In a rare display of his Jewish faith, President Volodymyr Zelensky quoted from a book of Tehillim given to him by the Jewish community before a group of foreign diplomats.
By Anash.org reporter
Speaking before a delegation of foreign diplomats, President Volodymyr Zelensky quoted from a book of Tehillim given to him days earlier by the Jewish community as a gift for his 45th birthday.
Zelensky quoted from Tehillim chapter 3 declaring: “With my voice, I call to the Lord, and He answered me from His holy mount to eternity…I will not fear ten thousand of people, who have set themselves against me all around.”
Zelensky explained that “if you pay attention to the Psalms of David, you will pay attention [to] how often they ask the Lord to hear their prayers. We never know whether our prayer has come close to perfection and whether the Lord heard it.
“We have been standing against evil for almost a year. We are united as never before. We are brave – our warriors have struck down evil on the battlefield. Did it only happen because of our efforts or did God hear our prayers?”
The rare display of his Jewish faith, came just days after Mr. Zelensky received a leather-bound Ukrainian language book of Tehillim on the occasion of his 45th birthday (the Hebrew date is the 16th of Shevat).
The gift was presented by Vice-Chairman of the Jewish Communities, Rabbi Rafael Rutman, in a splendid leather binding with the name “Zelensky Volodymyr Alexandrovich” emblazed in beautiful gold lettering.
The first-ever translation of Tehillim was commissioned by the Chairman of the Jewish Communities, Rabbi Meir Stambler in 2014 after the Russian invasion of Crimea when many of the country’s residents boycotted or stopped using Russian as a spoken language.
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