Draft. This siddur is waiting for a rav's review. For a halachic question, ask your rav.
Hebrew, then English. Open "What it means" under any line for the explanation.
Said near the end of the morning service, before Aleinu:
קַוֵּה אֶל יְיָ חֲזַק וְיַאֲמֵץ לִבֶּךָ וְקַוֵּה אֶל יְיָ.
Hope in Hashem be strong and He will make your heart bold and hope in Hashem
אֵין קָדוֹשׁ כַּייָ כִּי אֵין בִּלְתֶּךָ וְאֵין צוּר כֵּאלֹהֵינוּ.
There is no one holy like Hashem for there is no one besides You and there is no rock like our God
No one is holy like Hashem, for there is no one besides You, and there is no rock like our God.
כִּי מִי אֱלוֹהַּ מִבַּלְעֲדֵי יְיָ וּמִי צוּר זוּלָתִי אֱלֹהֵינוּ.
For who is a god besides Hashem and who is a rock other than our God
This is Tehillim 18:32. The same song is also in Shmuel II 22. There the verse reads "El" instead of "Eloah" and uses a different word for "besides."
Tehillim 18:32; Shmuel II 22:32Now one pattern, said five ways. It uses four names for God: our God, our Master, our King, our Rescuer:
אֵין כֵּאלֹהֵינוּ. אֵין כַּאדוֹנֵנוּ. אֵין כְּמַלְכֵּנוּ. אֵין כְּמוֹשִׁיעֵנוּ.
There is none like our God There is none like our Master There is none like our King There is none like our Rescuer
מִי כֵאלֹהֵינוּ. מִי כַאדוֹנֵנוּ. מִי כְמַלְכֵּנוּ. מִי כְמוֹשִׁיעֵנוּ.
Who is like our God? Who is like our Master? Who is like our King? Who is like our Rescuer?
נוֹדֶה לֵאלֹהֵינוּ. נוֹדֶה לַאדוֹנֵנוּ. נוֹדֶה לְמַלְכֵּנוּ. נוֹדֶה לְמוֹשִׁיעֵנוּ.
We thank our God We thank our Master We thank our King We thank our Rescuer
בָּרוּךְ אֱלֹהֵינוּ. בָּרוּךְ אֲדוֹנֵנוּ. בָּרוּךְ מַלְכֵּנוּ. בָּרוּךְ מוֹשִׁיעֵנוּ.
Blessed is our God Blessed is our Master Blessed is our King Blessed is our Rescuer
אַתָּה הוּא אֱלֹהֵינוּ. אַתָּה הוּא אֲדוֹנֵנוּ. אַתָּה הוּא מַלְכֵּנוּ. אַתָּה הוּא מוֹשִׁיעֵנוּ.
You are our God You are our Master You are our King You are our Rescuer
אַתָּה תוֹשִׁיעֵנוּ.
You will rescue us
אַתָּה תָקוּם תְּרַחֵם צִיוֹן כִּי עֵת לְחֶנְנָה כִּי בָא מוֹעֵד.
You will rise up and have mercy on Zion for it is time to be gracious to her for the appointed time has come
This is Tehillim 102:14. The line before it, "You will rescue us," is not in that verse. Radak (Rabbi David Kimchi, Provence, around 1200) explains "You will rise up" with a picture: like a person who gets up from his place, stirred to act. The psalm opens as the prayer of someone weak, pouring out his plea.
Tehillim 102:1 and 102:14; Radak on Tehillim 102:14"There is no rock like our God" comes from the prayer of Hannah, the mother of the prophet Shmuel. The Gemara (the main record of the rabbis' teachings) hears a pun: tzur, "rock," sounds like tzayar, "artist." A person can draw a figure on a wall but cannot give it breath, a soul or inner organs. God forms a figure and does all of that. So the Gemara reads the line as being about making things, not only about strength.
Berakhot 10a; Shmuel I 2:2No author is named. The earliest books we could open that explain it are Siddur Rashi and Machzor Vitry, prayer books from France around 1100. Machzor Vitry says Rav Amram Gaon (head of a Babylonian academy in the 800s) gave the reason at the start of his own prayer book. The Tur (a law code from the 1300s) says Rav Amram's prayer book has Ein Keloheinu before the incense passage. We could not open Rav Amram's book itself.
Siddur Rashi 1; Machzor Vitry 134 and 383; Tur, Orach Chaim 133On a weekday the Amidah (the main standing prayer) has 19 blessings. On Shabbat it has 7. Siddur Rashi says this prayer was set for Shabbat to cover the 12 that are missing. Saying it on weekdays was not universal. The Eliyah Rabbah (a commentary on the Shulchan Aruch, the main code of Jewish law, written around 1700) records advice that the careful avoid saying it on weekdays.
Siddur Rashi 511; Eliyah Rabbah on Shulchan Aruch, Orach Chaim 132:5Look at the first word of each group. Ein, Mi, Nodeh begin with alef, mem, nun, which spell amen. The next two groups begin Baruch and Atah. So the whole run hides "amen, baruch atah": the answer to a blessing, then the opening of one. Siddur Rashi counts each of the first twelve lines as one amen. Shibbolei HaLeket (an Italian book of law from the 1200s) passes this on in the name of Rabbeinu Shlomo, usually understood to be Rashi.
Siddur Rashi 1; Shibbolei HaLeket 1:7 and 83The opening lines come from three places. "Hope in Hashem" is Tehillim 27:14. "There is no one holy like Hashem" is from Hannah's prayer, Shmuel I 2:2. "For who is a god besides Hashem" is Tehillim 18:32, a song whose heading says David sang it on the day God saved him from all his enemies and from Shaul. The same song also appears in Shmuel II 22. We could not find who first joined the three verses.
Tehillim 27:14; Shmuel I 2:2; Tehillim 18:1 and 18:32; Shmuel II 22:1In the siddur this prayer leads straight into the incense passage. The Noda BiYehuda (Rabbi Yechezkel Landau of Prague, 1700s) explains why, and the Kaf HaChaim (a Sephardic commentary on Jewish law, early 1900s) quotes him. The incense is said to bring wealth. So we first say "none is like our God," so no one thinks "my own power and the might of my hand made me this wealth," the thought the Torah warns against in Devarim 8:17. The Rema (Rabbi Moshe Isserles, Poland, 1500s) also gives this order.
Noda BiYehuda I, Orach Chaim 10; Kaf HaChaim, Orach Chaim 132:22; Rema, Orach Chaim 132:2; Devarim 8:17The Gemara says Rabbi Meir taught that a person must say a hundred blessings every day. His proof is a verse in Devarim: "What does Hashem your God ask of you?" Siddur Rashi spells out the wordplay. Do not read mah, "what." Read me'ah, "a hundred."
A weekday gives you plenty of chances. The Amidah has 19 blessings and you say it three times a day. Shabbat comes up short, because its Amidah has only 7. The Gemara tells of Rav Chiya, son of Rav Avya, who made up the gap on Shabbat and festivals by bringing spices and delicacies so he could say a blessing over each.
Siddur Rashi and Machzor Vitry say Ein Keloheinu was set for Shabbat as another fix. Four lines begin with Ein, four with Mi, four with Nodeh. Those three words begin with the letters of amen, and each of the twelve lines counts as one. Then come the lines that begin Baruch and Atah. Together they sound like "Blessed are You... Amen" twelve times, one for each missing blessing.
The same passage in Machzor Vitry then raises an objection. If this prayer already filled the gap, why did Rav Chiya need fruit? And these lines lack the wording of a normal blessing, such as "King of the universe." So how can they count? It goes on to suggest a different order for the lines, and the sources do not settle the matter.
Seder HaYom (a guide to the daily prayers by a rabbi who lived near Tzfat, first printed in 1599) takes the number seriously. It advises counting your blessings through the day, starting from the evening, so you do not end up with fewer than a hundred. For Shabbat it says to pay close attention to the blessings over the Torah reading and the seven blessings of the haftarah (the reading from the Prophets). If that is not enough, it points to the spices and fruit of the Gemara. It does not mention Ein Keloheinu there. So the sources agree the number matters, but not on how to reach it.
Menachot 43b,Siddur Rashi 1,Machzor Vitry, Laws of Shabbat 134,Seder HaYom, One Hundred BlessingsCount the lines. There are five groups of four: "There is none like," "Who is like," "We thank," "Blessed is," and "You are." In every group the same four titles come in the same order: our God, our Master, our King, our Rescuer. It looks like repetition. The sources give several reasons, and they do not agree on one.
Seder HaYom says the four in each group point to the four-letter Name of God, the way the four Torah passages inside tefillin do. It adds that this praise should be said with care, word by word.
The Chida (Rabbi Chaim Yosef David Azulai, 1700s) passes on a plain-meaning reading he says he heard. Each title answers one of four world powers. "God" answers Babylon, whose king Nebuchadnezzar ordered everyone to bow to a statue. "Master" answers Media, where Ahasuerus (the king in the Purim story) sold us to Haman as slaves. "King" answers Greece, since Alexander was king of the whole world. "Rescuer" answers Esau. He adds that he is being brief. This is a reading he reports, not a ruling.
Machzor Vitry reads the lines as a question and its answer. It suggests the right order is "Who is like our God?" and then "There is none like our God," because the Tanach often asks "who" and then answers, as in "Who is this King of glory? Hashem of hosts." In our siddur the "none" lines come first.
A count, a Name, four empires, a question and an answer: these are different explanations, and none cancels the others. What Seder HaYom asks for is simple. Do not rush it. Say it word by word.
Seder HaYom, Order of Kaveh,Kesher Gudal 20:7,Machzor Vitry, Laws of Shabbat 134,Tehillim 24:10The first line of this prayer speaks to exactly that. "Hope in Hashem. Be strong, and He will make your heart bold. And hope in Hashem." It says "hope" twice. Radak (Rabbi David Kimchi, Provence, around 1200) says the repeat means the hope should never leave your heart.
The L'David Hashem Ori prayer ends with this same verse and tells the Gemara's teaching on it: if you prayed and were not answered, pray again. The same passage of the Gemara lists four things that need strengthening: Torah, good deeds, prayer and derech eretz. Rashi (the great French commentator of the 1000s) explains derech eretz as a person's work, whether a craftsman, a merchant or a soldier. Each is backed by a verse that uses the word "strong." For prayer it is this one.
Rashi says a person should strengthen these four all the time, with all his strength. So the Gemara treats prayer as something you have to keep working at.
Ibn Ezra (a Bible commentator born in Spain, 1100s) notes that "He will make your heart bold" is something done to you: God is the one who strengthens your heart. On his reading the verse is an instruction and also a promise.
The next verse in the siddur belongs to Hannah. She could not have children. The text says that year after year she went up to the sanctuary, and that she prayed there in tears. Her son Shmuel was born, and after he was weaned she brought him to the sanctuary. There she said the prayer that includes "There is no one holy like Hashem."
What the sources do not say is that prayer always gets you the answer you want. They say to go back and ask again, and not to give up hope. That is as far as they go.
Berakhot 32b,Rashi on Berakhot 32b,Radak on Tehillim 27:14,Ibn Ezra on Tehillim 27:14,Shmuel I 1:6-24 and 2:1-2Short ideas from the Chassidic masters, the Kabbalah and the Mussar teachers.
Rebbe Nachman of Breslov (a Chassidic master who died in 1810) is recorded teaching that even if you have been calling out to God for a long time and still feel far away, you should keep going. If you stay strong in your prayers, he says, God will answer in the end. He ties it to the first verse of this prayer. The answer he promises is that God will bring you closer to serving Him.
אִם יִהְיֶה חָזָק וְאַמִּיץ בִּתְפִלּוֹת וּבַקָּשׁוֹת, בְּוַדַּאי סוֹף כָּל סוֹף יַעֲנֵהוּ הַשֵּׁם יִתְבָּרַךְ
Likutei Moharan, Part II 101The Gemara says four things need strengthening, and prayer is one. Its proof is the first verse of this prayer: "Hope in Hashem. Be strong." The Maharal of Prague (Rabbi Judah Loew, a great thinker who died in 1609) asks why prayer needs strength. His answer: when you pray, you often ask for something you do not deserve on your own, and there are accusers who argue against you. So you need to be strong when you ask. He adds that all four things on the list go beyond the natural way of the world.
ולפיכך צריך האדם לחזק בתפלתו כאשר יבקש דבר שאינו ראוי לו מצד עצמו
Berakhot 32b; Maharal, Netivot Olam, Netiv Derech Eretz 1Rabbi Kalonymus Kalman Shapira, a Chassidic rebbe in Poland who was killed in the Holocaust, wrote about his own feelings at the third Shabbat meal. Some weeks he felt only shame, small in front of God. But when he reached Ein Keloheinu, he says, his soul always grew strong and glad. Not because of himself, he writes, but because he was chosen to announce God's greatness. He calls out to the whole world, "even the grains of sand under my feet."
אבל כשהנני מגיע, לאין כאלקינו, תמיד נפשי מתחזקת ושמחה
Rabbi Kalonymus Kalman Shapira, Tzav VeZeruz 26The Tikkunei Zohar (a companion book to the Zohar, in the same style) says that no gate is open except the gate of tears. It connects the crying child in Shemot 2:6 with a plea that God have mercy in exile. Then it cites a verse from the end of this prayer: "You will arise and have mercy on Zion." So that line is described as a cry. Now read it again slowly.
ולית תרעא פתיחא אלא תרעא דדמעה
Tikkunei Zohar 26bThe practical laws. For a final ruling, ask your rav.
The old sources call it a custom. The Tur (a law code from the 1300s) quotes the siddur of Rav Amram Gaon (Babylonia, 800s): after the prayer leader says Oseh Shalom, they are accustomed to say Ein Keloheinu, and then the incense passage. The Rema (Rabbi Moshe Isserles, who added Ashkenazi custom to the Shulchan Aruch, the main code of Jewish law) says to say it first, before the incense. Peninei Halakhah (a modern guide to Jewish law) describes the same order today: the Song of the Day, then Ein Keloheinu, then the incense.
Tur, Orach Chaim 133; Rema, Orach Chaim 132:2; Peninei Halakhah, Prayer 23:5The reason given is the hundred blessings a day. The Kol Bo (a medieval book of law and custom) says that in some places it is said after Musaf on Shabbat and holidays. The Amidah is shorter then, so he counts 33 blessings short. Musaf's seven, the third meal's six and twenty titles in this prayer, each counting as one, make them up. The Mishnah Berurah (a standard commentary, around 1900) gives the same reason for Shabbat. This siddur, in Nusach Sefard, says it on weekdays too.
Kol Bo 37:16; Mishnah Berurah 622:5It depends on the custom. The Rema rules: not on Yom Kippur. The Mishnah Berurah explains that it is said on Shabbat to fill in missing blessings, and Yom Kippur already has plenty of praise. The Kaf HaChaim (a Sephardic law commentary, early 1900s) writes that the Sephardic custom is to say it after the Kaddish that ends Musaf, and so do the Kabbalists of Beit El in Jerusalem.
Rema, Orach Chaim 622:1; Mishnah Berurah 622:5; Kaf HaChaim, Orach Chaim 622:6The Rema lists the incense passage among the things left out that day. The Kaf HaChaim adds that Ein Keloheinu is also not said, citing the Levush (a law code from the 1500s). Then he reports another custom: the Kabbalists of Beit El in Jerusalem say the Song of the Day, Ein Keloheinu and the incense on Tisha B'Av just as on every day.
Rema, Orach Chaim 559:4; Kaf HaChaim, Orach Chaim 559:47 and 559:48ולכך תיקנו בשבת לומר אין כאלהינו, לפי שאין מתפללין שמונה עשרה... אין מי נודה, הרי י"ב פעמים אמן, ולבסוף ברוך אתה
That is why they set Ein Keloheinu for Shabbat: we do not pray the eighteen blessings. Ein, Mi, Nodeh makes twelve times amen, and at the end comes Baruch Atah.
חייב אדם לברך מאה ברכות בכל יום שנאמר... ועתה ישראל מה ה׳ אלהיך שואל מעמך
A person must say a hundred blessings every day, as it says: "And now, Israel, what does Hashem your God ask of you?"
רב חייא בריה דרב אויא בשבתא וביומי טבי טרח וממלי להו באיספרמקי ומגדי
On Shabbat and festivals, Rav Chiya, son of Rav Avya, went to the trouble of filling the count with spices and delicacies.
כנגד י"ב ברכות החסירות אמרי י"ב פעמים אמן. אין. מי. נודה. ולבסוף ברוך אתה... ולא איתנהו כשאר ברכות היכי חשב להו ברכה
For the twelve missing blessings they say amen twelve times: Ein, Mi, Nodeh, and at the end Baruch Atah. Then he objects: these are not like other blessings, so how are they counted as a blessing?
מדת בשר ודם צר צורה על גבי הכותל ואינו יכול להטיל בה רוח ונשמה... והקדוש ברוך הוא אינו כן צר צורה בתוך צורה ומטיל בה רוח ונשמה
A person draws a figure on a wall and cannot put breath or a soul into it. God is not like that. He forms a figure inside a figure and puts breath and a soul into it.
מאי אין צור כאלהינו אין צייר כאלהינו
What does "there is no rock like our God" mean? There is no artist like our God.
והוא שבח ראוי לדקדק בו ולאומרו מלה במלה. ויש ד' פעמים בכל ענין וענין לרמוז לשם בן ד' כל אחת במקומו המיוחד כענין ד' פרשיות של תפלין
It is a praise worth being careful with and saying word by word. The four times in each group hint at the four-letter Name, each in its own place, like the four Torah passages in tefillin.
ומה שנהגו לומר חרוזים הללו קודם לכן היינו לפי שמעשרת ולכן אומרים אין כאלהינו שלא נאמר כחי ועוצם ידי עשה החיל רק הכל מה׳ ניתן לנו
The custom of saying these lines before it is because the incense makes a person rich. So we say Ein Keloheinu, so that we do not say "my power and the might of my hand made me this wealth." Everything was given to us by Hashem.
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