For most Americans, Thanksgiving morning is often associated with watching the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and some football games, all the while preparing the festive meal.
But for the members of the historic Congregation Shearith Israel (the Spanish & Portuguese Sephardic Congregation in Manhattan), an additional feature of Thanksgiving morning is, appropriately, a religious service expressing gratitude for the blessing of living in America.
Founded in 1654 by 23 Spanish & Portuguese Jews, Shearith Israel is the first and oldest Jewish congregation in America. Having lived through and proudly participated in America’s War of Independence, Shearith Israel’s members took heed to George Washington’s official declaration of Thanksgiving as a national holiday, when he proclaimed November 26, 1789 “as a day of public Thanksgiving and prayer.”
As descendants of Sephardic Jews who were persecuted in the Spanish Inquisition, and ultimately expelled from Spain in 1492, the members of Shearith Israel were grateful to live in the United States, where they were granted full citizenship, freedom of worship and were not persecuted by the government for being Jewish. The idea of an American “day of public Thanksgiving and prayer” deeply resonated with them.
They established an official Thanksgiving service, to be held mid-morning in the synagogue’s sanctuary. Observed to this very day at Shearith Israel in New York, the service features the chanting of several Biblical Psalms of thanks, a prayer for the United States government, and a sermon by the rabbi with a message of gratitude for the blessing of living in America. The service was composed and adjusted by the congregation’s different rabbis, and finalized by Rabbi David De Sola Pool. Rabbi De Sola Pool’s version was printed in 1945 as “Minhat Todah – Service for Thanksgiving Day.”
I feel that it’s no coincidence that the service was printed as an official prayer booklet in 1945 – the first post-World War II Thanksgiving. A prayer book deepens the official status of a prayer service, and I imagine that after the Holocaust, Rabbi De Sola Pool and the congregation felt an even deeper measure of gratitude for having lived in America – and not in Europe – during World War II.
Like the founding members of Shearith Israel, I am a descendant of Sephardic Jews whose ancestors were persecuted and expelled from Spain. I am also a proud first-generation American child of immigrants.
The great Sephardic poet Judah Halevy famously wrote “My heart is in the East,” proclaiming his longing for the Land of Israel.
I have fulfilled Judah Halevy’s longing for “the East,”, and I am now privileged to live in Israel. But I will always be proud to be an American Jew.
On Thanksgiving Day, here in Israel, I will proudly recite the prayers in Minhat Todah, expressing my continued gratitude for the blessing of being an American, and for the blessing that is America.
Happy Thanksgiving and Shabbat Shalom
Rabbi Daniel Bouskila is the international director of the Sephardic Educational Center.
