(AMERICAN-JUDAICA).
(Jacob Cohen).“May He that formead and compleated the wonderous work of ...

(AMERICAN-JUDAICA).
(Jacob Cohen).


“May He that formead and compleated the wonderous work of creation, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom… Bless, preserve, guard… The President and the Vice President of the Union. The Senate and the House of Representatives of the United States of America…” Manuscript written in English, with two short lines in English written in Hebrew letters.
pp. 2. Folio.
(Richmond, Virginia): 1790


An 18th-century manuscript draft of the Sabbath prayer for the Government and President of the United States. This manuscript is an expanded English translation of the “HaNothen Teshua” prayer that Jews recite on the Sabbath, beseeching God for the welfare of their government. The text bears a resemblance to the “Prayer for the Government” composed and delivered in New York by Gershom Mendes Seixas on Thanksgiving, 1789, and is likely based upon it. However there are numerous differences in language, with specific words, changed to correspond to the state of Virginia (where this was written) instead of New York (e.g. “this Commonwealth” instead of “this state”). Other changes are for stylistic reasons (e.g. New York’s “all Kings and Potentates in alliance with these States” as opposed to Virginia’s “all nations in alliance with these States”). God is called upon here to “Bless preserve guard assist and Supremely exalt to the highest degree the President and the vice president of the Union, the Senate and the House of Representatives of the United States of America; the Governor, the Lieutenant Governor, the People of this State represented in the Senate and Assembly, with the Judges and Magistrates of this city; and all nations in alliance with these States.” Noted on the side of the second page are a few fascinating words - English written with the Hebrew alphabet, in the same manner as Judeo-German. It reads: “A prayer for [these?] United States 1790. Jacob I. Cohen (1744-1823) was the Richmond and then Philadelphia-based progenitor of a prominent American Jewish family of Baltimore. Arriving in Pennsylvania from Bavaria in 1773, he served a stint in the revolutionary ary, and afterwards settled in Richmond where he was a founder of Congregation Beth Shalome. See Rosenbloom, A Biographical Dictionary of Early American Jews, p. 24). This prayer by an early American Jew is an expression of deep faith expressed in a distinctly American way.