Prayers and Poems for IDF Soldiers
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Prayers
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Prayer for Soldiers in Captivity
Prayer for the Welfare of Soldiers in the Israel Defense Forces
El Maleh Rachamim
Poems (by author):
Natan Alterman | Uri Zvi Greenberg | Amir Gilboa | Chaim Hefer | Shaul Tchernikhovsky
Prayer for Soldiers in Captivity
As we recite this prayer, please have in mind the six soldiers who remain in captivity: Gilad Shalit, Ron Arad, Guy Hever, Zachary Baumel, Zvi Feldman, and Yehuda Katz
He who blessed our forefathers Abraham, Isaac and Yaacov, Joseph, Moses, Aaron, David and Solomon, may He bless, preserve and protect the captive and missing soldiers of the Israel Defense Forces including:
Yekutiel Yehuda Nachman ben Sarah (Katz)
Zecharia Shlomo ben Miriam (Baumel)
Zvi ben Penina (Feldman)
Ron ben Batya (Arad)
Guy ben Rina (Hever)
Gilad ben Aviva (Shalit)
May He Rescue them from captivity and speedily restore them in peace, in the merit of the prayers of this holy assemblage who pray for them. May the Holy One, Blessed be He, show them mercy, increase their strength, remove their pain and send them a recovery of body and recovery of spirit, may He return them to the bossom of their families, swiftly and soon. Now let us respond: Amen.
Prayer for the Welfare of Soldiers in the Israel Defense Forces
May He who blessed our fathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, bless the soldiers of the Israel Defense Forces who keep guard over our country and cities of our Lord from the border with Lebanon to the Egyptian desert and from the Mediterranean Sea to the approach to the Arava, be they on land, air or sea. May the Almighty deliver us our enemies who arise against us, may the Holy One, blessed be He, preserve them and save them from all sorrow and peril, from danger and ill. May He send blessing and success in all their endeavors, may He deliver to them those who hate us and crown them with salvation and victory, so that the saying may be fulfilled through them, “For the Lord, your God, who walks with you and to fight your enemies for you and to save you”, and let us say, Amen.
El Maleh Rachamim
G-D of Overflowing Compassion, Who Lives in the Highest and All Worlds, give limitless rest to those who are now under your Holy Sheltering Spiritual Wings, making them rise ever more purely, through the Light of your Brilliance, to the souls of:
Add each name
(Chant El Maleh Rachamim)
Poems by Natan Alterman
The Silver Salver
“A State is not handed to a people on a silver salver”
Chaim Weizmann, first President of Israel
The Earth grows still.
The lurid sky slowly pales
Over smoking borders.
Heartsick, but still lving, a people stand by
To greet the uniqueness
of the miracle.
Readied, they wait beneath the moon,
Wrapped in awesome joy, before the light.
— Then, soon,
A girl and boy step forward,
And slowly walk before the waiting nation;
In work garb and heavy-shod
They climb
In stillness.
Wearing yet the dress of battle, the grime
Of aching day and fire-filled night
Unwashed, weary unto death, not knowing rest,
But wearing youth like dewdrops in their hair,
— Silently the two approach
And stand.
Are they of the quick or of the dead?
Through wondering tears, the people stare.
“Who are you, the silent two?”
And they reply: “We are the silver salver
Upon which the Jewish State was served to you.”
And spekaing, fall in shadow at the nation’s feet.
Let the rest in Israel’s chronicles be told.
2. The Third Mother
Mothers are singing. Mothers are singing.
A fist of thunder bangs down. Strong silence.
Red-bearded lamps are marching
in the empty streets in rows.
Autumn mortally ill, weary,
inconsolable autumn,
rain without beginning or end.
No candle in the window, now light in the world,
three mothers sing.
I hear one of them say:
“He was here but yesterday.
I shall kiss his every fingernail and finger.
I see a tall ship in a calm bay,
and my son from the topmast hanging.”
And the second one says:
“My son is tall and quiety.
I am sewing a holiday shirt for my dear.
He’s walking in the fields. He will soon be here.
And he holds in his heart a lead bullet.”
And the third mother says with her wandering eyes:
“No one was dearer or kinder…
WHo shall weep when he comes if I cannot see?
I do not know where he finds him.”
And she bathed her eylashes with weeping.
Perhaps he is only resting. Perhaps
in foreign places he mesures
the paths of Your world, O God,
(Like a wandering monk) with kisses.
Uri Zvi Greenberg
Those who Live by their Virtue Will Say
They were the chosen… They sang… Now their voices are silent.
The true sons of the race of David that fell with their sword in their hand
Simple and lovely like young David of the Shepherd Clan…
And they shall praise Thee, O Lord, from the dust they’ve returned to!
The dust Thou created them from is the dust of death…
This kind of dust whereof Thou createth primeval man.
The Temple Mount and the Rock –
From that dust they’ll praise Thee… Immortal are they!
There is no truth, no glory but them.
And we, in this world, do live by their virtue.
And by their splendor we prosper.
Whoever looks unto their graves will ne’er be enslaved any longer.
Amir Gilboa
And My Brother Said Nothing (extracts [for copyright reasons]):
My brother came back from the field
dressed in gray. And I was afraid that
my dream might prove false, so at once
I began to count his wounds.
And my brother said nothing.
[…]
Then I undid the pack
and took out his belongings, memory by memory.
[…]
And my brother said nothing.
And his blood was crying out from the ground.
Chaim Hefer
The Paratroopers Wept
This Wall has heard many prayers.
This wall has seen many walls crumble.
[…]
But this wall never saw paratroopers weep…
[…]
Perhaps it is because the bours of 19
who were born together with the State
carry on their backs — two thousand years…
Shaul Tchernikhovsky
You See, O Earth
You see, O earth,
how very wasteful we have been:
In your secret laps of blessing
we hid seed – not the clean
Glass-clear pearls of spelt,
but seeds of heavy wheat,
Grains of yellowish barley,
oats on frightened feet.
You see, O earth,
how very wasteful we have been:
Flowers of flowers we hid in you,
fresh with glorious sheen;
They were kissed by the earliest kiss
of the sun just coming up,
Burying beauty with graceful stem,
with the crown of the willing cup;
Before they could know noon
in the midst of innocent sorrow,
Before dreaming of light in growth
or drinking dew upon the morrow.
The best of our sons we brought you,
youth of purest dreams,
Clear in heart and deed,
untouched by earth’s dark streams,
The cloth of their years yet woof,
a cloth of hopes to be,
We have none better than these.
Earth, did you see?
And you shall cover them all.
Let the plant rise in its season!
A hundred measures of might and glory,
for people, homeland vision!
They atone for our lives in glory,
their sacrifice unseen…
You see, O earth,
how very wasteful we have been.
Psalms
Psalms of faith in distress, like:
# 3,
# 8,
#23.
Psalms of prayer and comfort, like:
# 20,
# 71,
# 77,
# 90,
#102.
Book of Kohelet [Ecclesiastes]:
Chap.2, verses 3-8, “To everything there is a season…”