Tikkun Olam

Miriam from Philadelphia told Anna during their conversation:
“I’ve seen so much brokenness in my life. When my father left, our family felt like it was held together by threads. It was painful, but I learned that small acts - like making dinner, listening, or being truly present in hard moments - can hold the pieces together. It’s what gave me hope when everything else seemed to fall apart.”

Listening to her, Anna recognized that Miriam’s story embodied the essence of Tikkun Olam, the Jewish teaching of repairing the world. In this tradition, brokenness is not an ending but a call to action. Every act of care, however small, helps mend the fracture and reveals something sacred, even within pain.

She suggested the words from the Aleinu prayer: לתקן עולם במלכות שדי — to repair the world under the sovereignty of God. The addition במלכות שדי, “under the sovereignty of God,” grounds this vision in humility, reminding us that healing does not depend solely on human strength but rests within divine order.

It carries both mystical and moral weight — an encouragement to act, balanced by reverence for something greater — a prayer and a task to help make the world, and ourselves, whole again.