A Wife's Prayer whose Husband is on a Journey, by Rabbi Moritz Mayer (1866)

Source Link: https://opensiddur.org/?p=32391

Date: 2020-06-22

Last Updated: 2020-06-22

Categories: Travel, Marriage

Tags: 19th century C.E., 57th century A.M., English vernacular prayer, Jewish Women's Prayers, תחינות teḥinot

Excerpt: A prayer of a wife on behalf of her husband traveling. . . .

Content:

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Source (English)

My God and Father! God of life, gracious Protector in all dangers! With devout heart I invoke Thine almighty protection upon my beloved husband. His avocations and duties have removed him from me, the sacred duty of maintaining and supporting his family have called him away from his home. O Lord! do Thou protect him in all his ways! Do Thou preserve his health and life, strengthen and inspire him, that he may not succumb to the labors and troubles of his avocation. Remove far from him all trials and dangers wherewith journeys are usually beset. Guard him against all mischances, that cunning and malice, falsehood and deceit may devise for him. O grant! that he may find favor in the eyes of all men, and vouchsafe Thy blessing unto all that he may undertake, that his sojourn in a foreign land may be unto our benefit and happiness. Oh! bring him back unto me, unto his home, full of health and cheerfulness, and I will at all times thank Thee, and praise Thy holy name for evermore. Amen.

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“A wife’s prayer whose husband is on a journey” is one of thirty prayers appearing in Rabbi Moritz Mayer’s collection of tehinot, Hours of Devotion (1866), of uncertain provenance and which he may have written. –Aharon Varady

Source(s)

 

Contributor: Aharon N. Varady (editing/transcription)

Co-authors:

• 
  Name: Aharon N. Varady (editing/transcription)
  Bio: Aharon Varady (M.A.J.Ed./JTSA Davidson) is a volunteer transcriber for the Open Siddur Project. If you find any mistakes in his transcriptions, please let him know. Shgiyot mi yavin; Ministarot naqeni שְׁגִיאוֹת מִי־יָבִין; מִנִּסְתָּרוֹת נַקֵּנִי "Who can know all one's flaws? From hidden errors, correct me" (Psalms 19:13). If you'd like to directly support his work, please consider donating via his Patreon account. (Varady also translates prayers and contributes his own original work besides serving as the primary shammes of the Open Siddur Project and its website, opensiddur.org.)
  Website: https://aharon.varady.net
  Profile Link: https://opensiddur.org/profile/aharon-varady
• 
  Name: Moritz Mayer
  Bio: Rabbi Moritz Mayer (originally Moses Maier, later Maurice Mayer; 1821-1867) born in Dürckheim-on-the-Haardt, Germany, fled to the United States and to New York as a political refugee of the 1848 revolution. In 1859, after seven years as the rabbi of Ḳ.Ḳ. Beth Elohim in Charleston, South Carolina, he returned in poor health to New York where he contributed frequently to the Jewish press, and translated various German works into English: Rabbi Samuel Adler's catechism, Abraham Geiger's lectures on Jewish history, and Ludwig Philipson's pamphlet, Haben die Juden Jesum Gekreuzigt? (the Crucifixion from the Jewish Point of View), et al. In 1866, a number of his English translations of Fanny Neuda's teḥinot in German (from her Stunden Der Andacht, 1855/1858) were published in a volume he titled Hours of Devotion. The work also included a number of his own prayers as well as those of Marcus Heinrich Bresslau. The following year, Moritz Mayer passed away. He was 45 years old. (We are indebted to Anton Hieke for his research on Mayer, "Rabbi Maurice Mayer: German Revolutionary, Charleston Reformer, and Anti-Abolitionist" published in Southern Jewish Life, 17 (2014), pp. 45-89.) For Mayer's translations of prayers by other authors, please visit here.
  Website:
  Profile Link: https://opensiddur.org/profile/moritz-mayer

Featured Image:

Title: A wife’s prayer whose husband is on a journey(Moritz Mayer 1866)
Caption: Detail of Moritz Mayer's prayer for a wife whose husband is on a journey (Moritz Mayer 1866).