Tefillah Le-Erev Rosh Hashanah — Prayer for the Eve of Rosh Hashanah
This deeply personal prayer of supplication is traditionally recited on the eve of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, which is also observed as the Day of Judgment. Composed in the tradition of Yiddish tkhines — intimate confessional prayers written for everyday worshippers — it invites the one praying to stand honestly before God, confess their failings, and ask to be inscribed in the Book of Life for a year of goodness, health, and peace. Whatever your faith or background, you are welcome to let these words open your heart.
A wondrous prayer and supplication, to be said on the eve of the holy Day of Judgment — Rosh Hashanah,
to confess and to plead before our Father, the merciful Father,
that He forgive us all our sins and grant us atonement for our transgressions,
and that He hear our prayer for a good year, a year of joy and of great salvation.
Master of the Universe!
If I were to begin to recount the sins I have sinned against You,
time would run out before they were exhausted.
Therefore, over my own soul I cry out with a bitter heart:
How have I driven You away from the fountain of living waters through my sins?
How have I shown no care for my own soul,
which is called by its Creator a precious daughter,
and filled it instead with filth and repulsion?
My Father in heaven, what shall I do tomorrow,
on the holy day of Rosh Hashanah,
when You sit in judgment over Your world?
For even Your holy angels in the heavens
tremble and quake with awe at Your judgment —
how much more so a sinful soul like mine,
who has sinned against You and angered You at every moment.
Woe is me when I think —
for in these days of remembrance
every person is written and sealed,
along with all their deeds and all that will befall them in the coming year:
whether they will live out their year with dignity,
or whether, God forbid, they will not live;
whether peace and health will be theirs throughout the year,
or whether they will be sentenced, God forbid, to suffering and illness.
All of a person's deeds, good and bad alike,
are weighed on the scale and in the balance of justice,
to see which of them will tip the measure.
How fortunate is the person whose good deeds
outweigh their bad deeds on that scale!
Master of the Universe!
My heart melts within me and a trembling passes through all my limbs,
as I look at myself on the eve of the Day of Judgment
and find myself full of sins.
For if my good deeds were weighed against my sins,
the sins would tip the scale against me.
Yet knowing that You are a God compassionate and gracious,
and that it is written in Your holy words:
"One who conceals his transgressions will not succeed" —
a person who does not confess all his sins will be punished for them;
"but one who confesses and forsakes them will find mercy" —
the one who confesses his sins
and turns in repentance from them
will be shown mercy by his Creator, who forgives his sins.
Therefore I confess the sins I have committed before You,
and I take upon myself not to sin before You again,
and You, the good God, forgive me for them,
do not turn my prayer away empty,
but hear all my prayers and requests,
as You heard the prayer of Hannah, the mother of Samuel,
and granted her every request.
And grant merit to me and to my husband (for a man: and to my wife) and to my children
in the judgment of this Day of Judgment,
and inscribe us for good life,
for health and for an honorable livelihood
from Your full and open hand,
that we not need the gifts of flesh and blood
nor be dependent on their loans,
and may we merit to raise our sons and daughters
without any sorrow or suffering,
so that they walk on the straight path before You,
and may we merit to see the coming of the righteous Redeemer, speedily in our days, Amen.
Tefillah ve-techinnah nifla'ah, le-omram be-erev yom ha-din ha-kadosh — Rosh Hashanah,
le-hitvadot ve-lehitchanen lifnei Avinu, Av ha-Rachaman,
she-yislach lanu al kol avonoteinu ve-yechapper lanu pesh'ateinu,
ve-yishma tefillateinu le-shanah tovah, shnat simchah vi-yeshu'ah.
Ribono shel olam!
Im amadeti lifrosh chata'ai she-chatati kenegdecha,
yichleh ha-zman ve-hem lo yichlu.
Lachen, alecha nafshi, akonen be-lev mar:
Keitzad hotzetichah mi-mekor mayim chayyim al yedei avonotai?
Keitzad lo chastu al nishmati,
ha-nikret le-Borah bat yekara,
U-mile'itiha sochi u-me'os?
Avi she-va-shamayim, mah e'eseh machar,
be-yom Rosh Hashanah ha-kadosh,
bo attah yoshev lishpot et olamecha?
She-ha-rei afilu mal'achecha ha-kedoshim asher ba-shamayim
chalim ve-ro'adim me-eimat dinecha —
kal va-chomer nefesh chotetet kamoni,
she-chatati negdecha ve-hich'astecha be-chol rega.
Oy li be-et she-choshevet (le-gaver: choshev) ani
she-be-yemei zikkaron ha-elu
nichtav ve-nechetam kol adam,
le-chol ma'asav u-mikreav ba-shanah ha-ba'ah:
im yichyeh et shnato be-chavod,
ve-im, chalilah, lo yichyeh;
im shalom u-vri'ut yihyu lo be-meshech ha-shanah,
oh yedunuhu, chalilah, be-yisurim ve-choli.
Kol ma'asei adam, tovim ke-ra'im,
nishkalim be-feles u-ve-moznei mishpat,
lir'ot elu mehem yichebedu.
U-mah tov lo le-adam she-ma'asav ha-tovim
Yachri'u be-mishkalam et ma'asav ha-ra'im!
Ribono shel olam!
Libbi namas be-kirbi ve-ra'ad over be-chol eivarai,
be-habitee al atzmi lifnei yom ha-din
va-ani mele'ah (le-gaver: male) be-avonot.
Ve-im tishkol ma'asai ha-tovim le-umat avonotai,
yachri'u ha-avonot et ha-kaf le-ra'ati.
Ella be-yod'i ki attah El rachum ve-channun,
u-vi-dverei kodshecha katuv:
"Mechasseh pesh'av lo yatzliach" —
adam she-eino mitvadeh al kol avonotav ye'anesh aleihem;
"U-modeh ve-ozev yerucham" —
ach ha-mitvadeh al avonotav,
ve-shav be-teshuvah aleihem,
merachem alav yotzero u-mochel lo avonotav.
Lachen mitvadah ani al avonotai she-aviti lefanecha,
u-mekabbelet (le-gaver: u-mekabbel) ani alai she-lo echta od lefanecha,
ve-attah, ha-Shem ha-tov, mechal li aleihem,
ve-al tashev tefillati rekam,
ve-ha'azen kol tefillotai u-vakashotai,
kemo she-shamata le-tefillat Channah, em Shemu'el,
ve-simachtah be-chol mevakshah.
Ve-tizke oti ve-et ba'ali (le-gaver: ve-et ishti) ve-et zar'i
be-mishpat yom ha-din ha-zeh,
ve-tichtevenu le-chayyim tovim,
li-vri'ut u-le-farnasah be-chavod
mi-yadecha ha-mele'ah ve-ha-rechavah,
ve-she-lo nitztarech le-mattnat basar ve-dam
ve-lo le-yedei halva'atam,
ve-nizke le-gadel banenu u-venoteinu
beli shum tza'ar ve-yisurim,
ve-yelchu be-derech ha-yesharah lefanecha,
ve-nizke le-vi'at Go'el Tzedek bi-meheirah ve-yameinu, Amen.
Common Questions
Rosh Hashanah, literally 'Head of the Year,' marks the beginning of the Jewish calendar year. Jewish tradition teaches that on this day God reviews the deeds of every person and, together with Yom Kippur ten days later, inscribes each person's fate for the coming year — whether for life or death, health or illness, abundance or hardship. This understanding gives the day its alternate name, Yom HaDin, the Day of Judgment, and invests the season with profound urgency and introspection.
The Book of Life is a central image of the High Holiday season. According to Jewish teaching, God opens this book on Rosh Hashanah and writes in it the destiny of each person for the coming year, with the decree sealed on Yom Kippur. The traditional greeting of the season, 'Shanah Tovah u-Metukah' — 'A good and sweet new year' — is often extended as a wish that one be inscribed and sealed for good. The image functions less as literal theology for many Jews and more as a powerful call to take one's life and choices seriously.
Hannah is a figure from the biblical Book of Samuel who was unable to have children and who prayed with such raw, silent intensity at the Sanctuary at Shiloh that the priest Eli initially mistook her for drunk. Her prayer was answered and she gave birth to Samuel, one of Israel's greatest prophets. In Jewish tradition, Hannah is held up as a model of genuine, heartfelt prayer — someone whose words came not from rote recitation but from the depths of her soul. This prayer invokes her as a precedent for God hearing the sincere cry of an ordinary person.
The prayer paraphrases Proverbs 28:13: 'One who conceals his transgressions will not succeed, but one who confesses and forsakes them will find mercy.' This verse is a cornerstone of the Jewish concept of teshuvah — repentance or 'return.' The prayer uses it to explain the logic of confession: not as self-punishment, but as the honest first step toward change and reconciliation with God. The full arc of teshuvah in Jewish thought includes recognition of wrongdoing, sincere regret, verbal confession, and a genuine commitment not to repeat the act.
Yes — and you are warmly welcomed to do so. The prayer's core movements — honest self-examination, confession, the longing to be written into life rather than death, the hope for a year of peace, health, and sustenance for one's family — belong to no single people. The references to Israel, the Day of Judgment, and Hebrew Scripture are translated faithfully here rather than smoothed away, so you can encounter the prayer as it truly is. A non-Jewish reader might approach it as a guest at a sacred threshold: you need not claim every detail as your own tradition to be genuinely moved by, and to genuinely mean, the words.
Hebrew is a grammatically gendered language, so verbs, adjectives, and participles change form depending on the speaker's gender. The original prayer, following traditional practice, provides both feminine and masculine forms at the relevant phrases — for example, 'and I am filled' appears in both feminine and masculine grammatical form, with an instruction indicating which a man should use. This dual-form structure is common in traditional Jewish prayer literature, particularly in the tkhine genre, which was composed primarily for women but used by all. The English translation, which is not grammatically gendered in the same way, reads equally for any speaker.