Three years ago, the first egalitarian Sephardi siddur, containing services for weekdays, was published in London.

Now the team behind the unique prayer book has produced a companion volume for use on Shabbat and festivals other than the High Holy Days.

Siddur Or veShalom runs to nearly 800 pages and includes a “gender-sensitive” English translation.

Each page carries the Hebrew with not only a parallel translation but also the transliteration of the prayers into English letters.

“We are not trying to make something new but to improve on what is already great within the tradition,” said Rabbi Adam Zagoria-Moffet, minister of St Albans Masorti Synagogue, who edited the volume with Isaac Montagu, a young member of Lauderdale Road Sephardi community in Maida Vale.

In the preface, American-based Sephardi educator Rabbi Haim Ovadia writes that it breathes “new life into ancient tefillot [prayers].

“Our glorious past has been forgotten, not only by others but by us as well, and there are many Sefaradim unaware of their glorious history and of their unique traditions and customs. When we speak of the future, this siddur is the harbinger of a journey into a new world.”

With text adorned with specially commissioned art and calligraphy, the siddur takes its name from a Sephardi congregation in Atlanta, Georgia, with which the editors have worked in partnership.

“They found that younger members were leaving for Ashkenazi communities because they wanted to be somewhere egalitarian,” Rabbi Zagoria-Moffet explained. “So they started exploring where they could make room for egalitarian practice.”

Several hundred copies of the new siddur have been ordered by the American congregation.

Minyanim in London, Boston and even Oslo are using the prayer book. But Rabbi Zagoria-Moffet stressed that it can be used in traditional communities.

One of the most striking features of the translation is its use of the pronoun “They” rather than “He” for God.

“This is the thing that people find most jarring when they first look at it. But they get used to it,” Rabbi Zagoria-Moffet told the JC.

Using “It” to describe the Divine would be “inaccurate” and “potentially irreverent”, the siddur explains. “They” is more faithful to the Hebrew which does sometimes use a plural form for God.

The enterprise dates back seven years to when Rabbi Zagoria-Moffet was at rabbinical school at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York and received a small grant to fund unusual projects. “I had no idea what I was signing up for.”

Traditionally, siddurim bear the voices of men. But Or veShalom also includes religious poetry by women such as the remarkable Tanna’it Asenat Barzani, a 16th century scholar from Kurdistan who is the first recorded female yeshivah head in history.

It also uses more inclusive versions of the early morning blessings based on texts found in the Cairo Geniza — so that men avoid having to thank God for “not making me a woman”, as they do in the standard formula.

More details from izzunbooks.com