Tag Archive for "peace" | To Bend Light

Posts Tagged ‘peace’

Lamentation from Both Sides of the Fence

Posted on: May 17th, 2018 by Alden

On a bus-stop bench in my Jerusalem neighborhood this morning, a couple in Muslim garb spoke softly to each other. On the same bench, an ultra-Orthodox man sat studying Talmud. Signs of hope for peace, for coexistence, are abundant in this city. They’ve been overwhelmed by images and emotions from actions at the Gaza border fence. What do we say to G-d in these moments of anguish? We cry in pain, we beseech heaven with our lamentations, and we beseech each other with our wailing. We ask, isn’t there a better way?

Crafted to avoid politics or accusation, this lament is for everyone who has hardened their positions, be they politically right or left, Israeli or Palestinian. It’s for everyone on both sides of the fence and around the world who claim to know the truth, the undeniable validity of their views and exactly who to blame. It asks simply this: that we weep together. The first stanza alludes to Isaiah 2:4: “They shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks, nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore.” The final stanza quotes Lamentations 1:16: “For these things do I weep, my eyes are flowing with tears.”

Let this wailing crack open our hearts to each other: Jew to Jew, Jew to Muslim, Muslim to Jew, Muslim to Muslim, Israeli to Palestinian, Palestinian to Israeli. And after we wail, let us pray for peace, let us pray that we sit together on the same benches, in friendship, creating a new legacy, together.

Lamentation from Both Sides of the Fence
Oh, my people,
Look at what we’ve done,
And look at what we’ve become,
Hardening our hearts,
Shutting our eyes,
Closing our minds,
Banishing justice and love from our midst,
Turning fears into swords,
And hopes into spears,
Defending, always defending,
Our divine rights
To sovereign land.

Woe to the land that has soaked up so much blood.
Woe to the sky that has witnessed so much death.
Woe to the sea that cannot calm our grieving souls.

You who cast peace and prosperity to the winds,
Chasing hope to the clouds,
Banishing sanity to the netherworlds,
We have lost too many sons,
We have grieved too many daughters,
We rend our clothes and sit in sackcloth too often,
And we are crying, always crying,
Deep in our veins.

Alas!
Darkness marches and madness sings,
‘Keep on, keep on, for this is the only path,’
While death dances with glee shouting,
‘Keep on, keep on, there is no other way.’

Oh, my people,
Look at what we’ve done,
And look at what we’ve become.
For these things do I weep,
My eyes are flowing with tears:
For the dead,
For the children,
For our aching hearts,
For this yearning for peace.

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Postscript: See also “For Peace in the Middle East” and “When Peace Comes: A Meditation.”

Please check out my ELItalk video, “Falling in Love with Prayer,” and This Grateful Heart: Psalms and Prayers for a New Day. For reprint permissions and usage guidelines and reprint permissions, see “Share the Prayer!” To receive my latest prayers via email, please subscribe (on the home page). You can also connect on Facebook and Twitter.

Photo Source: PranaShanti

Art and Practice

Posted on: January 14th, 2018 by Alden

Send a blessing. Be a blessing. These are two of the arts and practices of inspiring love and sowing peace. Here’s a new meditation on embodying G-d’s gifts.

Art and Practice
These are the practices of love,
And the arts of peace…

Gratitude is the practice of sending blessings.
Compassion is the art of being a blessing.
Kindness is the practice of granting mercy.
Forgiveness is the art of being mercy.
Wonder is the practice of seeking holiness.
Humility is the art of being holiness.
Hope is the practice of seeing abundance.
Joy is the art of being abundance.

These are the practices of love,
And the arts of peace.
Gifts of G-d,
To share with each other.

Photo Source: Connection to Healing

Without a Sound

Posted on: September 19th, 2017 by Alden

For Rosh Hashanah, a new prayer of faith in God’s love, a deep level of trust that’s needed for me to do the hard and necessary work of t’shuva.

Without a Sound
I whispered a secret prayer to God,
Who whispered a secret answer to me,
So quietly
That it arrived
In the chambers of my soul
Without a sound.

Oh how I wish to hear Your voice.
Oh how I wish to know Your dreams for me.
Oh how I wish to let my heart run wild and free,
As light as a bird song,
As true as the call of the shofar,
As certain as an angel calling out holy, holy, holy…

I whispered a secret prayer to God,
Who whispered a secret answer to me,
To trust
That blessings arrive
In the chambers of my soul
Without a sound.

Postscript: Here are more prayers for the High Holidays. Thanks to my friend Shmuel Browns for allowing use of his photograph.

Photo Source: Israel Tours/Shmuel Browns

Two Prayers for Matot-Masei 5777

Posted on: July 19th, 2017 by Alden

Here are two prayers for this week’s double Torah reading: Matot-Masei. Matot stresses the sacredness of vows to God. They’re serious, solemn and binding. “Vows” portrays love as a scared oath. In Masei we read: “…for blood, it polluteth the land…” (Numbers 35:33). Blood may not be spilled on holy ground. “Blood on Holy Ground,” a prayer for peace, expands the definitions of “innocent blood” to all of humanity and “ground” to the entire earth.

Vows
What vow can I make before You
God of the ages?
What vow can I make before You
My people?
Empty words sting the heart.
Empty promises rend the soul.

This is my pledge:
To love with all of my being,
To the best of my ability,
Even when love seems to have departed.
Yes, some days I will love
More deeply, more fully,
You, my God,
And you, good people.
Some days I will struggle
Even to love myself.
Yet here is my vow,
Simple and pure,
To remember that love surrounds us.
Not to give up
On love,
On loving,
On the love that flows from You,
On the love that surrounds us all.

Blood on Holy Ground
We have all shed blood on holy ground.
Christians. Muslims. Jews.
We have all used anger, violence and hatred
To prosecute our cause.
Woe unto the land
That has soaked in so much blood.
Woe unto the generations
That has soaked in so much death.

We have all shed tears on holy ground.
Christians. Muslims. Jews.
We have all buried the lost
And dressed the wounds
Of those who prosecuted our cause.
Woe unto the generations
Who have tasted so many tears.
Let no one proclaim innocence.
Let no one proclaim justice.
Let no one proclaim God’s blessing.

We have all prayed for peace on holy ground.
Christians. Muslims. Jews.
Woe unto the land
That has waited for our words to become deeds.
Let these hopes become the work of our hands.
Let these blessings become the work of our hearts.
Let no blood be shed on holy ground.
Let all ground be holy.
And let peace spread to the four corners of the earth.

Postscript: My other prayers for peace include: “For Peace in the Middle East,” “To Win the Peace,” “Children of Gaza, Children of Israel” and “When Peace Comes: A Meditation.” “Blood on Holy Ground” first appeared on this site on July 14, 2015.

Photo Source: Wikimedia Commons

The Preacher Said

Posted on: November 9th, 2016 by Alden

Here’s a prayer for use in celebrating Martin Luther King Jr. Day and written for my book, “This Grateful Heart.”

The Preacher Said
Let us pray,
The preacher said,
Let us pray in the name of hope,
In the name of justice,
In the name of truth.

Let us commit to each other,
The preacher said,
Commit in the name of equality,
In the name of righteousness,
And in the name of our children.

Let us take to the streets,
The preacher said,
Let us take to the streets
To make our space,
To claim a place,
For no one race
Can live in grace,
Until we face,
Together,
Oppression and hate.

Let us walk,
The preacher said,
Let us walk from Selma to Montgomery,
From oppression to the Promised Land,
From fear to courage,
From silence to action,
From today to the future,
To a place where all people
Will be judged by the content
Of their character,
The humanity of their words,
And the compassion of their deeds.

Stick with love,
The preacher said,
Stick with love
Because love is the only answer.

Stick with love.
Stick with love.

Let us pray,
The preacher said,
Let us pray in the name of hope,
In the name of justice,
In the name of truth.

Postscript: Here’s a link to a prayer “In Thanks for U.S. Democracy.”

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Photo Source: Millard Fillmore’s Bathtub

For Aleppo and Syria

Posted on: October 17th, 2016 by Alden

In a vicious and cruel civil war, Aleppo has become a symbol of suffering and brutality, along with thousands upon thousands of Syrian refugees. This prayer ends with the hope that a nation of justice and peace will spring forth from this tragedy.

ADDENDUM, April 4, 2017: This week, the people of Syria faced the worst chemical attack in years. As of April 7, after the U.S. bombing raid, I’ve added a reference to chemical attacks and Idlib Province to this prayer, where the attack took place.

For Aleppo and Syria
G-d of All,
Protector and Redeemer,
Watch over the people of Syria
As they endure a prolonged and brutal civil war.
May a world of justice, righteousness and mercy
Come decisively to their aid.
Grant physical and emotional safety to
Citizens and residents,
And all who dwell there,
During this time of struggle and strife.

Grant deliverance to the residents of Aleppo and Idlib Province,
The children and the beleaguered,
Battered,
Torn apart by unrelenting bombardment,
And chemical attacks,
Surrounded by violence,
Enduring as food and electricity run low.
Let relief reach them quickly.
Bless all of the Syrian refugees
With safety and security.

End this campaign of terror
And set the people of Syria on the course
To a peaceful and prosperous future.
Grant them new leaders with courage and wisdom,
Rebuilding the land,
Creating a haven of justice and freedom for all.

Source and Shelter,
Grant peace to all nations,
So that truth and harmony resound
From the four corners of the earth.

Blessed are You, G-d of All,
Forging nations and peoples
In the crucible of history.

Postscript: Please take a moment to read “For Peace in the Middle East” and “Israel: A Meditation.” This prayer is a revision and expansion of a prayer “For Syria” that first appeared here on July 8, 2012.

Please consider making a contribution to support this site and my writing. For usage guidelines and reprint permissions, see “Share the Prayer!” For notices of new prayers, please subscribe. You can also connect on Facebook and Twitter.

Photo Source: BBC/Reuters

Sleeping Prophets

Posted on: October 18th, 2015 by Alden

Once, the prophets of Israel admonished kings – the civil leadership – against their failures and transgressions. Where are those prophets now, as the leadership of the modern State of Israel flounder and fail to make a real and lasting peace? Where are the calls for bravery and justice, the calls for honesty and righteous treatment of all? We must become the new prophets of Israel. It appears that no one else is coming to save us from our modern kings.

Sleeping Prophets
Wake,
You sleeping prophets.
Awaken your voices and your legs.
Come out among us.
Admonish callous hearts.
Admonish violence, hatred and sin.
Where is your passion?
Where is your thunder?
Where are your grievances?
Cry out against wickedness and deceit.
Cry out for wisdom and truth.
Why do you hide among the arrogant?
Why do you hide among and stiff-necked?
Why do you rest as bloodshed and slaughter
Threaten to consume us?

Wake you sleeping prophets, wake.
Unleash your vision and your voice.
Summon us to righteousness.
Summon us to heal ourselves and the world.
Once, brave men and women
Rose up to challenge the errors of our ways
And the foolishness of our kings.

Rise up, rise up.
You are the prophets of peace.
Demand strength and compassion.
Compel our leaders to a new path
And a new light,
In G-d’s Holy Name.

Postscript: This is a link to my prayer “For Political Leadership” and another to more prayers for Israel and peace.

Tweetable! Click here to tweet this: “Wake you sleeping prophets…” A call for peace and justice by @ToBendLight. https://tobendlight.com/?p=13695

Photo Source: WikiMedia Commons

Blood on Holy Ground

Posted on: July 14th, 2015 by Alden

Spilling innocent blood defiles holy land. In this week’s double Torah reading, Matot-Masei, we read: “…for blood, it polluteth the land…” [Numbers 35:33] This is a new prayer for peace, expanding “innocent blood” to the idea that all of humanity is sacred and “ground” to the entire earth. Blood may not be spilled on holy ground. This piece appears in This Precious Life: Encountering the Divine with Poetry and Prayer from CCAR Press.

Postscript: My other prayers for peace include: “For the Return of Peace,” “For Peace in the Middle East,” “To Win the Peace,” “Children of Gaza, Children of Israel” and “When Peace Comes: A Meditation.”

Photo Source: Wikimedia Commons

Renewal

Posted on: February 15th, 2015 by Alden

This simple meditation is a reminder that making space for spiritual renewal is vital to a life of love and service.

Renewal
Make for yourself
A quiet place,
Beyond the noise and chaos,
A place of refuge and retreat
To renew your mind.

Make for yourself
A prayer place,
Beyond the fear and doubt,
A place of comfort and calm
To renew your heart.

Make for yourself
A healing space,
Beyond the shadows and grief,
A place of hope and love
To renew your soul.

G-d,
Teach me to use my moments and days
As acts of renewal,
Drawing your divine energy
Into my life
So that I may serve You
And Your creation
With the fullness of my being.

Postscript: Related prayers include: “Quiet,” “This is the Place” and “All is Well.”

Photo Source: Alden Solovy

Let Tranquility Reign

Posted on: January 18th, 2015 by Alden

This is a prayer for peace, yearning for the day when all peoples will live together in harmony. It’s my first attempt to emulate paytanim of old – the liturgical song writers – by weaving lines of Psalms into a prayer. It includes the closing couplets of Psalms 120, 121 and 122, in both Hebrew and English. Special thanks to papercut artist Deborah Tepper for allowing me to illustrate this with “Pathway of Protection,” which is based on the closing line of Psalm 121. This prayer appears in This Joyous Soul: A New Voice for Ancient Yearnings.

Let Tranquility Reign
Some days,
Ancient One,
Some days the prayers
Of Your people
Are so close
We can hold them in our hands,
Feel them with our eyes,
Taste them with our breath.
They surround our hearts
To become our yearning.
They surround our song,
To become our grieving.
They surround our souls,
To become our pleading.

“My soul has dwelled too long
Among those who hate peace.
I am for peace, but when I speak of it
They are for war.”
:רַבַּת שָׁכְנָה-לָּהּ נַפְשִׁי, עִם שׂוֹנֵא שָׁלוֹם
:אֲנִי-שָׁלוֹם וְכִי אֲדַבֵּר, הֵמָּה לַמִּלְחָמָה

When will peace come,
Source of Peace,
When will sorrow be vanquished?
When will tranquility reign?

“Adonai will guard you from all harm;
G-d will guard your soul.
Adonai will guard your going and coming;
Now and evermore.”
:יְהוָה יִשְׁמָרְךָ מִכָּל-רָע, יִשְׁמֹר אֶת-נַפְשֶׁךָ
:יְהוָה יִשְׁמָר-צֵאתְךָ וּבוֹאֶךָ, מֵעַתָּה וְעַד-עוֹלָם

For You are our Hope.
Our Comfort.
Our Blessing.
Let those who cherish life
Bless this day and every day.

“For the sake of my comrades and companions,
I shall say: ‘Peace be within you.’
For the sake of the House of Adonai our God
I will seek your good.”
:לְמַעַן אַחַי וְרֵעָי, אֲדַבְּרָה-נָּא שָׁלוֹם בָּךְ
:לְמַעַן בֵּית-יְהוָה אֱלֹהֵינוּ, אֲבַקְשָׁה טוֹב לָךְ

Let these prayers ascend
To the lofty heights,
So that the nations,
And peoples of the earth,
Will rejoice in holiness,
Will rejoice in splendor,
And will rejoice, together, in righteousness.

Postscript: Psalms 120-122 are the first three of 15 Songs of Ascent. Along with the Barchi Nafshi, Psalm 104, these Psalms are traditionally said each Shabbat afternoon from the Shabbat after Simchat Torah until (but not including) Shabbat HaGadol, the Shabbat before Pesach. The translation from the Psalm 122 couplet is from Siddur Sim Shalom, which uses “comrades and companions” in lieu of the more literal “brothers and friends.”

My other prayers for peace include: “When Peace Comes: A Meditation,” “Children of Gazas, Children of Israel,” and “For Peace in the Middle East.”

Thanks again to papercut artist Deborah Tepper for allowing me to illustrate this with “Pathway of Protection.” She explained that it was commissioned by the Jewish Federation in Kalamazoo, MI, to honor a Righteous Gentile in their community. The women was a teenager during the Holocaust. Her family hid and protected two Jewish children. It was “the family’s love of humanity and belief in God that guided them to protect the going and coming of the Jewish children, while they were in hiding from the Nazis,” Deborah wrote. “The family remained tranquil and loving through their ordeal.” Deborah previously allowed me to use “The Joy of Shabbat – Lecha Dodia” to illustrate “Come Beloved.”

Photo Source: Deborah Tepper, papercut image used with permission

Posts Tagged ‘peace’

Lamentation from Both Sides of the Fence

Art and Practice

Without a Sound

Two Prayers for Matot-Masei 5777

The Preacher Said

For Aleppo and Syria

Sleeping Prophets

Blood on Holy Ground

Renewal

Let Tranquility Reign

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