Partners In Prayer - Siddur

  ♦ Please, God, save us! Please, God, make us successful!             Psalms 118:25               As you recite the first phrase—“Please, God, save us!”—ask God to empower all of your efforts during the coming month to repair the past year and prepare you for Rosh Hashanah.             And as you recite the second phrase—“Please, God, make us successful!”—pray that you will complete the month with a powerful sense of success and enter Rosh Hashanah with joy and confidence (based on a teaching by Rabbi Yechezkel Levenstein in Or Yechezkel ). By: Rabbi Simcha Weinberg

  ♦ God is with me, I have no fear; what can a man do to me?             Psalms 118:6               The “man” mentioned in this verse represents exile.             In his dream of the ladder, Jacob saw this “man” in the form of an angel that ascended the ladder and seemingly did not come back down ( Chapters of Rabbi Eliezer 35). Jacob was terrified until God assured him, “Behold, I am with you” ( Genesis 28:15).             And the prophet Obadiah quoted God as addressing this man with the words, “Even if you raise your nest like an eagle or place your nest among the stars, I will bring you down from there” ( Obadiah 1:4). Rabbi Yitzchak Eizek Chaver states that the verse from Hallel, “God is with me, I have no fear; what can a man do to me?” is ...

  ♦ For His kindness has overwhelmed us, and the truth of God is eternal, halleluyah!             Psalms 117:2               Rabbi Baruch Ber Leibovitz, the rosh yeshiva of Kaminetz, told the following story to my grandfather, Rav Ruderman (may his memory be for a blessing), when my grandfather was a young teenager.             In eighteenth century Lithuania, an aristocrat called Count Valentine Potocki converted to Judaism, in consequence of which he was sentenced to death. As he was awaiting execution, the Vilna Gaon visited him. Avraham ben Avraham (as Count Potocki was now called) was weeping, and the Vilna Gaon expressed surprise at his tears in light of the fact that he had the opportunity to sanctify God’s Name. Avraham ben Avraham replied, “I rejoice over this opportunity. But I am weeping because...

  ♦ I will raise the cup of salvations and I will call upon the Name of God.             Psalms 116:13               The Talmud ( Pesachim 119b) tells:               On the day that the Holy One, blessed be He, will manifest His love to the descendants of Isaac, He will make a great banquet for the righteous….             David will be told, “Take [the wine cup] and recite grace.” And he will reply, “I will recite grace, and it is fitting for me to recite grace.” [This response of David is alluded to in] the verse, “I will raise the cup of salvations and I will call upon the Name of God.”               Elul, the month of manifest love between ourselves and God, presages the perio...

  ♦ May God increase you, you and your children!             Psalms 115:14               Rav Chaim Kanievsky states that this verse is referring to converts to Judaism ( Ta’ama DeKra ).             The Talmud teaches that “the Holy One, blessed be He, exiled Israel among the nations solely in order that proselytes might join them” ( Pesachim 87b). We must live with such sanctity and integrity that we will attract people of all nations to attach themselves to God.             We sing this verse on rosh chodesh Elul, the month of intense love between God and Israel, with a vision that this love will grow so clear that all of the people of the world will desire the same level of relationship with God.  

  ♦ Who turns the rock into a pond of water, the flint into a flowing mountain.             Psalms 114:8               When the Jews in the desert demanded water to drink, God created the miracle of water flowing from a rock that sufficed not only for them but for their animals as well ( Menachot 76b).             As we begin the month of Elul, the month of intense expression of God’s love for us and our love for Him, we celebrate the fact that He cares even for our money and possessions. No detail of our lives escapes His attention and concern.  By: Rabbi Simcha Weinberg

  Hallel of Rosh Chodesh Elul               As on every rosh chodesh (new month), on rosh chodesh Elul we recite the psalms that constitute Hallel—this time with a focus on finding themes of Elul in the verses.   ♦ He transforms the barren wife into a glad mother of children, halleluyah!             Psalms 113:9             The Hebrew word for “transforms,” moshivi , is related to the words teshuvah and yeshiva , “being seated,” a term that denotes a stable and changeless state.             Elul, the month of teshuvah , is a period of intense and unchanging love between ourselves and God. As we recite this verse, we celebrate the fact that, despite the distance that may have developed between us and God since last Rosh Hashanah, when ...