A Prayer
This prayer for the living is meant to be prayed in community as a responsive reading. It was written by Rabbi Rachel Barenblat. She is a poet, spiritual director, and the rabbi of Congregation Beth Israel in North Adams, MA.
Prayer for the Children of Abraham/Ibrahim
For every aspiring ballerina huddled
scared in a basement bomb shelter
For every toddler in his mother's arms
behind rubble of concrete and rebar
For every child who's learned to distinguish
"our" bombs from "their" bombs by sound
For everyone wounded, cowering, frightened
and everyone furious, planning for vengeance
For the ones who are tasked with firing shells
where there are grandmothers and infants
For the ones who fix a rocket's parabola
toward children on school playgrounds
For every official who sees shelling Gaza
as a matter of "cutting the grass"
And every official who approves launching projectiles
from behind preschools or prayer places
For every kid taught to lob a bomb with pride
And every kid sickened by explosions
For every teenager who considers
"martyrdom" his best hope for a future:
May the G-d of compassion and the G-d of mercy
G-d of justice and G-d of forgiveness
and nurses us each day with blessing
G-d Who suffers the anxiety and pain
of each of His unique children
G-d Who yearns for us to take up
the work of perfecting creation
G-d Who is reflected in those who fight
and in those who bandage the bleeding --
May our Father, Mother, Beloved, Creator
cradle every hurting heart in caring hands.
Soon may we hear in the hills of Judah
and the streets of Jerusalem
in the olive groves of the West Bank
and the apartment blocks of Gaza City
in the kibbutz fields of the Negev
and the neighborhoods of Nablus
the voice of fighters who have traded weapons
for books and ploughs and bread ovens
the voice of children on swings and on slides
singing nonsense songs, unafraid
the voice of reconciliation and new beginnings
in our day, speedily and soon.
And let us say:
amen.
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