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We feel the uncertainty. We feel the pain. And we are not helpless. God, we pray for peace: For wholeness and healing, For safety when violence touches us all. God, we pray for peace: For justice and compassion, For acceptance in the face of hatred.
- Biblical Usages
- Rabbinic Morality
- Rating The Value of Peace
- The Obligations of Peace: A Special Category
- God as Peacemaker
In the Bible, the word shalom is most commonly used to refer to a state of affairs, one of well-being, tranquility, prosperity, and security, circumstances unblemished by any sort of defect. Shalomis a blessing, a manifestation of divine grace. In inquiring about the peace of one’s fellow, one inquires as to whether things fare well with him. (In a...
In the rabbinic texts, shalom primarily signifies a value, an ethical category — it denotes the overcoming of strife, quarrel, and social tension, the prevention of enmity and war. It is still, to be sure, depicted as a blessing, a manifestation of divine grace, but in a great many sayings it appears in a normative context: The pursuit of peace is ...
Nevertheless, alongside this sort of expression the Sages discuss the question of the relationship between peace and other competing values, of situations in which different norms might conflict with one another. For instance, peace was opposed to justice: Rabbi Joshua ben Korha taught that “where there is strict justice there is no peace, and wher...
Drawing upon a fine distinction between the terms used in several scriptural expressions, one rabbinic saying proposed an interesting differentiation between two types of obligation. The first type is that which arises from a given situation, that is, man’s obligation to respond in a particular way to a given set of circumstances. The second type, ...
Finally, several sayings concerning the power of peace go beyond the social-ethical realm to enter the domain of the cosmic: The Holy One makes peace between the supernal and the lower worlds, among the denizens of the supernal world, between the sun and the moon, and so on (Leviticus Rabah, loc. cit.; Deuteronomy Rabah 5:12; and see Job 25:2). Mos...
Jun 5, 2014 · St. John Paul launched the interreligious prayer for peace gatherings in Assisi in 1986. He asked Catholic, Orthodox, Muslim and Jewish leaders in particular to join him in Assisi in for a...
May 1, 2021 · Oseh shalom bimromav, hu ya’aseh shalom aleinu, v’al kol yisrael, *v’al kol yosh’vei tevel. May the one who makes peace in the high heavens, make peace upon us, for all of Israel, and for *all who inhabit the earth. One of the ways we express our core values as a Jewish People is through prayer.
Hindu Prayers for Peace. Oh God, lead us from the unreal to the Real. Oh God, lead us from darkness to light. Oh God, lead us from death to immortality. Shanti, Shanti, Shanti unto all. Oh Lord God almighty, may there be peace in celestial regions. May there be peace on earth.
Perhaps nothing exhibits the importance of peace more than the fact that almost every major Jewish prayer — the Amidah, Kaddish, Priestly Blessing, Grace After Meals — concludes with an appeal for peace. And yet, Judaism is hardly pacifistic. There are clearly times when Judaism permits and even requires war.
This prayer for peace, a prayer for a better world, is remarkably hopeful, an attempt to look for a future that seems difficult to reach at best, impossible to imagine at worst: a future of complete peace in the Middle East for all nations and all peoples.
