Mahzor Lev Shalem

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The famous medieval Spanish philosopher and poet, Yehudah HaLevi, wrote: “prayer is for the soul what food is for the body.” Prayer helps to sustain and to nourish our souls. And prayer is at the core of what binds us together as a community.

A few years ago, we were blessed to transition to Siddur Lev Shalem, the new siddur of the Conservative Movement. Through its commentaries and explanations, our new siddur has helped elevate our relationship with prayer on both Shabbat and holidays. 

This Fall we are now excited to transition to Mahzor Lev Shalem, the companion High Holy Day prayerbook to Siddur Lev Shalem. Like its sister siddur, it contains instructions for choreography, more Hebrew words in transliteration, as well as wonderful reflections and teachings on the liturgy. In addition to using Mahzor Lev Shalem in the main sanctuary, we will be using Mahzor Sholom a new family mahzor created by Alex Weinberg, in our family High Holy Days services.

Each mahzor will be inscribed with a line from the High Holy Day liturgy: “May our prayers rise up at evening, coming to You with the dawn, transforming us at dusk.” Commenting on the larger medieval poem that this line is extracted from, our new mahzor teaches: “this poem is a reverse acrostic… it is as if throughout the day, we move back in our recollections, allowing the events of the year to pass before our mind’s eye. This day is set aside for introspection: at different hours, in different light, we may see different aspects of our lives; as we move inward, we can be in touch with the ways our lives might be renewed.” (page 223).

Thanks to generous gifts from numerous donors, we were able to purchase Mahzor Lev Shalem. We hope that this mahzor will serve as source of reflection and renewal for our community. We hope it will help to lift our prayers and our hearts up to one another, and ultimately, to God.

Another way that we hope to lift up our prayers is by dedicating the mahzorim in honor of a loved one or in honor of a simha. We hope you will choose to dedicate one or more mahzorim to recognize special people or moments in your life. In doing so, you will also be giving tzedakah that helps support our community.

- Rabbi Wexler

For more information on Mahzor Lev Shalem please email Rabbi Peltz, Rabbi Wexler, Cantor Cohen, or Rabbi Lindemann or call 856-751-6663.