We are winding down on our Az Yashir classes and the last pasuk (seemingly) is,
ה׳ ימלוך לעולם ועד
Hashem Yimloch L’Olam VaEd
Hashem should be King forever.
In the siddur, we repeat this pasuk a second time, and we translate with the Targum (the Aramaic translation) as God’s kingdom is standing forever, forever and ever.
This pasuk shows up in the introduction to the Amida prayers of Shaharit, before we start our main prayers. We make the Beracha of Geula in Shaharit, and say,
שִׁירָה חֲדָשָׁה שִׁבְּחוּ גְאוּלִים לְשִׁמְךָ גדול עַל שפַת הַיָּם. יַחַד כֻּלָּם הודוּ וְהִמְלִיכוּ וְאְָמְרוּ: ה' יִמְלךְ לְעולָם וָעֶד:
A new song was sung by those that were redeemed- to Your great name together. They all said thank You and they made You king and said, Hashem Yimloch L’Olam VaEd… גאל חשראל
So, as we start our Amida, we're supposed to repeat the pasuk, “Hashem Yimloch L’Olam V’Ed,” because with those words, we coronated God for the first time. And in Baruch SheAmar tefilah, we praise Hashem with praises and song and will make You great…, “V’Namlichach/ and we will coronate You”
Where does that V’Namlichach come from? Where do we coronate Hashem? It’s from Az Yashir, when we said, Hashem Yimloch LOlam VaEd.
In Arbit too,, we say, “Your kingdom, Hashem our God, they saw Your kingdom…”
And those of us that are sticklers are bothered by something- why is the introduction to Arbit different than the introduction to Shaharit? At night, we say, “We saw Your kingdom,” whereas in the morning, we say, “We sang a song to Your great name on Sefat Hayam,” but we don't mention anything about seeing Your kingdom.
(These are nuances. Another nuance, which I once saw, is that in the morning we say, “The God of the host is our Savior. But at night, we say, “God redeemed..” Why is it that we quote two different pesukim before the words Ga’al Yisrael im Arbit and Shaharit? I once did a lot of research on this question but did not find a satisfactory answer. So if anyone out there, has an answer, you're welcome to send it in to Rabbisutton@gmail.com)
Getting back to our story, there's yet another important time of the year where we quote this pasuk Hashem Yimloch L’Olam VaEd- in our Rosh Hashana Malchuyot prayers, when we say ten pesukim of kingdom, and the first of those ten Pesukim is
Hashem Yimloch L’Olam VaEd, because the splitting of the sea caused us to see God's kingdom.
At that time, we said Hashem Yimloch...Hashem will in the future. But our rabbis explain that there's something called the present constant, it can mean, “He is, was and will be,” and that's why we say, every morning at the beginning of our Pesukei D’Zimra, Hashem Melech, Hashem Malach, Hashem Yimloch, God is king. Hashem was king.Hashem will be king.. L’Olam VaEd.
These are three different pesukim, but our rabbis say they’re all found in our pasuk, and that realization that came at Keriat Yam Suf – we saw how God is the King, and God is the boss.
So, every single day when we say Az Yaahir, it's supposed to bring us to a feeling of V’Namlichach, that we're going to make Hashem king over us.
We say it at night and in the morning, but not at Mincha time, because Ga’al Yisrael is really a continuation from the remembering of Yetziat Mitzrayim that we do in Keriat Shema, which we say in the morning and at night (but not in the afternoon).
All of this is to say that this is an extremely important pasuk, and we're supposed to pause and contemplate Hashem's power and kingdom, accept upon ourselves His kingdom, and realize that He’s in charge. That's the ultimate message of Az Yashir- walking away with that feeling of Hashem’s Malchut/Kingdom.
Have a wonderful day.