Shalom Table
Content review
What “pending review” means
Shalom Table marks every text that a human advisor has not yet checked. This page explains what that banner is claiming, and what it is not.
The banner is about the process, not the text
When you open a blessing or a Torah passage in Shalom Table and see Pending review, it means exactly one thing: no rabbinic advisor has yet gone through that item and signed it off.
It is not a warning that the words are wrong. Hebrew liturgical text and scripture are reproduced verbatim from published editions, and every item records which edition it came from, under which license. The banner is there because reproducing a text accurately and having a qualified person confirm it is right for use at your table are two different things, and only the first has happened so far.
The short version
Pending review means: sourced, cited, licensed, and not yet checked by a person qualified to check it. Follow your household’s custom and your own community’s guidance.
Where the texts come from
Hebrew liturgy and scripture are drawn from Sefaria, pinned to a specific published edition rather than to whatever a default lookup returns. Every passage in the app displays its source, its edition, and its license beneath the text.
- Hebrew scripture — Tanach with Nikkud, public domain.
- Traditional English — the 1917 Jewish Publication Society translation, public domain.
- Modern English — the Metsudah Chumash (Metsudah Publications, 2009), used under CC BY with the attribution the license requires.
- Hebrew liturgy — Siddur Sefard and, where the wording differs, Siddur Ashkenaz and Siddur Edot HaMizrach, from public-domain and CC-licensed editions.
Where no usable translation exists under an acceptable license, the app ships the Hebrew and leaves the English absent rather than filling the gap. Nothing in Shalom Table’s liturgy or scripture is written, paraphrased, or completed by software.
Transliteration is derived, and says so
The Latin and Cyrillic transliterations are produced mechanically from the pointed Hebrew by a published rule set, not written by hand and not reviewed. They carry the same pending-review marking, and the app names the derivation in the source line beneath each text.
Rites are matched, and substitutions are disclosed
Not every blessing is in the app in every rite. When you have chosen a rite the app does not carry for a particular text, it serves the text it does have, tells you which rite that is, and points you to your own siddur — it never relabels one rite’s words as another’s.
Where the wording is the same across rites, the app says so instead of warning you. Those cases are established by comparing the shipped Hebrew word for word against a published siddur of that rite, ignoring only pointing and the printed form of the Divine Name. That is a factual comparison, not a ruling.
Discussion material is editorial, and separate
The family discussion material is written by Shalom Table. It is not liturgy, it is not presented as one, and it does not tell a household what it must do. Where it quotes a Torah passage, the quotation is checked character for character against the translation the app actually displays, so a quotation never sends you to a passage to find words that are not there.
What happens when an item is reviewed
Approval is recorded as data alongside each item rather than compiled into the app’s logic, and a reviewed item’s banner is removed in the next content update. Review is per item: one text being approved says nothing about the one next to it, and the app will not imply otherwise.
If you think something is wrong
Corrections are welcome and are read by a person. Please include the screen, the text, and what you expected instead.