אֱלֹהֵֽינוּ וֵאלֹהֵי אֲבוֹתֵֽינוּ Our God and God of our fathers. Our ancestors were the first to believe that God is One, and that He can be addressed in prayer: not prayer as ritual and rite, but prayer as a conversation between I and Thou. When we pray, we continue this tradition, guided by their precedent, empowered by the knowledge of the love God had for them. אֱלֹהֵי אַבְרָהָם, אֱלֹהֵי יִצְחָק, וֵאלֹהֵי יַעֲקֹב God of Abraham, God of Isaac and God of Jacob. Though there is only one God, we do not say, “God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.” Instead we emphasize the fact that each of the fathers served God in their own way; Abraham teaching us to pioneer, Isaac to fear and revere, Jacob to persevere.

מָגֵן אַבְרָהָם Shield of Abraham. This, the opening paragraph of prayer, implicitly asks the ultimate question of prayer: by what right do we stand before the Author of the universe, Creator of all, and ask Him to listen to us? The answer lies in the fact that, beginning with Abraham, our ancestors listened to God. It was Abraham who, in response to God’s call, left his land, birthplace and father’s house to travel to an unknown destination, there to become God’s covenantal partner, His witness and ambassador to the world. In the merit of Abraham’s listening to God, we ask God to listen to us. זָכְרֵֽנוּ לְחַיִּים Remember us for life. The first of four additions made in the opening and closing paragraphs of prayer during the Ten Days that begin on Rosh HaShana and end on Yom Kippur. There was an initial resistance to the inclusion of these prayers since they are requests, bakashot, and we do not usually include requests in the opening and closing paragraphs of the Amida which are dedicated to praise, shevaḥ, and thanks, hoda’a. Eventually they were admitted on the grounds that the requests are not personal (“Remember me”) but collective (“Remember us”). When praising and thanking God we may not ask for our individual needs but we may speak on behalf of the Jewish people, and humanity, as a whole. This particular prayer with its fourfold repetition of the word “life,” reminds of the centrality in Judaism of this life, this world; of finding God in the here-and-now of existence, not just in the World to Come. In many other religions, God is primarily to be found elsewhere: in heaven, life after death, the world of the soul and of eternity. Judaism, while believing in life after death, focuses relentlessly and gloriously on the presence of God here-where-we-are. Faith in God is faith in life. “Choose life” said Moses (Deut. 30:19). “Can the dead praise You, can they proclaim Your truth?” asked David in Psalms (30:10). God is the God of life, and it is in life itself that we find God. We may be dust of the earth, but within us is the breath of God. To be a Jew is to take hold of life and say a blessing over it. Judaism is a supremely life-affirming faith.

אַתָּה גִּבּוֹר *You are eternally mighty.*The second paragraph of the Amida is known as Gevurot, a blessing praising God’s power and might. The specific structure of the prayer goes back to an ancient controversy between the sages and the Sadducees in Second Temple times, about belief in the resurrection of the dead. The sages held this to be a fundamental of Jewish faith, and signaled its centrality by including five references to it in this one paragraph alone. How it will be, we do not know, but that it will be, this we believe: that death is not the end. Loss is not final. Those who died will one day live again.

מִי כָמֽוֹךָ אַב הָרַחֲמִים Who is like You, compassionate Father? This, the second of the special prayers for life, echoes two phrases in the blessing itself: “Who is like You” and “compassion,” thus weaving the request into the text and context of the Amida.

וּבְכֵן תֵּן פַּחְדְּךָ ...עַל כָּל מַעֲשֶֽׂיךָ And so place the fear of You…over all that You have made. Note the universality of this prayer that speaks not just of the Jewish people but of all You have made, all You have created, all who were made, all of creation. “On the High Festivals the Jew thinks not only of himself, but of peace and blessedness for all mankind,” praying for the time “when the mighty shall be just and the just mighty; when all the children of men shall form one band of brotherhood; when national arrogance and oppression shall have passed away, like so much smoke from the earth” (J.H. Hertz). The three pilgrimage festivals – Pesaḥ, Shavuot and Sukkot – are about God as He has shaped the history of our people. They represent particularity: God and His relationship to the children of Israel. But on the Days of Awe we speak of God the Creator, Sovereign of the universe, the God who made all humankind – hence the universalism of this paragraph. All humanity, not just the Jewish people, is judged on these days, for our God is the God of everyone and everywhere, the God of humanity as such.

מְלֹךְ עַל כָּל הָעוֹלָם *Rule over all the world.*This prayer is specific to the Days of Awe because of their emphasis on kingship and creation. It mirrors the universality of these days, in which we think not only of God’s relationship to the Jewish people but also to humanity as a whole.

עֹשֶׂה הַשָּׁלוֹם Who makes peace. This ending, used by Ashkenazim only on the Days of Awe, was originally said by the Jews of Eretz Yisrael every day. In general on Rosh HaShana and Yom Kippur, the influence of the land of Israel’s texts and customs is more pronounced than those of Babylonian Jewry because the great liturgical poets, Yannai and HaKalir, lived and worked in Israel.