"Avinu Malkeinu," dvar tefillah by Rabbi David Seidenberg (neohasid.org)
Source Link: https://opensiddur.org/?p=47057
open_content_license: Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike (CC BY-SA) 4.0 International copyleft license Date: 2022-10-03
Last Updated: 2025-02-06
Categories: Yom Kippur
Tags: 21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., Aseret Yemei Tshuvah, commentary as prayer, d'var t'fillah, English vernacular prayer, paraliturgical avinu malkeinu, Prayers as poems, אבינו מלכינו avinu malkeinu, שבת תשובה Shabbat Teshuvah
Excerpt: The words of Avinu Malkeinu are a little different from the standard translation. It doesn't say in Hebrew, "we have no good deeds" (ein lanu ma'asim tovim), but rather, "there are no deeds in us" (ein banu ma'asim). The p'shat (literal meaning) implies that whatever we have done in the past does not have to live inside of us -- we can release our deeds and be released from them, fully, to start over, like a newborn, to become whoever we need to become. . . .
Content:
The words of Avinu Malkeinu are a little different from the standard translation. It doesn’t say in Hebrew, “we have no good deeds” (ein lanu ma’asim tovim), but rather, “there are no deeds in us” (ein banu ma’asim). The p’shat (literal meaning) implies that whatever we have done in the past does not have to live inside of us — we can release our deeds and be released from them, fully, to start over, like a newborn, to become whoever we need to become.
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Source (English) |
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“Avinu Malkeinu” —
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It says, no deeds
not good-bad, not beautiful-ugly
no trace of the past in us to
constrain, condone, condemn
our forward path,
not regret, not mistakes, not strife, nor failure
or triumph,
ki ein banu ma’asim.
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What-for-ever in us is is the now, the aha
of one instant — just!
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So here, bring your lovely-most self
nothing else
to meet-greet the unladen year.
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Clear the channel; become hollow
as a bone.
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What you are
becoming now here, for the Source of Life:
a wellspring of tsedaqah and
ḥesed, of righteous love,
a fountain of blessing.
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“Avinu Malkeinu” by Rabbi David Seidenberg, versified paraliturgical commentary on the prayer Avinu Malkenu, was first offered on Shabbat Tshuva in 2022 (5783).
Contributor: David Seidenberg
Co-authors:
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Name: David Seidenberg
Bio: Rabbi David Seidenberg, founder of NeoHasid.org, teaches text and music, Jewish thought and spirituality, in their own right and in relation to ecology and the environment. With smikhah (ordination) from the Jewish Theological Seminary and from Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, he has taught at over 100 synagogues, communities, retreats and conferences across North America (and a few in Europe and Israel). Rabbi Seidenberg's teaching empowers learners to become creators of Judaism through deep study and communion with texts and tradition. Areas of specialty include Kabbalah and Ḥasidut, Talmud, davenning, evolution and cosmology, sustainability, Maimonides, Buber, and more. Rabbi Seidenberg has published widely on ecology and Judaism and is the author of Kabbalah and Ecology: God's Image in the More-Than-Human World (Cambridge University Press, 2015).
Website: https://neohasid.org
Profile Link: https://opensiddur.org/profile/david-seidenberg
Featured Image:
Title: Eli Wallach in The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly – cemetery scene (dir. Sergio Leone 1966)
Caption: Eli Wallach (1915-2014), z"l, as "The Ugly" in THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE UGLY (dir. Sergio Leone, 1966) - cemetery scene