MARCH 14 • 2024 | 11
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mountaintops. Thoughtful 
petitions need somewhere 
to go. Mother Nature will 
receive them. 
So will your favorite book, 
wedged with a bookmark. 
Or the crisp novel on your 
nightstand that still smells of 
new book. Pray into swings 
and sandboxes, the yelps 
of children. Caterpillars 
emerging into fluttering 
butterflies. Pray into puddles 
of fresh rain. The promise of 
a rainbow.
Pray into your freshly 
brewed coffee. Onions 
hissing and browning on 
the stove, steaming pots 
of nourishing soup. Beam 
soulful sustenance of all sorts 
to the hostages. Gift to them 
your first pristine moments 
of warm, deep morning 
sleep, the shelter you feel in 
your bed.
Direct your supplications 
to the dark, damp subter-
ranean tunnels holding 
hostages. We can shine our 
invocations to perforate the 
darkness with pinholes of 
light. Radio stations dedicate 
songs and uplifting messages 
to hostages in hopes that 
they are listening. Fill 
the sound waves with the 
conscience of your caring. 
That can also be done 
through the regular kind of 
prayer. 
One Saturday several 
weeks ago, our synagogue 
recited all the names of the 
hostages, grouped by family 
and geographic community. 
Whence they were taken, 
familial relationships and 
their parents’ names. Foreign 

nationals, too. Grouped by 
family, community, age. It 
took seven to eight minutes, 
but it also took forever. This 
is so hard, said a friend, 
her body weighted by 
melancholy. 
My friend’s 13-year-old 
daughter wept, hugging 
her mom. Recitation by the 
community felt like a cloak 
of protection; it reminded us 
that these hostages belonged 
to someone and to some 
place. Partygoers at a Nova 
music festival in a field, 
a community of music lovers, 
now bound together by the 
brutality of Hamas. 
Read the whole, 
otherwordly long list. Stifle 
your sorrow.
Join the voices 
singing Acheinu (Hebrew for 
“our brothers”), a prayer to 
release from captivity:
Our brothers, our sisters, the 
entire family of Israel, all who 
have been squeezed by distress 
or taken into captivity, whether 
on the sea or on dry land, may 
the Ever-present One have 
mercy upon them and bring 
them out from suffering to relief, 
from darkness to light, from 
subjugation to redemption, now, 
speedily, and soon, and let us 
say, Amen.
When the quiet of prayer 
reaches a deeper register, 
touch the Divine. Pray to 
Song. Of songs. Liturgy 
can be a cloak of national 
resilience.
You don’t need faith to 
have words or pray. Prayer 
can be a simple petition. 
Meditation. Dialogue without 
a partner. Communities of 

good and caring people in 
this world are watching and 
listening. And joining in.
We aren’t politicians 
or deciders. We turn to 
prayer because we must 
do something. Storm the 
heavens. Because the status 
quo is not just heartbreaking, 
it’s humanity-breaking and 
just plain breaking.
We, the people who pray, 
invite the emotional sun to 
come up earlier and stay out 
longer. We, the people who 
pray, utter our devotions 
unrushed. Full-throated. 
Unabashedly lacing our 
hearts together. No one 
really knows when life might 
return to normal. The path 
out of this purgatory — pray 
that there is one.
So, dig your hands in 
freshly turned earth. Pray 
for healing from the scent 
of damp soil, mossy bark 
of trees, blooming fragrant 
flowers. Pray into the rushing 
water of the river. Take in 
the distinct hues of a bright, 
bewildering luminous blue 
sky stretching over us — and 
them. Pray into air tinged 
with salt from the sea. That, 
too, stretches from us to 
them. Pray to heal the Earth. 
Pray that they don’t lose the 
pulsing will to live.
Hope is important energy. 
A glimpsed alternative. Pray 
that your leaders can see 
that. Pray that your people 
can see that. Pray that the 
hostages, faces imprinted 
in our retina, can feel it. 
Where does hope go when it 
vanishes? Pray for hostages 
to get it back. Pray for their 

families to get it back. Pray 
for hope itself to get itself 
back. Pray for you-me-
everyone to get it back.
All of us in the community, 
praying for all of them, 
including the non-pray-ers 
and the never-prayers and 
the what-the-hell-is-pray-
ers and the I-don’t-pray-ers, 
who do not pray but have 
their own way of sending out 
energy. Pray to a brilliant 
patchwork of stars stretching 
over us all.
Pray for healing for 
hostages who’ve been 
released. The body almost 
always heals faster than the 
psyche.
Pray that we will be whole 
again. Pray that we’re not 
destined to forever be the 
people of the missing people, 
circa 2023. Six million still 
echoes painfully through us.
It’s a sacred responsibility 
to secure the release of 
every single hostage. We are 
instruments.
Our shared intention. We 
must be indefatigable. 
Because until they come 
home, we are all hostages. 
Everywhere. We, the people.
So pray. 

This essay was originally published 

by Jewish Book Council as part of 

their Witnessing series. Ms. Ebenstein 

is an American-Israeli award-winning 

journalist/writer, historian, public 

speaker and peace activist. Her writ-

ing has appeared in the New York 

Times, the Atlantic, the Washington 

Post, Los Angeles Review of Books, 

TriQuarterly, Lilith, Tablet, the Forward 

and other publications. She is penning 

a memoir about an Israeli-Palestinian 

friendship begun in a breast can-

cer support group. She grew up in 

Southfield.

