ס

Hashem — I heard Your report and I was afraid; Hashem — Your work: in the midst of the years revive it; in the midst of the years make it known; in wrath may You remember mercy [Habakkuk 3:2]. Fear and trembling have come upon me and horror has covered me [Psalms 55:6]. My flesh bristled from dread of You and from Your judgments I was in fear [Psalms 119:120]. Who shall not fear You, O King of the nations — for to You it is fitting; for among all the wise of the nations and in all their kingdoms there is none like You [Jeremiah 10:7]. G‑d is revered in the council of the holy ones and awesome above all who surround Him [Psalms 89:8]. Therefore from before Him I am frightened — I contemplate and I am terrified of Him.

Master of the Universe — great and awesome G‑d; You are holy and Your Name is awesome; Whose reverence and dread is upon all the supreme heavenly beings [shina'nei shachak] and upon all the Serafim and the Ofanim and the holy Chayos; and upon all the upper and lower worlds and upon all the dwellers above and the dwellers below — all of them tremble and are in dread from the dread of Your Name. Have compassion and pity upon me with Your great compassion — and pour and draw upon me Your holy reverence; that I merit to fear and to be in dread and to tremble before You always in truth; in fear and trembling shall we crown You over us. And may we merit to feel Your holy reverence in all our 248 limbs and 365 sinews — and may Your reverence be upon our faces so that we not sin at all — neither inadvertently nor deliberately from now and forever. And the reverence of Hashem shall hover over us always in truth and in complete faith — until we merit through the reverence of Hashem to lengthen and to magnify our days; to add at every time and every moment additional extra holiness. And may all our days be expanded and lengthened and magnified each time more and more with additional holiness at every time and every moment — until we merit to true length of days and years; in holiness in truth as Your good will desires. And may we not consume our days in vanity, G‑d forbid — rather may we merit to guard all our days and hours and times and moments to add each time much additional holiness through the reverence of Hashem. And may the verse be fulfilled in us: The reverence of Hashem shall add days [Proverbs 10:27]. And have compassion upon us and see our affliction and our distress — and in the straits broaden for us. For You know the immensity of the multitude of our troubles and our distress and our poverty and our toil that we have every single day from its very beginning — for it is very, very difficult for us; and we cannot begin any service at all: neither Torah nor prayer nor charity nor any holy deed. And each day our evil inclination overpowers us, G‑d forbid — and makes the yoke of Your service very heavy upon us without measure and reckoning; and presses us forcefully; and confounds our mind and wearies and torments our soul and spirit and neshamah; and closes and locks all the gates and paths of holiness from before us; and wants to bind us, G‑d forbid, in the chains of poverty and iron [cf. Psalms 107:10]. And humbled our heart with toil — until we stumbled and there is no helper.

And may You heal us from all our afflictions and from all our ailments and may complete healing be elevated for all our wounds (and in particular for so-and-so the son of so-and-so).

Full of mercy — Master of all: You alone know the distresses of our heart, for it is evil and bitter — for it has reached the soul. You know all the trouble that has befallen us. Look please upon our affliction and plead our cause; have compassion and mercy and pity please upon us. Turn toward us with mercy for You are the Master of mercy — and give us strength and power every single day and every single moment and every single hour and every single time; that we merit always to repel and drive out and nullify our evil inclination from within us; and to accept upon ourselves the yoke of the Kingdom of Heaven with love in truth at every time and every moment. And to lengthen our days and our years through the true reverence of Hashem — to add holiness and purity every hour and every day and every week and every month and every year; until we merit to true length of days and years; to good old age and hoary head of holiness. And may we not lose even one day or one hour from all our days forever. In such a manner that when You gather us to You in peace — we merit to come and to ascend and to appear before You with all our days and years; that they all be complete, holy and pure with additional holiness upon holiness; and may we never be shamed or disgraced forever.

And therefore grant me merit through Your abundant mercies — and guard me and save me always from false grace [chein shel sheker] and from the vanity of beauty; and may I not covet and not desire in my heart the vanity of women's beauty; and may I not gaze at them; and may I not stray after my heart and after my eyes at all — as it is written: Do not covet her beauty in your heart — for through a wanton woman one comes to a loaf of bread [Proverbs 6:25–26].

Please Hashem — have compassion and pity upon us as a gratuitous gift and a generous act of lovingkindness; have compassion upon us through Your abundant mercies and Your great mercies — and do not deal with us according to our sins and do not judge us according to our deeds. Grant us merit to turn from evil; deliver us from such evil; grant us merit from now to truly sit and not do. Have compassion upon our holy soul and rescue it from the pit; deliver me from mud and may I not sink — may I be rescued from my enemies and from the deep waters [cf. Psalms 69:15]. Let not the flood waters wash over me and let not the depths swallow me and let not the pit close its mouth over me [Psalms 69:16]. For what profit is there in my blood in my going down to the pit — will the dust acknowledge You? Will it tell Your truth? [Psalms 30:10]. For I know not at all how to guard and watch myself from what I must be on guard against — except that upon You alone I cast my burden. Behold I am before You full of shame and disgrace — do with me what You shall do in Your abundant mercies and Your great lovingkindnesses; and return me in complete repentance before You in truth. And save me from the blemish of the covenant — and may no evil thought whatsoever come upon me and no evil reflection at all; and may You sanctify me with Your supernal holiness always. And may You guard me and save me always from false grace and the vanity of beauty — and may You grant me merit that I conduct no false grace myself; neither in sitting nor in standing nor in walking; nor in my eating nor in my speech with people; nor in any other movement or dealing with people: in which people are very much caught in these false graces and conduct a unique grace for each and every movement. Please Hashem — have mercy upon me and guard me and save me from all these kinds of false grace; that I not be caught in them at all in any movement or any dealing; rather may all my deeds be for the sake of Heaven without any ulterior motive to show off or to find grace in the eyes of people, G‑d forbid; and may all my intention in all my movements and dealings be only for Your Name alone — for Hashem alone. And may I draw upon myself complete fear always from before You in truth — and may the reverence of Heaven be upon me like the reverence of flesh and blood; until I merit through the reverence to lengthen and expand and magnify my days and years in Your supernal holiness. And may we merit to illuminate and draw upon us and upon all Israel illumination and great holiness from the Tikkun of Atik [tikkunei Atik] — which is drawn and flows through the true aged holy tzadikim; and through this may we merit to great holy wealth [ashirus dikdushah]. And may You guard us and save us from the desire for immorality always — and may You help us that we merit to have compassion upon ourselves to guard the vital fluids and oils in our body that they rise to the brain to complete and magnify our holy mind; and may they not flow outward, G‑d forbid, through excessive intimacy [ribuy mishgal]. And may You save us from the spirit of foolishness and madness that comes through the desire of immorality, G‑d forbid — through which the vital fluids and oils of the body dry up, G‑d forbid; from which comes all madness in the world. Have compassion upon us and save us from this — and may we have compassion upon our body and soul and spirit and neshamah; and may we merit to greatly guard the oils in our body. And may You save us from shortness of breath and interruption of breathing — and may You grant us merit to length of breath; that we merit to draw to ourselves always the spirit of holy life at every time and every hour and every moment. And may You guard our mind always — and may we merit to draw always at every time holy oils to our mind; until our mind burns with great holy contemplation; and may our brain and our mind go and grow in great holiness in truth. And may You grant us merit to great holy wealth drawn from the chips of the Tablets [pesolet haluchos] — from which Moshe grew wealthy; until we merit through this to the very great, exalted and awe-inspiring holy supernal contemplation — which is drawn through great holy wealth.

And may we merit to reverence in completeness in all its aspects and its parts and its fine details. And may the three lines of reverence [sheloshah kavei hayir'ah] be drawn upon us — which are comprised of three times three: which are the reverence of Heaven [mora shamayim], the reverence of the rabbi [mora harav], and the reverence of father and mother [mora av va'aim] — in all their parts and aspects. And may You give Your dread, Hashem our G‑d, upon all Your works and Your awe upon all that You have created; and may all Your works fear You and all creatures bow before You; and may they all become one union to do Your will with a complete heart.

And therefore have compassion upon us through Your abundant mercies and great and immense lovingkindnesses — and stir us from our sleep; for through our many iniquities sleep has greatly overpowered us; until these many days and years the true tzadikim have been occupied with stirring us and awakening us from our sleep and our deep slumber. And in many ways and manners and through many causes and great and immense toils and efforts they labored and toiled for our sake — and condensed His G‑dliness, blessed be He, for our sake; and they illuminated for us the face of the holy Torah; and dressed us in the face of the holy Torah in many and many ways — in Torah discourses and in story-tales of ancient times; as all that we have seen in their holy books and heard from their holy mouths: words that are very high and immense and awesome beyond all end; words that stand at the height of the height of the world; words drawn from You in truth; words that have the power to stir and awaken all the people of the entire world from their great sleep — great and small alike; and we have still not stirred and have not repented from our error. And now what right do we have to cry further to the King? What was not done for us — that was not done for us through Your holy and awesome tzadikim and sages who were in every generation from the day of the giving of our holy Torah until this very day; all of them as one stirring and awakening us with great stirring — and no one takes it to heart. And I — poor and suffering and dying: I have no escape or rescue except that I cry out and shout. My voice to Hashem — I cry; and He answers me from His holy mountain forever [Psalms 3:5]. I lay down and slept; I awoke — for Hashem supports me [Psalms 3:6].

Please Hashem — before Whom there is no sleep or slumber; as it is written: Behold — the Guardian of Israel neither slumbers nor sleeps [Psalms 121:4]. And You stir those who are asleep and awaken those who slumber — You revive the dead and heal the sick; You open the eyes of the blind and raise up those who are bowed down; You give speech to the mute and release those who are bound. Please through Your abundant mercies — stir me, please; awaken me, please; raise me up, please; through Your abundant mercies. Turn toward me and be gracious to me — for solitary and poor am I [Psalms 25:16]. The distresses of my heart have enlarged — from my straits bring me out [Psalms 25:17]. See my affliction and my toil and forgive all my sins [Psalms 25:18]. See my enemies for they are many and with violent hatred they hate me [Psalms 25:19]. Guard my soul and rescue me — may I not be ashamed for I have taken refuge in You [Psalms 25:20]. Help me and be gracious to me from now that I merit to be stirred from my great sleep — which has overpowered me through my evil deeds and also through the desire of eating and drinking. Help me to be stirred with great stirring and to return to You in truth absolutely with great diligence. And may You save me from now from all kinds of sins and iniquities and transgressions — and be with me always; and guard me and save me from the blemish of the desire of eating and drinking; and may I merit that my eating always be in great holiness and purity without any physical desire at all. And may my eating and drinking always be from food that has been clarified for human consumption — and may You shield me and guard me and save me that no food or drink that has not yet been clarified for human consumption come into my mouth; which can destroy, G‑d forbid, the holy countenance through these foods; and cause one to fall into sleep, G‑d forbid. Rather may I merit to eat in great holiness clarified foods — foods that are in the holiness of the Showbread [lechem hapanim]; through which I merit to a good heart, a joyful heart and a holy countenance; and may You save me from foods that bring evil to the heart.

Master of the Universe — save me from evil of the heart; save me from crookedness in the heart; grant me merit to goodness of heart in truth; do with me a gratuitous act of lovingkindness; and command through Your great lovingkindnesses to speedily return and restore to me all the lost things that I have lost until now. And may You draw upon me the holy countenance drawn from ancient times — from the adornment of the face [hadras panim]; where all the seventy faces of the Torah are rooted. According to Your lovingkindness revive me and I shall keep the testimony of Your mouth [Psalms 119:88]. Gracious and compassionate Hashem — slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness. To You my heart said: seek My face; Your face, Hashem, shall I seek; do not hide Your face from me, do not turn in anger Your servant away — You have been my help; do not abandon me and do not forsake me, G‑d of my salvation [Psalms 27:8–9]. Illuminate Your face upon Your servant — save me in Your lovingkindness [Psalms 31:17]. Make Your face shine upon Your servant — and teach me Your statutes [Psalms 119:135]. Turn to me and be gracious to me — give Your strength to Your servant; and save the son of Your handmaid [Psalms 86:16]. Hashem G‑d of Hosts — restore us; illuminate Your face and we shall be saved [Psalms 80:4]. Awake my honor — awake the lute and the harp; I shall awaken the dawn [Psalms 57:9].

And have compassion upon me and save me and grant me merit that I merit to be among the fitting and worthy students — that I merit to hear and to well remember the voice of the words of the true tzadikim; all that they did and accomplished for our sake; all the holy words that we merited to hear from their mouths and from the writing of their pen; all the great and awesome things; all the great work of Hashem that they did for our sake; who left after them a blessing — their holy books: more desirable than gold and great fine gold and sweeter than honey and dripping combs. Illuminating the eyes and reviving the soul from paths of death to paths of life. And may I merit that their words enter my ears and my heart — and may I well hear their holy words and not forget any part of my teaching.

Please — have compassion upon my very wretched and very abused soul; and have pity upon me with Your great compassion; and give me hope that I not be lost; and give me a good end. And have compassion upon me from now that I merit from today to remind myself of all the words of Hashem that we heard from our holy teachers, may their memory be for a blessing; in such a manner that I merit to truly be stirred from my great sleep. For I am walking wandering and errant like a sheep without a shepherd [cf. Numbers 27:17]; like a mast on the top of a mountain and like a ship in the heart of the sea [cf. Isaiah 30:17]. I am wakeful and I have become like a solitary bird upon a roof [Psalms 102:8]. Please — awake! stir, please; rouse yourself, please; awaken now! Stand now, arise now; entreat the face of G‑d with the best meditation. My soul, my soul — prostrate yourself to the dust and bow to Him; and put your mouth to the dust. And you shall speak from the ground and your utterance shall whisper from the dust [Isaiah 29:4]. Perhaps there is hope. Perhaps the Hashem of Hosts shall be gracious [cf. Amos 5:15]. Perhaps Hashem shall act — according to all His wonders that He performed with our fathers. What ails you that you sleep — arise and call to your G‑d; perhaps G‑d shall take thought for us and we shall not be lost [Jonah 1:6] — perhaps He shall have pity on a poor and destitute people, perhaps He shall have mercy. Awake, my brother, from the sleep of your foolishness; awaken and arouse! How long will you sleep, O sluggard — when will you arise from your sleep? [Proverbs 6:9]. A little more sleep, a little more slumber, a little more folding of the hands to lie down [Proverbs 6:10]. Give no sleep to your eyes and no slumber to your eyelids [Proverbs 6:4]. Be rescued like a deer from a hand and like a bird from a fowler’s snare [Proverbs 6:5]. Remember — do not forget how many days and years you angered Hashem your G‑d; yet even so the lovingkindnesses of Hashem toward you have not ceased; and at every time He occupies Himself to stir you and awaken you from your sleep through His abundant lovingkindnesses. Remember how many times they stir and awaken you in so many kinds of stirring without measure or account or number — which would be incredible to recount; that it should be possible to sleep from the sound of the crying out and the stirring and the proclamations and hints and glimmerings such as these: openly and covertly; the herald crying out with great power, a great voice that did not cease [cf. Deuteronomy 5:19]; and the sound of the great shofar going and strengthening in its sound every day and every time and every hour. Behold He gives forth His voice with power and says: Awake you sleepers from your slumber and you who are in deep sleep rouse from your drowsiness! And you have still not returned from your error; you are still rolling about in the middle of the road; in the midst of murky mud and mire; in the midst of the depths of foolish vanities — will you yet not return? You are still wrapping yourself in yourself so as not to set yourself free; that you return to do the will of your Fashioner and your Creator — which is all the longing and desire and strong and immense yearning of your soul.

And do not say, G‑d forbid, words of despair — saying: my iniquities are with me; and in them you will waste away, G‑d forbid; and it is no longer possible for you to repent from your foolishness and stupidities; for your iniquities have passed over your head; until G‑d forbid your everlastingness and your hope has been lost. Ahah — Ahah! Have compassion and pity upon yourself and upon your few determined days that you still have to tarry a little in this world that passes like the blink of an eye. And do not say such things, G‑d forbid — for this is worse than the first; for thoughts and reflections and confusions such as these are harsh and harmful; and anger your Creator more than all the sins and iniquities and transgressions that you have done from your beginning until this very day. For I still have great hope at every time and every hour and every moment: the lovingkindnesses of Hashem have not ceased for they have not been exhausted — His mercies are forever [Lamentations 3:22]. And hidden from you and unknown to you is the immensity of the multitude of His mercy and His great lovingkindnesses upon all who desire to return in truth — even though they have not yet repented. And His entire salvation and His entire desire, blessed be He, is to return and to have compassion upon all who wait and anticipate and long and burrow in the tunnel to find rescue and escape to return to the Blessed Name — even though they are overpowered at every time more and more; and days and many years do not allow them to return to their Father’s house. Even so — His lovingkindness has overpowered and overpowers them and us very greatly, beyond all measure and account and number; what the mouth cannot speak and the heart cannot think. If all the seas were ink and all the lakes quills and all the people scribes and praising tongues — they would not suffice to set forth and explain even one in a thousand and ten thousand of His abundant lovingkindnesses; which He deals with in His lovingkindness in every generation. And in particular upon those who groan and are crushed and wait and anticipate to return to Him, blessed be He, in truth — have you not already now called to Him: my Father, you are the companion of my youth [cf. Jeremiah 3:4]? Will He quarrel forever — will He be watchful to the end? [Jeremiah 3:5]. Be strong and strengthen yourself and renew yourself at every time — and begin from now to serve your Creator in truth; abandon your evil ways and your shameful thoughts; forget your vanities and foolishnesses; remove anger from your heart and put away evil from your flesh [cf. Koheles 11:10]; bind yourself in truth to the Blessed Name; and do not return again to foolishness. Lift your eyes upward and remember your ancient love. Awake, awake — arise my soul; awaken, awaken! Speak a song; be not silent and be not still. Raise your voice sweetly and open your mouth and bring forth your pleasant words before the Holy Blessed One — open your mouth and may your words illuminate.

And therefore grant me merit through Your abundant mercies — that I merit through the stirring from sleep to strong holy speech; that I merit through Your mercies to speak holy words always with great power and with true self-sacrifice [mesiras nefesh] and a complete heart; and may I merit to put all my strength into the words of prayer and into all holy speech. And may the verse be fulfilled: Bless Hashem — His angels, mighty of power, who do His word, hearkening to the voice of His word [Psalms 103:20]. And may You grant us merit to great holy trust [bitachon dikdushah] — for You know the immensity of the lack of livelihood at this time; for money has run out and the small coin has been exhausted from the purse; and the needs of Your people are very many; for even the necessities alone are also very many: needs of food and drink and clothing and dwellings and other essential requirements. And we know not what to do — for our eyes are upon You; for we do not know at all from where to seek our livelihood; and we have no hope or trust except upon You alone — upon You alone our eyes are raised. Therefore we have come to ask of You — full of mercy; that You be gracious to us through Your great lovingkindnesses; and pour upon us the attribute of trust [midas habitachon] in completeness: that we merit to trust in You in truth and complete faith with strong and firm trust; that You shall fill all our needs; and that You shall give us our livelihood in completeness. And You through Your mercies shall be filled with compassion upon us at every time — and shall give us all our needs and all the needs of our household with great expansiveness; and may You provide us our livelihood before we need it: in the permitted and not the forbidden; with honor and not with disgrace; with ease and not with constraint; from beneath Your wide and full hand; in such a manner that we merit to do Your will all the days of our life forever. And may we merit that our words be in great holiness — until we have the power to visit barren women through our words [lifkod akoros b'diburenu]; and may the vessels of speech be adjacent to the vessels of birth [klei hadibbur s'mukhim l'klei haveladah]. And may we merit to bring forth through our words in holiness holy births — and may Your people Israel multiply like the sand that is on the shore of the sea and like the stars of heaven in multitude; and may there be among us no barren man or barren woman [Deuteronomy 7:14]; and may You visit all those who are without children with an enduring offspring for Your service and Your reverence. And through this may full reverence be revealed — great reverence in the world; and may You pour Your reverence and Your dread upon all who come into the world; and may every created being know that You created it and every formed being understand that You formed it. And may we merit to all the portions of reverence in completeness — and through the reverence may we merit to humble and shatter and nullify false grace and the vanity of beauty; as it is written: False is grace and vain is beauty — a woman who fears Hashem is she who shall be praised [Proverbs 31:30]. And may we merit to lengthen our days and years in great holiness — to add holiness and purity at every time; so that we not toil in vain and not give birth to futility [Isaiah 65:23]. And may we merit to the repair of all the worlds anew — and to draw upon us always the illumination of the Tikkun Atik drawn through the true elderly holy tzadikim. And in their merit may we merit to flow and great holy wealth [ashirus dikdushah] — all the wealth of the world; in such a manner that we merit through this wealth to very great and supernal contemplation in Your Torah and Your service; and in the attainment of Your G‑dliness in great holiness and purity — in truth and complete faith as Your good will desires in truth from now and forever. May G‑d be gracious to us and bless us — may He illuminate His face with us forever [Psalms 67:2]. Awesome is G‑d from His sanctuaries — the G‑d of Israel, He gives strength and power to the people; blessed is G‑d [Psalms 68:36]. Those who fear Hashem — praise Him; all the seed of Yaakov — honor Him; and be in dread of Him all the seed of Israel. For He has not despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted — and He has not hidden His face from him; and when he cried to Him He heard [Psalms 22:24–25]. May G‑d bless us and may all the ends of the earth fear Him [Psalms 67:8]. The beginning of wisdom is the reverence of Hashem — good understanding to all who practice it; His praise endures forever [Psalms 111:10]. Blessed is Hashem G‑d the G‑d of Israel — Who alone does wondrous things. And blessed be His glorious Name forever; and may His glory fill all the earth — Amen and Amen [Psalms 72:18–19].