New on Rikers Island: a Jewish prayerbook designed with incarcerated congregants in mind

August 12, 2025

by By Marla Brown Fogelman for JTA

When some of Rabbi Mia Simring’s congregants named themselves The Very Narrow Bridge Congregation, they weren’t just referring to the anthemic Hebrew song “Gesher Tsar Meod” or the teaching from Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav on which it is based.

They were also alluding to their status as inmates on Rikers Island, New York City’s largest jail.

“Everybody there knows that they are separated from the rest of their lives by an actual very narrow bridge,” Simring said.

So when it came time to name the jail’s new siddur — perhaps the first ever Jewish prayer book compiled expressly for the use in a correctional facility — the choice was obvious. “The Very Narrow Bridge: A Rikers Island Siddur” entered use earlier this summer.

The one-of-a-kind siddur features bright colors, bold text and an amalgam of Hebrew, English, Russian and Ladino prayers, as well as meditations on healing and recovery and poems by individuals currently or formerly in custody at Rikers.

It replaces what Simring’s colleague, Rabbi Gabriel Kretzmer-Seed (YCT ’17), called “photocopied packets for prayer” that the two Department of Corrections Jewish chaplains long cobbled together to try to meet their diverse congregants’ emotional and spiritual needs.

The prayer book was dedicated twice in June: during a ceremony on Rikers attended by DOC First Deputy Commissioner Francis Torres, and at the publication launch at Manhattan’s Central Synagogue, a few miles and a world away from the jail that houses more than 7,000 people and has, since May, been under federal receivership because of its poor conditions.

On hand were representatives of the New York Jewish Coalition for Criminal Justice Reform, a nonprofit that helmed the project, and its funders, including JCRC-NY, the Revson Foundation, the NY Board of Rabbis and Central Synagogue. They understood the long and winding path to create a prayer book that could meet the mix of Jewish, Jewish-curious and non-Jewish individuals who attend services on Rikers.

According to Kretzmer-Seed, the idea for the siddur project began in 2022, when Rachel Lissy, then-director of the coalition, along with Rabbi Bob Kaplan of the JCRC-NY, visited Rikers and attended one of the prayer services.

“The visit was a good catalyst,” said Kretzmer-Seed, noting how it sparked a partnership between the chaplains and the coalition and helped to bolster the prayer services by recruiting other volunteers from the “outside.”