כא

"My voice — to Hashem I cry out; my voice — to Hashem I plead" [Psalms 142:2]. My voice — to Hashem and I shall cry out; my voice — to Hashem and hearken to me [Psalms 77:2]. "From the belly of the underworld I cried out — You heard my voice" [Jonah 2:3]. "And may my cry come before You, to Your holy Sanctuary" [Psalms 88:3]. "Hear, O Hashem, my voice when I call — and be gracious to me and answer me" [Psalms 27:7]. Receive our cry and hear our shout — O You Who knows hidden things. Master of the Universe, Who hears the voice of the cry of Your people Israel with mercy — have pity and be gracious to us and have mercy upon us and be with us to help us; and prepare our hearts that we cry out and shout to You in truth until You answer us — may we cry out and may You say: Here I am [cf. Isaiah 58:9]. And may the voice of our cry go and grow very strong — and may we give You no rest [Isaiah 62:7]; until You be gracious to us and hearken to our voice and attend to our cry and have mercy upon us through Your mercies. And may we merit to reveal and illuminate and bring forth the holy intellects [mochin dikdushah] that are now hidden from us through our iniquities — in a great hiddenness and great concealment; until through our iniquities we now have no mind at all to recognize You and to serve You in truth; and we do not merit to innovate anything in the holy Torah truly and in truth.

Master of the Universe — before You all hidden things are revealed, and You know our hearts. For we are so far from You now — until shame has covered our faces and we are ashamed to ask and to request of You this: that You reveal to us the hidden and concealed things of the Torah. For we do not know what to request first — for we have not yet even begun to purify and sanctify ourselves at all. But You know the great preciousness of the holiness of our souls at their root — for You chose us from all the peoples and called us a holy people, a treasured people [am segulah] — as it is written: "And you shall be to Me a treasure from among all the peoples" [Exodus 19:5]. And as it is written: "For G‑d has chosen Yaakov for Himself — Israel as His treasure" [Psalms 135:4]. Have pity and compassion upon Your treasure and Your companion, upon Your people and Your inheritance, upon the splendor of the hosts of Your delight [tzvi tzva'os chemdosecha] — whom You called by all the expressions of affection in Your love and in Your compassion. You loved us and desired us and elevated us above all tongues and drew us near, our King, to Your service. May Your innards churn over us; may Your mercies be stirred over our lowliness and our degradation. Arise to help us and save us — and place in our hearts to cry out to You always, until You have mercy upon us and turn Your face toward us and draw us near. Although I know well that according to the magnitude of my distance from You — by thousands and tens of thousands of distancings — the voice of my cry has no power to stir and to bring forth the hidden intellects [taalumos hamochin]; and even if I had the power to cry out with all the voices of all the creatures of the world, they would not suffice for me — not even for what I need to cry out over a single distancing of a single day. And there is no voice in the world that has the power to avail me, given the enormity of my distance from You — and even when I cry and shout, my prayer is stopped up [Lamentations 3:8]. How much more so — for I have not yet even begun to cry out even according to my own strength. But You have already made known to us that You are full of mercy at every time and every moment toward us; and through Your abundant mercies You hear and attend to all the voices in the world from the very depths of depths — as it is written: "From the belly of the underworld I cried out — You heard my voice" [Jonah 2:3]. Therefore I have set the stakes of my tent in Your goodness and Your great graciousness — for upon Your abundant mercies I trust, and upon Your lovingkindness I lean, and for Your forgiveness I hope, and for Your salvation I look forward. And I have come to spread out my palms before You, Hashem our G‑d and G‑d of our fathers: help me and be gracious to me and stir my heart in truth — that I merit to feel my enormous pain in truth: the pain of my soul and spirit and neshamah; and may I merit to see and to understand the very essence of my distance from You; and may You grant me merit to cry out to You always with all my strength. And You shall be filled with mercy toward me — and may You attend to my blemished voice and hearken to my corrupted cry. And have mercy upon me through Your mercies and help me to repair my voice — and may You raise me up from a blemished voice to a good voice. And may You grant me merit to cry out — both in Torah and in prayer — until I merit through Your abundant mercies to stir and to bring forth through my voice the hidden intellects that have become hidden from us through our iniquities. And through the multitude of our iniquities we have, as it were, weakened the supernal power — until the power of the Shechinah has, as it were, grown weary of giving birth to the intellects — as it is written: "The Rock that bore you, you have grown unmindful" [Deuteronomy 32:18]. "For the children have come to the point of breaking forth, yet there is no strength to give birth" [Isaiah 37:3].

Master of the Universe — act for Your sake and not for our sake. Act for the sake of Your Shechinah — and help us to cry out to You in truth in Torah and in prayer; and may our voice rise and come and reach You; and may You receive the voice of our cry in the place of the cry of the Shechinah [tzakas haShechina]; until we merit to stir and to bring forth the hidden holy intellects of ours that have been hidden from us. For You alone know hidden things — and before You the hidden intellects of every single one of us are revealed: to where they have become hidden and concealed from us. Help us and save us — us and all Your people the House of Israel — that each one merit through the voice of his cry to stir the holy intellects hidden from each and every one — to the place where they have been hidden; until each one merit at every time to bring forth and reveal and attain new intellects that belong to him, according to the root of his soul and spirit and neshamah. And may we merit to recognize You in truth and to know You at every time with ever greater understanding; and may we merit to reveal Your G‑dliness in the world.

And therefore may it be Your will, Hashem our G‑d and G‑d of our fathers, full of mercy — that You have mercy upon us and help us and save us speedily: that we begin from now to sanctify the seven lamps that illuminate toward the face of the holy Menorah [Menorah dikdushah] — which are the eyes and ears and mouth and nose. And may You grant me merit to sanctify my mouth — that no word of falsehood ever go forth from my mouth, and no speech that blemishes the mouth, G‑d forbid. Rather may all my words always be words of truth in holiness and in purity; and may I merit to sanctify my mouth through Torah and through prayer and through all kinds of speech that sanctify the mouth. And may You grant me merit to sanctify my eyes — and help me to shut my eyes from seeing evil; and may You be with me to help me so that I have no gaze whatsoever upon anything in this world at all. And in particular — help me and save me and deliver me: that I not gaze, G‑d forbid, upon anything that brings to sinful thoughts [hirhurim], G‑d forbid. Have pity and be gracious to me and have mercy upon me and save me — and deliver my soul from now from the blemish of sight; and may I not stray after my heart and after my eyes [cf. Numbers 15:39]. "Turn my eyes away from seeing vanity — in Your ways give me life" [Psalms 119:37]. And grant me merit to sanctify my ears — and may I merit to always hear the words of true sages and to believe in them; and may I have complete faith in sages [emunos chachamim]; and may You be with me to help me so that I always incline my ear to hear the words of true sages, and may their words enter my ears and stir my heart in truth — to return to You and to do Your will always. And may You guard me and save me — that I never hear, and that there never enter my ears, any blemished speech; and may I not hear and not receive any speech of lashon hara and tale-bearing [rechilus]; and may I never hear frivolous speech [naval peh] nor any blemished utterance at all. Rather may I merit to always hear holy words from the mouths of true tzadikim and worthy people — words that sanctify the ears of those who hear them. And grant me merit that I have true fear of Heaven — and through this may I merit to sanctify my nose; and may the verse be fulfilled in me: "And his scent shall be in the fear of Hashem" [Isaiah 11:3].

And all that I have blemished until now in these seven lamps through my many iniquities and blemishes — through which I sinned and transgressed and rebelled before You and blemished my mouth and my eyes and my ears and my nose from my youth until this very day: in error and in deliberateness, under compulsion and willingly — for all of them may You forgive me and pardon me, O full of mercy, gracious One Who multiplies forgiveness [cf. Yom Kippur liturgy]; and may You repair through Your mercies all these blemishes — and may no trace of them remain at all. For You know that we have no power to repair these blemishes — for we have multiplied transgression and blemish in them greatly. For who can assess and estimate and count all the sins and blemishes in the utterances of our mouths from the day we came upon the earth until this very day — and how many falsehoods went forth from my mouth almost every single day; and likewise the other great sins and blemishes I blemished through the utterances of my mouth: through speaking lashon hara and tale-bearing and mockery and idle words without measure or reckoning or number. And in particular the multitude and the enormity of the great and many blemishes I blemished through my eyes — who can assess them and count them, who can enumerate them with the mouth? — it is impossible for me even to confess them; how much more so to perform the many repairs proportional to the multitude of these blemishes to repair them. For there has not passed over me a single day of my life in which I did not blemish through my eyes — in error and in deliberateness, under compulsion and willingly. And You alone know how far the blemish of the eyes reaches — upon which the entire Torah in its entirety depends. Woe is me and alas for me — what shall I say, what shall I speak? If I were to say: I will recount even the tiniest fraction of the blemish of the eyes I have blemished every single day — time would run out and they would not be finished; they would outnumber the sand [cf. Psalms 139:18]. And if You Yourself do not act for Your own sake, G‑d forbid — and repair all these enormous blemishes through Your mercies — we have no power to repair even one of them, let alone all of them together. "If You, G‑d, were to keep account of iniquities — O Lord, who could stand? But with You there is forgiveness, so that You may be feared" [Psalms 130:3–4]. Have pity and compassion upon us; have pity and have mercy upon us — for we have no sense or knowledge of how to please and appease You for all these great and awesome blemishes that we have blemished until now in these seven holy lamps that draw from the holy mind [moach dikdushah]. And from the very multitude of these blemishes we have blemished in these seven holy lamps — through this our minds have been blemished and our intellect has been muddied and our mind and knowledge have been confused; and because of this there come upon me hardnesses and confusions and crookedness of heart — and they confuse and twist my knowledge and my heart greatly; until I cannot draw near to any matter of holiness as is fitting; and they seek to distance us completely, G‑d forbid, from Your service in truth.

Master of the Universe — You know the bitterness of my heart; You know the bitter crookedness that is in my heart. You know who and who stand over us at every time and every hour — "O Hashem, how many are my tormentors — many rise up against me" [Psalms 3:2]. And not only do we have the many afflictions of our soul that we have through our evil desires — through which we sinned and transgressed and rebelled before You greatly; through following the stubbornness of our evil hearts and blemishing Your great Name; and how many worlds were destroyed through our many iniquities — as You alone know — how many blemishes we caused through our many transgressions. Not only do we have all of this — but in addition they coil up and ascend upon our neck, and confuse our minds greatly and twist our hearts greatly with all kinds of foolish hardnesses: against the blessed Name and against the true tzadikim; and they seek to distance us from the point of truth, G‑d forbid. Master of the Universe — have pity and compassion upon us; and do not judge us according to our deeds and do not deal with us according to our sins. Have mercy upon us and rebuke those who pursue us — and distance and drive away from us and from all Your people the House of Israel all kinds of evil thoughts and stirrings and crookedness of heart, and foolish hardnesses and confused philosophic investigations that seek to arise in the heart and to confuse us, G‑d forbid, from Your true service. And may You act through Your mercies — that there arise no more in our hearts any kind of stirring or thought at all of this sort, from the matter of these confusions and muddles. For "I am more brutish than any man, and I have not the understanding of a man" [Proverbs 30:2]. "And I was brutish and did not know — like an animal was I with You" [Psalms 73:22].

Master of the Universe — have pity and compassion upon us and grant us merit to complete faith in truth: that we merit to believe in You and in Your true tzadikim in truth and with a whole heart. And may our hearts not incline to any difficulty or any confusion in the world at all — and may they not arise and not enter our hearts and our minds at all. Rather may we cast away our confused and muddled intellect — and may we lean only upon faith alone. For we are flesh and blood — a clod of earth, shaped from clay [cf. Job 33:6], warmed through sin, soiled through iniquity. And how is it possible for one born of woman — a putrid drop — to grasp and to understand anything of Your ways and Your conduct? And may we merit not to use our intellect except for Your service and Your Torah and Your fear in truth — and may we not begin to investigate through our reasoning any inquiry in the world at all. And may we know and believe in truth and with complete faith that You are righteous and upright — as it is written: "The Rock — His work is perfect, for all His ways are justice; a G‑d of faithfulness and without iniquity, righteous and upright is He" [Deuteronomy 32:4]. And it is said: "To declare that Hashem is upright — my Rock in Whom there is no wrong" [Psalms 92:16]. And may You guard us through Your abundant mercies and save us and our offspring and all Your people the House of Israel — that we not study and not give any attention at all to the books of the investigators [sifrei hamechakrim]: neither the books of investigation of the nations, nor the books of investigation of Israel; and may we not be willing and not listen to them at all; and may we not walk in their ways, and not tread in their paths, and not give heed to their words. And may their words and their misleading investigations and their difficulties and their confusions not enter our ears and our minds at all. For You know how many great evils and how many destructions the investigators have caused us through their inquiries and their errors — for they seek to distance us, G‑d forbid, from Your service in truth. Have pity and compassion upon Your great and holy honor — and act for the sake of Israel Your people, and for the sake of their forefathers Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaakov; and for the sake of Moshe and Aharon, Dovid and Shlomo; and for the sake of the twelve tribes of G‑d; and for the sake of all the holy elders and the true prophets — the earlier and the later ones; and for the sake of all the Tanna'im and Amora'im; and for the sake of all the true tzadikim and worthy people who were in every generation. And have mercy upon the remnant of Your people Israel in this time of distress — the like of which has never been: for in the footsteps of the Mashiach [ikvesa d'Meshicha] they seek, G‑d forbid, to spread the wisdom of philosophy in the world; and they seek to ensnare the souls of Israel with their ways and their reasonings; and they begin to educate small children who do not know their right hand from their left — to educate them in the study of their books and in the languages of the nations; to bring them, G‑d forbid, into their ways and their reasonings. And there is no one who takes it to heart to feel this great trouble within him — the like of which has never been from the days of the world. For this is the very birth-pangs of Mashiach [chevlo shel Mashiach] — and over this great trouble all our true prophets and sages prophesied from of old — as it is written: "And it shall be a time of trouble for Yaakov, the like of which has never been" [Jeremiah 30:7]. And as Daniyal prophesied through his holy spirit — as it is written: "Many shall be refined and purified and tried; and the wicked shall act wickedly — and none of the wicked shall understand; but the wise shall understand" [Daniel 12:10]. Master of the entire universe — You alone know the magnitude of this trouble, which has no equal: darkness and gloom, distress and anguish, with none who stands up for us — for the true tzadikim have been removed through our iniquities. Have pity and compassion upon us — may Your mercies be stirred over Your children; and shield us and guard us and save us and deliver our souls. And save us through Your mercies — us and all our company and all Your people the House of Israel — from all the evil and alien views and reasonings of all the investigators and philosophers: both the investigators of the nations, and the investigators of Israel who have also been caught in this evil net and snare of inquiry and philosophy. And may You clothe Yourself in Your jealousy and gird Yourself in Your might — and may You uproot and break and cast down and nullify their evil thinking from the world. And all the heretics and all the brazen ones and all the apostates and all the freethinkers [apikorsim] — may they perish instantly; and may no reasoning of their reasonings and no view of their views ever be remembered or recalled again. Have pity and compassion upon us; have pity and be gracious to us and save and deliver us and our offspring and all Your people the House of Israel — from all their books and from all their views and all their reasonings. For not in these is the portion of Yaakov; not in these is our portion; not in these is our lot [cf. Jeremiah 10:16] — for we are from the seed of Avraham, Yitzchak and Yisroel Your servants: believers the children of believers [ma'aminim bnai ma'aminim]. And we believe in You, Hashem our G‑d, and in Your true tzadikim — with complete faith in truth, without any investigation at all. For You are righteous and upright; and You conduct all the world with the attribute of lovingkindness and mercy — as it is written: "Hashem is good to all, and His mercies are over all His works" [Psalms 145:9].

Please Hashem — may Your innards churn over us; incline Your ear to my voice when I call to You. And may You be with us to help us — that we merit to always stir and bring forth the hidden intellects through the voice of our cry. And may You have mercy upon us and save us and grant us merit to truly sanctify and purify the seven lamps that go forth from the mind in our heads: which are the mouth, and the two eyes, and the two ears, and the two nostrils. And through this may we merit to draw upon ourselves the light of the face [or hapanim] — which is the divine overflow [shefa Elohi], which is the attainment of the holy encompassing intellects [hashgas hamakifim dikdushah]; and may You pour upon us Your holy spirit [ruach kodshecha]. And may we merit through Your mercies to understand and attain at every time new holy encompassing intellects [makifim chadashim dikdushah]; and may we merit to understand and to comprehend the depths of Your secrets. And help us that we merit at every time to additional holiness — so that we merit at every time to attain new encompassing intellects, to bring them inward into our intellect — to understand and to attain at every time new holy understandings and attainments, of that which we previously had no knowledge to understand or attain. And may we merit to recognize You even in this world — and to attain Your greatness and Your exaltedness as much as it is possible to attain in this world; for this is why we were created: to know and to attain You. And You will in the future hold us to account for this — for one who did not endeavor to truly sanctify himself in this world, until he attain the attainment of Your G‑dliness and knowledge of Your exaltedness — blessed and exalted be Your Name forever. Have pity and compassion please upon us — and help us through Your mercies to ever higher attainments at every time, in holiness and in purity, in truth and with complete faith. The truth I know, Master of the entire universe — for I am so far from this now that I cannot even request and entreat and press You for this; but what shall I do — for my Father in Heaven has decreed? For You Yourself decreed upon us through Your Torah through Your true tzadikim — that we endeavor and exert ourselves always to recognize and to attain and to know You in truth and with a whole heart. Have pity and be gracious to me as a free gift — that we merit to truly sanctify ourselves with additional holiness; and may You pour into our hearts the strength and the fortitude to be strong in our minds — to entreat and to press You for this. For You are our Father and You desire to benefit us with Your true goodness with all kinds of true goodness; and You always look out to reveal to us and to make known to us Your hidden goodness and Your high attainments — and the only obstacle is from our side. Arise to help us and save us — to cry out to You always in truth and with a whole heart; and to purify and sanctify ourselves with all kinds of purifications and holiness; and to multiply prayer and supplications and words of pleasing and appeasing before You always — until we merit at every time to attain and to bring new holy encompassing intellects [makifim chadashim dikdushah] into our mind and intellect. And may You grant us merit to the World to Come — to a world that is entirely good; and there may You grant us merit through Your mercies to be included in You, and to attain all the holy encompassing intellects of the intellect that it was impossible to attain in this world in any way. And may we merit through Your mercies to eternal life — to good and long life from now and forever, to the worlds of eternity and to the eternity of eternities. And may You grant us merit to complete holy knowledge [da'as shalem dikdushah] — and may we merit to know that everything is for our good; and may all good influences flow to us without any lack of anything.

And have mercy upon us through Your abundant mercies — and grant merit to us and to all Your people the House of Israel: that there remain from us a remnant in the land in this world after our passing from the world — for long days and years; that we merit that our offspring and the offspring of our offspring be established forever and for generations until the end of all generations. And may our name and our memory be fulfilled forever through our offspring who shall remain after us. And may You grant us merit to many sons and daughters in holiness and in purity — and may we merit to see sons of our sons; and may there be no barren man or barren woman among us and our offspring. And may You have mercy upon them and pour upon them life and length of days and years — that all who go forth from our loins live long days and years; and may all of them be those who engage in Your Torah for its own sake and who fulfill Your commandments; and may they all be holy and pure from all sin and iniquity; and may they do Your will and engage in Your service in truth all their days forever. In such a way that our children after us continue to draw the radiance of the face [sechel hapanim] in the world after our passing — and may they reveal and publicize Your G‑dliness and Your sovereignty in the world; and may our memory remain for generations and generations forever and ever.

O full of mercy — Who thinks thoughts so that none be cast away from Him [cf. II Samuel 14:14] — may Your mercies churn over us; arise and save us; and deliver us and our offspring and all the offspring of Your people the House of Israel — that all Your people Israel not need to come, neither to chalitzah nor to yibum [levirate marriage]. And may the verse be fulfilled in us: "And may you see sons of your sons — peace upon Israel" [Psalms 128:6]. For You alone know the very essence of the compassion resting upon the soul of one who departs without enduring offspring, G‑d forbid — for the soul goes forth bare and naked and has no power to ascend to its original place; and it cannot return to its Father's house; and it goes wandering and roaming and driven; and it has no rest for the sole of its foot [cf. Genesis 8:9]. Master of the Universe — have mercy upon us through Your abundant mercies and Your mighty lovingkindnesses; and save us and our offspring and all Your people the House of Israel — that not one of them depart from the world without enduring offspring; rather may all of them leave behind living and enduring sons and daughters — who engage in Torah and mitzvos. And may they all bear much fruit — may their shoots lengthen and their boughs spread; "they shall still bring forth fruit in old age — fat and flourishing shall they be" [Psalms 92:15]. And may the boundary of holiness be multiplied through the offspring of Israel — that they multiply greatly in the world; and may there remain from every single one of Israel generations and generations of generations until the end of all generations. And may You grant enduring offspring to all those who are without children — offspring for Your service and Your fear. And all those souls from Your people Israel who have already gone to their world and left no enduring offspring — may You have mercy upon them through Your abundant mercies and repair them through Your mighty lovingkindnesses. And help all Your people the House of Israel in every place they are — that they merit to fulfill the commandment of yibum and chalitzah in its proper completeness in truth, in great holiness and purity; and may they merit to perform in completeness the repair needed for the soul of the departed — in such a way that his soul ascend to the light of the face [or hapanim] and return to its place and to its rest — to walk before G‑d in the light of life. And from now may You have mercy upon us and upon our offspring and upon all Your people the House of Israel — that no one among Israel ever need come to either chalitzah or to yibum.

And may You be filled with mercy upon all those whose heart is broken — who have great suffering of children, G‑d forbid — and help them from now that they merit to raise their sons and daughters to Torah and to the chupah and to good deeds for long days and years — (and in particular etc.). Master of the Universe, full of mercy — You know their bitter and bitter heart, their broken and crushed heart — whose strength of endurance has given out [cf. Psalms 38:18]. See their affliction and their toil; see their tears and hear their groan — and do not hide Your ear from their cry. For who can endure the sound of their weeping and their cry and their groaning — from the magnitude of the troubles that have already passed over them? Master of the entire universe — Who heals the broken-hearted and binds up their sorrows [Psalms 147:3]: heal their brokenness and gladden their souls — and say to their troubles: Enough; and have compassion upon them from now and say to the angel: Withdraw your hand [cf. II Samuel 24:16]. And may You stir Your enormous mercies over them — and send good life and length of days and years to the children already born to them: that they merit to raise them to Torah and to the chupah and to good deeds; and may they live long days and years in this world; and may they merit to see from them sons and grandsons; and may many generations go forth from them. And may they merit to beget yet many more living and enduring sons and daughters — and many generations and generations of generations shall go forth from all of them: may they multiply and grow and flourish until the coming of the Redeemer, until the end of all generations; and may all of them do Your will in truth. And may the verse be fulfilled in them and in their offspring: "The smallest shall become a thousand, and the youngest a mighty nation — I Hashem will hasten it in its time" [Isaiah 60:22]. Master of the Universe — act for Your sake; act for the merit of their holy forefathers; and have compassion upon them from now — that their offspring be established for long days and years. Gladden them like the days of their affliction [cf. Psalms 90:15]; comfort them from their sorrow; prepare their hearts and help them from now — that they merit to always rejoice in the children already born to them, and in those they are yet to beget — may they all live long days and years in Torah and greatness, until Shiloh come [Genesis 49:10]. And grant me merit through Your great mercies and Your abundant lovingkindnesses — to fulfill the commandment of Sukkah as is fitting: in all its particulars and fine details and intentions and the 613 commandments dependent upon it; with joy and gladness of heart and with complete intent as is fitting. And may we merit that through the commandment of dwelling in the Sukkah there be drawn upon us all seven clouds of glory [shiv'ah ananei kavod] that surrounded Israel in the wilderness; and may You spread over us the Sukkah of Your peace [sukkas shlomecha]. And may we merit to attain the attainment of the holy encompassing intellects [hashgas hamakifim dikdushah] — the attainment of the holy spirit [ruach hakodesh] — through the commandment of the Sukkah as is fitting, in holiness and in purity and in joy. And through this may You protect and shield us and save us from all enemies and lurkers and all kinds of foes — which we have in the physical and in the spiritual; and remove the adversary from before us and from behind us; and in the shadow of Your wings may You conceal us [cf. Psalms 17:8]. Master of the Universe — have pity and be gracious to us and hear the voice of our prayer with mercy; and may You pour upon us divine overflow [shefa Elohi] — the overflow of the true intellect, the overflow of the holy encompassing intellects, the overflow of Your holy spirit [shefa ruach kodshecha]. And may the light of the intellect be opened for us — and may the movement of our intellect be hastened to attain with great swiftness the attainment of the holy encompassing intellects; and may we merit to attain the intellect called Kedem [the Primordial — the transcendent flash of insight] — which is the light of the face, until we need use no preliminary step at all. And through the swiftness of the movement of this intellect, may we merit that the flame of our heart always rise up of itself. And help us always that our heart burn with great ardor in truth for Your service and Your fear — with the sparks of the flame of G‑d [rishpei shalheves Kah]; and through the holy ardor of the heart, may we merit to repair all the blemishes we blemished through the ardor of the heart from the sitra achra. And may we merit to speedily repair all the blemish of the heat and the ardor that we had for physical things — for evil desires and evil traits; until we came to great sins and iniquities through the ardor of the heart for the desires of this world. Therefore I have come early to seek Your face, our Lord our G‑d — may Your mercies churn over us; and may You endeavor in our salvation and exert Yourself in the repair of our souls. And help us from now that we have no more any ardor in our hearts for any desire in the world — not even for permissible things; and how much more so may there arise in our hearts no ardor at all, G‑d forbid, for anything that is forbidden to us. And help us and be gracious to us and pour upon us in Your compassion — that we merit that there be for us the holy ardor of the heart [hispa'alus halev dikdushah]: to burn with the flames of love [shalhuvin d'rechimusa] for Your Name and Your service in truth; to pray and to beseech; to study and to teach; and to fulfill all Your commandments with great ardor — in holiness and in purity — as You truly desire in truth. And through this may we merit to repair all the blemish of the ardor of the sitra achra that was in our hearts from our youth until this very day — in such a way that we merit that our hearts be purified in truth. And through this may we merit to set forth our speech before You always — and may we merit to please and appease You and to beseech before You at every time with new and true words, that shall be a delight and an acceptance before Your Throne of Glory. And may we merit to draw near to You with great closeness in truth and with a whole heart — as befits Your treasured people. "Create in me a pure heart, O G‑d — and renew a steadfast spirit within me" [Psalms 51:12]. "Do not cast me away from before You — and Your holy spirit do not take from me" [Psalms 51:13]. And help me that I merit to innovate in Torah true novellae in holiness and in purity — and may I merit to always draw Torah novellae for which I have permission from Heaven to reveal them to Your people the House of Israel — to the treasured people [am segulah]; and may merit roll through me; and may I merit to do good with Your goodness which You have granted me — to all Your people the House of Israel: to reveal the treasure to the treasured people; to reveal to them what You grant me to attain in my intellect — true Torah novellae in holiness and in purity; in such a way that they return in complete teshuvah through my words; and may I not stumble in the utterances of my mouth, and may I not say any word that is not according to Your will. "He raises the poor from the dust — from the ash-heaps He lifts the needy" [Psalms 113:7]. Have pity and be gracious to me — and fill my requests with mercy; and act for Your sake and not for our sake. Act for Your sake and save us. And from before You, our King, may we not be turned away empty — be gracious to us and answer us and hear the voice of our prayer; for You hear prayer and attend to our voice from the depths, where the House of Israel cries out to You from the lands of the far-away — those who sigh and groan. "You may not hide yourself from your impoverished brother" [Deuteronomy 22:4 — adapted] — "you shall surely help him" [ibid.]. Rider of the heavens is our help — and in His majesty the skies [Deuteronomy 33:26]. (And say Psalm 29: 'A Psalm of David — Give unto Hashem, O sons of the mighty' etc. to its end.)