Prayer of Thanksgiving after the Portuguese Attack on Recife
Isaac Aboab da Fonseca
Mid–17th Century
And Isaac offered this prayer and supplication before the Lord:
Master of the worlds and Lord of lords, possessed of infinite wisdom and endless understanding, who emanates through His beings which are the souls of His sefirot[divine aspects, in kabbalah], and whose sefirot permeate the worlds that He created, formed, and made:
May it be Your will that You pour out over us Your spirit of grace and generosity. Hear our prayer with favor and answer our supplication in mercy. Open the channels of the waters of the supernal pool, through the breadths of the river, to the center line, the river that proceeds from Eden to water the garden, and that branches out from there upon Your people to water them and vivify them. Be for us a shield and armor, a fortress and refuge. Guard us and all your people, the house of Israel.
May it be the will of our God in heaven, by the power of His holy and pure names, to strengthen us and bless us, and to bless all this holy congregation, who stand in straits and trouble, they and their children and wives, their students and all that is theirs. May the King of the world bless you and accord you merit and hear the voice of your prayers.
May the King, King of Kings, the Holy and Blessed One guard you and grant you life, and may He deliver you from all trouble and harm.
May the King, King of Kings open for you the gates of relief and rescue, and may you know no more sorrow.
May the King, King of Kings lengthen your days with pleasantness and save you from all adversaries and attackers.
May the King, King of Kings fight your battles and wipe out all your enemies.
May the King, King of Kings stand by you to assist you and deliver you from every adversary and from all who rise up against you for evil, whether on sea or dry land.
May the King, King of Kings raise a storm wind against them, so that only mourning and moaning shall be heard in their midst, for their ships will be broken; they will ascend to the heaven and plunge to the depths; their souls will melt from so much anxiety.1
May the King, King of Kings put all your enemies to rout; may he make the Rephaim [an ancient race of giants] weak, and afflict the giants with scabs and blinding light so that they cannot find the entrance.
May the King, King of Kings convert the dews of your enemies to arrows and shower hailstones on them from heaven until He wipes them out. May they go from pits to pits,2 from gallant barks to a wasteland, and may they fall from the skies to the valleys and from the heights to the depths. May they prepare for themselves graves in the desert but not be delivered from death—the mighty ones who dwell in compartments and the strong ones who dwell in straits. May they then journey from Hazerot to Hazarmavet, and from the shade of their vine to the shadow of death; may they journey from the graves of their evil craving [Kibroth-hattaavah] and camp in Taberah, where they may all lay in the dust and sleep the eternal sleep.3
But as for all the members of this holy congregation, may the Rock of Israel be a rock and strong wall for them, turning away anger and fury from them. May the King in His compassion have mercy on you, to cause you to dwell in life and peace. May the Holy and Blessed One in His mercy and great lovingkindness open for you the gates of light, the gates of blessing, the gates of redemption, the gates of threshing, the gates of success, the gates of “and to the best,” the gates of merit, the gates of compassion, the gates of grace, the gates of lovingkindness, the gates of life, the gates of goodness, the gates of salvation, the gates of abundance, the gates of atonement, the gates of learning, the gates of sustenance, the gates of consolation, the gates of support, the gates of assistance, the gates of liberation, the gates of righteousness, the gates of self-sufficiency, the gates of healing, the gates of mercy, the gates of peace, the gates of prayer, the gates of repentance.4 May there be fulfilled for you the verse: May the Lord, the God of your fathers, increase your numbers a thousandfold, and bless you as He promised you (Deuteronomy 1:11). So may it be His will. And let us say, Amen.
Translated by
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Notes
[Plays on words.—Trans.]
[Laconic. Perhaps an allusion to Jeremiah 2:13: “[My people] have left Me, the fount of living waters, and hewed out for themselves cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot even hold water.” The word bor can mean cistern or pit.—Trans.]
[Word-play in this passage: Hazerot [“courtyards”], Kibrot-ha-ta‘avah [“graves of craving”], and Taberah [“burning”] are among the encampment sites recorded during the Israelites’ journeying in the wilderness, while Hazarmavet [“courtyard of death”] is a personal name mentioned in the biblical genealogies, but treated here as a place name. (See Numbers 11:3, 11:34–35, 33:16–17, and Deuteronomy 9:22; Genesis 10:26 and 1 Chronicles 1:10.)—Trans.]
[The names of these gates run the gamut of the Hebrew alphabet, with some letters repeated.—Trans.]
Credits
Isaac Aboab de Fonseca, “Prayer of Thanksgiving after the Portuguese Attack on Recife” (prayer, Recife, mid-17th century). Published in: Meyer Kayserling, “Isaac Aboab, the First Jewish Author in America,” Publications of the American Jewish Historical Society, no. 5 (1897): pp. 125–136 (135–136).
Published in: The Posen Library of Jewish Culture and Civilization, vol. 5.
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