Even if the quarter-dinar

This is a seliḥah (penitential poem) for the liturgy of the penitential season, specifically of the genre called ‘akedah, which recounts the story of the binding of Isaac and begs for mercy in its merit. The poet begins with the Jewish people bereft, a result of the destruction of the Temple, based on the Babylonian Talmud, Keritot 9a. In the ideal situation, a convert to the Jewish religion must, as part of the conversion process, bring a sacrifice to the Temple. But after the destruction of the Temple, this requirement was replaced by a requirement to set aside a quarter dinar, the cost of the least expensive bird sacrifice, to be held until the rebuilding of the Temple. When it became clear that the exile was not going to be short, Yohanan ben Zakkai abolished even the quarter dinar, because the money earmarked for the sacrifice would be likely to end up accidentally being spent on something else. The Jewish community is without even a monetary substitute for the Temple. Nonetheless, the Jewish people still has the merit of Abraham to protect them. This is the only poem of Ashkenazic origin to be widely accepted also in Sephardic rites.