SecularPrayer(.net)

a Jewish Prayer ~ based on the Dalai Lama’s Morning Prayer

I read online today a short posting about the Dalai Lama's morning prayer ~ you can see it here: .../his-holiness-the-dalai-lamas-morning-prayer/

The Dalai Lama's prayer combines well, I think, with the traditional Jewish prayer on awakening: the Modeh Ani (which, of course, is based on belief in God. You can read about that traditional prayer here ~ .../modeh-ani...).

I like the way that Dr Herbert Levine begins his non-theistic version of the Modeh Ani. In his prayerbook Blessed Are You, Wondrous Universe, Dr Levine suggests this new version of the traditional prayer:

אודה לך עולם חי וקיים

which he translates this way: I give thanks to you, living and enduring universe

With gratitude to two teachers (the Dalai Lama and Dr Herbert Levine), here is a newly traditional morning blessing for beginning the new day:

אודה לך עולם חי וקיים. בכל יום המחשבה הזו: היום אני יורש החיים; יש לי חיים אנושיים יקרים, והזדמנויות לפתח את עצמי, להרחיב את ליבי לאחרים. יש לי היום אפשרויות להועיל לאחרים ככל שאוכל.

I give thanks to you, living and continuing world. With every day this thought: Today I am an inheritor of life; I have a precious human life, and opportunities to develop myself, to expand my heart out to others. I have possibilities today to benefit others as much as I can.

About Me ~

I grew up in a traditionally religious world of New York in the 1950s and 1960s.

I was not planning to enter seminary, but I wanted to get a more contemporary understanding of religious traditions, so I studied at the Jewish Theological Seminary (JTS) for a number of years in the early 1980s ~ these were the days before JTS was ordaining women, but when we were being admitted into the graduate school, to study alongside men. (If I recall correctly, if we completed the full rabbinic curriculum, we were offered to graduate with a Doctor of Hebrew Letters degree.)

 I taught religious studies for a number of years, and also went for chaplaincy training; after a few years of   volunteering as an interfaith chaplain in a nursing home, I decided to complete rabbinic training.