PRAYERS FOR WOMEN

...Her arms were bare, her skirt the length that fashion decreed...

...Prayers for Women, edited by Rav Ben Zion Alfs, was published in New York by the Star Hebrew Book Company...

...PRAYERS FOR WOMEN translated by Sylvia Rothchild My grandmother, wigged, long-sleeved and skirted, spent Sabbath afternoons at a window in Williamsburg murmuring Tchinot just as she used to in Czernowitz and Lemberg, the other places she had called home...

...Their judgments and fears, satisfactions and sorrows, guilts and obsessions had been stamped — blessed into me too early and too well...

...I was determined to look forward, not back, up and not down...

...Sylvia Rothchild, this month's contributor, is a writer and lecturer who lives in the Boston area Her short stories and articles have appeared in a variety of publications, and her books include sunshine and salt...

...Protect the sailors at night so they don't fall asleep...

...By the beginning of the eighteenth century they were published in Yiddish for women in Bohemia, Prague, Basel, Furth and many Russian and Polish towns...

...Pour Thy holy spirit on all Your creatures so they know Your Oneness and hear Your holy words . . . so that the world is filled with understanding of God . . . covered as the water covers the ocean . . . May it happen soon, in our time, Amen...

...We were told to raise them in Torah and fear of Heaven so they will be good servants for You...

...I beg You to protect them from bad friends and to bring them close to those who love learning and good deeds...

...Unlike the formal, communal prayers of the Siddur, they were personal communications with the Almighty who could be approached anywhere, at any time, for consultation on any subject...

...On Good Children Compassionate Father and King . . . Our hearts are open to You . . . You know how much we want to serve You but a person is not immortal . . . I come to You, a poor woman with a burning prayer . . . Take my prayers with compassion . . . Lengthen the years of my husband and children in Yiddishkeit...

...A blessing made on the wearing of a new dress offers descriptions of all the kinds of fibers, where they come from and how they are spun or woven...

...Such envy is good because it helps me to strive to be better than I am...

...May I be nourished by Your broad and holy hand and not need the help of others...

...May we have long years and good fortune...

...Mostly she was very clear about who and where she was, where she had come from and where she was going...

...It took a while to learn that I lacked the proper fins for swimming...

...If one leaves good children behind, it is as if one did not die...

...They were excluded from men's study and prayer but exhorted to value scholarship and wisdom, to guard against creature-liness and be worthy of holiness...

...So I pour out my heart before Your holy throne...

...I beg You to make my voyage fortunate, that the ocean should be calm and the ship go where it should without cracking into anything, without stopping for lack of wind or becoming grounded in sand...

...in wordly things like riches and good fortune may my eyes look down to those weaker and more oppressed than I. Two purposes will be served...

...To Bring A Soul Out Of Sorrow Compassionate Father, You have helped me out of all my suffering, I beg You to help me once more out of a trouble I cannot share with anyone else...

...One and only Father, protect me and my children and all Israel from every sorrow and evil eye...

...Help our children...

...In modern editions, such as Rav Alfs' (1850-1940), the body might be compared to a "mashinkele...

...Unfortunately, the book has no date...

...May Your Holy Name be honored through our deeds...

...She was a modern woman...

...In the interstices between blessings there were lessons in morality, anatomy, Bible, Talmud and Zohar...

...On Traveling By Sea Dear Compassionate Father, I see signs of Your greatness and wisdom as I travel on the ocean...

...The prayers, called T'chinot, were modelled after Hebrew prayers of the sixteenth century...

...There were prayers to be said before going peddling in the market and upon entering a synagogue, prayers to be said during and after childbirth, for a bris, for taking a son to school on the first day and for educating daughters...

...Save us from the evil inclination and give us sustenance and Yiddishkeit...

...Then cautiously, with trepidation, I began reading in my grandmother's prayer-book...

...First I will be content with my portion because I will see those who are in deeper trouble than I . . . Secondly, looking behind me at those who are less fortunate than I will make me feel'for their trouble and help them out of their need...

...You are the master of the world and can make the oceans still or stormy . . . Bring me to 'my destination in peace and good health . . . May I be permitted to embark as I wish and may I find everyone there well and free . . . And as You quiet the ocean and still the waves, may You also calm the enemies of Israel that create turbulence for us...

...Give us, I beg You, a pure, kosher livelihood, without envy, enemies or the desecration of the Sabbath...

...She loved language, enjoyed a clever turn of phrase and even quoted the sages as if she studied them...

...May we not have to seek the help of others, not take a groschen that doesn't belong to us . . . May we be able to serve You with a pure heart, with charity for all and bring our children to Torah and Awe of Heaven...

...Your gentle hand is open to feed all Your creations from great to small . . . All hope for Your help . . . As King David said, "The eyes of all creation are on You...

...for whom we have been brought out of slavery in Egypt...

...But still I respond...

...Her mother's prayers and blessings had become part of the fabric of her own thoughts, fears and hopes...

...Open the Gates of Heaven and send all of Israel blessings, good fortune . . . When the time comes to dim our lights may we be prepared . . . We have married and borne children...

...Finding a well-thumbed, tear-stained collection of T'chinot is like stumbling on a diary with a personal record of struggles and yearnings, uninhibited conversations with a Father in Heaven...

...a novel, and keys to a magic door, a biography of I. L Peretz, which won the Jewish Book Award in I960...

...In the confusion of the journey between two languages and cultures, however, she had missed learning to read...

...I beg dear God that You should keep my household healthy and honor us with Your concern...

...But since the differences between me and the women before me were vast, chasms compared to the gaps between me and my daughters, I kept the simiOn Envy Dearest Father in Heaven, help me order my life as the Sages teach...

...The language and images suggest that it reflects the problems of women at the turn of the century, during the time of Jewish immigration to America...

...Amen...

...Parents take credit for the good deeds of their children...

...Amen...

...Protect them from every evil eye and from all enslavements and help ns to pay for their teachers so that my husband and I will hear their Bar Mitzvah speeches and lead them to the chupah...

...Send Your good angels to help me out of my sadness into a better, more cheerful path...

...She spoke of the deficiency as her "blindness," and like the truly REACCESS is our column for presenting aspects of the Jewish past...

...On Making a Living Compassionate Father...

...laritres hidden, disguised, out of sight and out of mind...

...I was a self-styled orphan who would not be a passive link in the chain of generations...

...The barricades still stand between the good and the evil inclination, between kosher and treif, between the sacred and the profane...

...Daughter of those mothers, I wore heavy scales...

...Jewish women might be subservient to their husbands and Heavenly Father, but they were encouraged to think of them-.selves as vessels containing "a spark of holy fire...

...There were blessings and comments for all occasions: for opening one's eyes in the morning, for taking a first step out of bed, for seeing and hearing...

...The modern woman that I am cringes from supplication and obsequiousness, and concern for the evil eye and Satan reeks of superstition...

...You know the ways of the heart, dear Father...

...May my heart look toward Heaven, envying those who are more learned in Yiddishkeit than I am, more pious than I, more generous in giving tz'dakah and better in character...

...My mother, later and in a newer neighborhood, sat at the window without the Yiddish prayer-book...

...I did not have her permission when I jumped into the world as if it were a pond in which I could swim free as a fish, cold-blooded, without promises to keep the ways of the past...

...It is hard to raise children to Torah and Fear of Heaven...

...Save us from collisions with other vessels and all the dangers of the sea...

...Moreover, I'm wary of men who begin their education of women with flattery, and Rav Alfs presents his commentaries to the "Noble women, mothers of our children, mothers of our people...

...May we not be shamed and bring joy to our enemies...

...blind made up for the lack with an extraordinary memory and finely honed intuition...

...They had no place in the synagogue, but the T'chinot brought the Heavenly Court into their kitchens, bedrooms and market stalls...

...In these days, dear God, there are evil winds blowing from all directions poisoning the minds of children, pulling them off the Jewish path into dark and bloody ways...

...She had refused to cut her hair...

...A prayer for safe crossing of the ocean includes an explanation of the working of a compass...

...You have given mankind great understanding so that a path can be made through the ocean, just as You brought the children of Israel on a path through the sea...

...My Yiddishe n'shomeh, acquired before rebellion and Americanization, recognizes old roots, sources from which I cannot swim away, no matter how hard I try...