contributor(s): A plea for the manifestation of righteous civic virtues on Election Day in the shadow of Hoshana Rabba. This is an original ḳedushtaot cycle for Yom Meturgeman, the eighth of Tevet, to be inserted into the ‘amidah. Categories: Tags: acrostic, Alphabetic Acrostic, עמידה amidah, אתבש atbash, קרובות ḳerovot, פיוטים piyyuṭim, Public Amidah, קדושתאות ḳedushtaot Contributor(s): Purim in walled cities (meaning, practically, in Jerusalem) occurs on the day after it does outside of them. This means that when Purim falls on a Friday, it falls on Shabbat in Jerusalem. This unique occurrence is called Purim Meshulash, “Threefold Purim,” because the practices for the day are divided into three. The megillah is read and gifts are given to the poor on Friday, the Torah reading is on Shabbat, and the festive meal and gifts to friends on Sunday. Since this practice of Shabbat Purim is unique to Jerusalem, and for much of Ashkenazi poetic history the Jewish community in Jerusalem was negligible, there are very few liturgical texts designed for Shabbat Purim Meshulash. This is, in the author’s opinion, a shame, because all the other special shabbatot surrounding it have a plethora of special piyyuṭim to insert into their cycles. This cycle of a shiv’ata (sevenfold piyyut) and an eloheikhem (Qedushah insertion) is meant to fill that void. Categories: Tags: acrostic, Alphabetic Acrostic, קרובות ḳerovot, פיוטי אלהיכם piyyuṭei eloheikhem, פיוטים piyyuṭim, Public Amidah, שבעתא shiv'ata, Shushan Purim Contributor(s): An original set of weekday yotsrot, in the style of those found in the Cairo Geniza (and compiled at Weekday Yotzrot, thanks to the work of Dr. Avi Shmidman), for Yom ha-Atsma’ut. The weekday yotsrot of the Cairo Geniza have a structure quite different from normative Ashkenazi festival yotsrot, and much closer to that of Ashkenazi maaravot. There are no yotser or ofan piyyutim — each blessing has a stanza of an extended, unified poem before its ḥatimah, and the only stanzas inserted into the guf ha-berakha are in the final blessing, surrounding the Mi Khamokha. They’re also generally much shorter and more user-friendly than the complex and intricate mysticism of Ashkenazi festival yotsrot. This cycle is written in an alphabetical acrostic, followed by the author tag “Yitzḥaq Harel son of Avraham the Kohen and Ya’el, be strong and courageous, amen.” Each stanza begins with a different word from Isaiah 47:4, and ends with a citation of a different relevant verse. Categories: Tags: 21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., acrostic, Acrostic signature, Alphabetic Acrostic, מדינת ישראל Medinat Yisrael, פיוטים piyyuṭim, יוצרות yotsrot Contributor(s): An original Aramaic-language “meturgeman piyyut” for Simḥat Torah and the reading of v-Zot haBerakha. I’m working on creating a seder meturgeman liturgy, akin to those for day 7 of Pesaḥ and for Shavuot, to be recited on Simḥat Torah. Mostly incorporating older Aramaic poems, I’ve also decided to write some originals myself. This is one of them, in praise of Moshe, to be recited after Deut. 34:10. Categories: Tags: Contributor(s): A pizmon for calling up a (male) Jew-by-choice for his first aliyah to the Torah after completing his conversion process. (Pizmonim for female and non-binary Jews-by-choice forthcoming!) To be recited before the blessing, led by the gabbai with the community responding with the refrain. Categories: Tags: 21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., acrostic, Aliyah, Alphabetic Acrostic, conversion, גרות gerut, פיוטים piyyuṭim, פזמונים pizmonim Contributor(s): An original Aramaic-language “meturgeman piyyut” for Simḥat Torah and the reading of Bereshit. I’m working on creating a seder meturgeman liturgy, akin to those for day 7 of Pesaḥ and for Shavuot, to be recited on Simḥat Torah. Mostly incorporating older Aramaic poems, I’ve also decided to write some originals myself. This is one of them, a reverse acrostic woven into the recitation of Genesis 1. Categories: Tags: acrostic, Alphabetic Acrostic, Aramaic, hymns of creation, פיוטים piyyuṭim, פרשת בראשית parashat Bereshit, תרגום targum Contributor(s): A new introductory piyyut-meturgeman serving as a reshut for the targum of the haftarah. This genre used to be very popular, especially among the old French paytanim, but nowadays the only one still recited is Yetsiv Pitgam, said in some communities on the second day of Shavuot — although the targum is no longer. I think that’s a shame, so I wrote a new one. I’m probably one of the first people to write one of these since the expulsion of 1394. So of course, it’s meta as all get-out, being a reshut not just for the targum of the haftarah but for the custom of reading the targum of the haftarah with a reshut at all. Categories: Tags: 21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., acrostic, Acrostic signature, Aramaic, הפטרות haftarot, פיוטים piyyuṭim, רשויות reshuyot, תרגום targum Contributor(s): While Gevurot Geshem is recited on Shmini Atseret, Baqashat Geshem as an addition to the birkat ha-shanim is recited later — from the seventh of Marḥeshvan in Israel, from sixty days after the Julian-calendar autumn equinox in the diaspora. This passage is added starting in the evening, but since there is no repetition at night there is no special custom for announcing its insertion. I think that’s a shame, so I wrote a series of ma’aravot (piyyuṭim to be inserted into the ma’ariv service) to be recited on the day where we begin to request rain. While the time for beginning to mention God’s power to bring rain in our prayers has a dramatic introductory piyyut (see my work here for a version with Immahot), the time when we begin actually asking for said rain is unadorned by any poetry, and is simply a change in one phrase in our liturgy. Therefore, inspired by a Facebook post by Isaac Gantwerk Mayer (who since wrote his own version here), I wrote the following piyyut over the course of 5785, to be added to the Maariv service on the evening when one begins praying for rain in their location. Each stanza of the piyyut is intended to be added before the ḥatimah of each of the four blessings surrounding the Maariv Shema. I have signed my name to the acrostic, and provided a translation that highlights said acrostic and structure. May we have a year of abundance and goodness. | ||
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