In this Tefilat haDerekh (the prayer for travel), I’ve made a synthesis of Ashkenazi and Sefardi nusaḥ. Even though the translation is pretty close to literal in most places, it comes across as an extraordinary and activist prayer for peace. So I think of this prayer not just as a prayer for the beginning a physical journey, but for any spiritual journey, and especially for any campaign or action for justice and peace that a person or group might undertake. When applied to activism, the “enmity and ambush and theft and predation” we ask to be rescued from could also be interpreted as hatred, deceit, jealousy, and aggression, i.e., the kinds of feelings that cause people to work against each other, even within an organization, instead of working together. I first used this version of the prayer at the beginning of a tour of Israel and Palestine focused on the human rights and non-violent resistance, when the group passed through the first checkpoint of the trip. . . .
Contributor(s): Isaac Gantwerk Mayer
Categories:  Travel | Tags:  North America, ascent, the Chariot, tefilat haderekh, starship, sic itur ad astra, space travel, haMerkavah, Leonard Nimoy z"l, where no earthling has gone before, spaceship Earth, bli-mah, traveling without moving, Jacob's Ladder, spaceship, 24th century C.E., 62nd century A.M. 
A prayer, inspired by Tefilat haDerekh and other traditional liturgical texts, for a Jew who, at some future point, would be about to go forth on a starship. Doesn’t include a chatimah so as not to be a brakhah levatalah, in the case that starships are (chas v’shalom) never invented. . . .
May it be Your will, our God That You lead us toward peace; that You enable us to ride in safety; that You lead us with blessing. Save us from all accidents and unstable wheels, from a dangerous driver and a bounding chariot.[ref]after Nahum 3:2[/ref]
Inspire in us unity of the material and the spiritual, Love of the ascent as well as the descent. Show us Your face, in the smallest of details and in the countenance of the other. Enable us to persevere on our journey toward love, truth and peace. Blessed are You, YHVH, the One who hears prayer. . . .
If I ascend up into the heavens, you are there. If I take wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there would your hand lead me, and your right hand would hold me. And may it be your will, our father in heaven, that you guard us from storm and tempest and grief. And may you bring forth from your storehouses a propitious wind to carry our plane, and may you sustain and preserve those who fly it, that they neither weaken nor falter, and may we reach our destination alive and well, without any trouble and injury. O keep my soul, and deliver me. Let me not be abashed, for I have taken refuge in you. But we will bless Yah from this time forth and for ever, Halleluyah. . . .
Yakov Green shares a short kavvanah (intention, meditation) which he wrote in Hebrew one morning at Beit Midrash Elul in Jerusalem. He later translated it into English. תפילת דרך משולשת | Triple Prayer for the Road . . .
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