“Eternal God: We thank you for this blessed nation that for 240 years has translated into reality the Biblical command to ‘proclaim liberty throughout the land for all the inhabitants thereof.’ We thank you for our constitutional government that has created and fostered the American ideals of democracy, freedom, justice and equality for all, regardless of race, religion, or national origin.”

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Those are the opening words of an invocation that was to have been offered Monday at the Republican National Convention by Rabbi Haskel Lookstein. One of America’s most respected Jewish leaders, he is rabbi emeritus of Congregation Kehilath Jeshurun, a Modern Orthodox synagogue at New York. Yet in the face of protests by anti-Trump elements, including members of the rabbi’s own community, the rabbi has asked not to be held to his commitment to offer a prayer in Cleveland. The turn will disappoint thousands, and we, for one, hope Donald Trump tries to turn the rabbi around.

The rabbi himself announced his demurral (and shared his prayer) in a cable to his community in New York. It has been widely covered in the Jewish and secular press. He said that once he was listed as a speaker at the convention, “the whole matter turned from rabbinic to political, something which was never intended.” He was to have been, after all, not a speaker but an invoker. Rabbi Lookstein is famed as a powerful and learned presence in synagogue, and his prayer in Cleveland would have inspired millions of Jews and non-Jews everywhere.

Rabbi Lookstein’s absence will no doubt be a disappointment to Mr. Trump, too. His daughter, Ivanka, was converted to Judaism under Rabbi Lookstein’s supervision. It was she who invited the rabbi to offer the opening prayer in Cleveland. It was a wonderful invitation, offering a chance to share with all Americans the love and respect that so clearly obtains between them. It was all the more apt because the rabbi is very much not a political figure but rather a religious leader (he does have a soft spot for the New York Mets).

Our guess is the rabbi retreated out of respect for his own community in New York, where opinions on Mr. Trump are as divided as elsewhere. Our guess, too, is that Mr. Trump himself understands this, as must his daughter and her husband, Jared Kushner. All the more reason, though, for Mr. Trump to make it his business to get on the phone with the rabbi and seek to change the rabbi’s mind. And to mark an essential point — that God is neither a Democrat nor a Republican.

The attempt to drive Rabbi Lookstein from offering a prayer in Cleveland is an instance of precisely the illiberalism of which the Republican nominee is often accused himself. So breasting it would be important. The rabbi, indeed, was to have concluded his prayer with a plea to the Father of All Mercies (to use Geo. Washington’s phrase for God) that ought to resonate with all parties to the American fray as they approach election day in November. The Rabbi was to have prayed:

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“Almighty God: We know that we are living in very dangerous times, when all of these blessings are threatened from without, by forces of terror and unimaginable brutality, and from within, by those who sow the seeds of bigotry, hatred and violence, putting our lives and our way of life at risk. And so we pray, Dear God: Help us to form a government which will protect us with sound strategy and steady strength; which will unite us with words of wisdom and acts of compassion; and which will thereby bring peace and harmony, safety and well-being to our beloved America and to all of humankind, and let us all say, Amen.”