Note 139 — II. OUR DUTIES. (continued 3)

(4.) It is further asserted that the Ritual was formulated in bygone times; our wants and tastes are different from those of former ages. We can neither pray for the same things nor in the same way as our ancestors. But what did our ancestors pray for? For the well-being of their body and of their soul; for the realisation of our national hopes and the ultimate triumph of our holy Religion. Just the same ends we wish to obtain at present, and these objects form the substance of our Ritual.—There are some petitions which seem to many out of place, and out of date. Such are petitions against cruel oppressors. Our fathers had good reason to cry to the Almighty for relief, for they were oppressed, whilst we, living in a free country, in the enjoyment of all the rights of citizens, have no cause whatever for complaint. If we were to separate ourselves from our brethren in distant countries, we could expunge all such petitions from the Ritual. This is, however, not the case; we feel deeply grieved at the sufferings of our brethren. We should like to see them relieved from oppression and persecution, and pray to God for His interference in behalf of the persecuted. When we use the term “revenge” (‏נקם‎) we do not associate with it any base desire to see the enemy crushed or annihilated; we use it rather in the sense of a just and merited penalty for evil-doers, and associate with it the idea of the ultimate victory and triumph of our holy Religion after long periods of oppression and persecution. It is their Faith for which our fathers suffered, and our brethren in some countries still suffer, and the triumph of which forms the centre of these petitions. Intense grief and sorrow sometimes suggested harsh expressions, such as “Destroy our enemies,” “Put an end to them,” but these are figurative expressions, and are used in the sense explained by Beruria, the wife of Rabbi Meir: “May the sinners cease from sinning, and sinners will be no more.” Similarly we pray in the Amidah: “Let our slanderers have no hope of success, so that evil-doers may soon vanish and disappear; break the power of the presumptuous, and humble them.” In these words we give expression to our feeling of indignation against the slanderers of our holy Religion, the revilers of Judaism, such, e.g., as from time to time renew the blood-accusations, or by false and deceptive arguments or other means entice Jews to abandon their faith.139