Yesterday's Daily Bitachon...
Today we will discuss Tehilim chapter 37, pasuk ה
גּ֣וֹל עַל־ה׳ דַּרְכֶּ֑ךָ וּבְטַ֥ח עָ֝לָ֗יו וְה֣וּא יַעֲשֶֽׂה
Literally, this means,
Roll your ways onto God, rely on Him and He will do
The Radak explains that this means- roll all of your problems onto God. He will take care of them. Just like when you get to the airport, take your wheeled suitcases and roll them onto the conveyor belt and off they go, so too, take all of your wants and needs and roll them all to God.
Rely on Him, and He will finish it off for you.
Of course, we have to do our hishtadlut/effort. But here, we are talking about our minds. In our minds, we don’t have to carry our loads. Rav Chaim Volozhin add to this with a beautiful explanation: He says that there’s a difference between carrying something square, and carrying some thing around. When you have to carry something like an old trunk, or a very big box, it used to be a hassle. They had to be dragged.
But a barrel, you can just tap, and it will roll on its own. Rav Chaim says that when a person has bitachon, he still has to do something, but the weight is not on him. Hashem takes care of it, and he just has to tap it along, like a barrel that rolls. He doesn’t really have to carry it. It is not his worry or his headache.
Another explanation of the words “Roll your ways onto Hashem..” is that you have to start off Leshem Shamayim/ for the sake of Hashem. You have to think that you want to conquer this for the sake of Hashem, and even if you can’t see how you’ll get there in a natural way, you rely on Hashem to finish it off for you.
The Chasid Yaavetz says that David HaMelech was referring to a story that he experienced, when he had to fight again Goliat. David HaMelech told Goliat, “You are coming with your sword, but I am coming with the name of Hashem that you cursed.”
In other words, David HaMelech was saying, “I don’t have a natural way to beat you, but I’m coming Leshem Shamayim.”
When a person comes Leshem Shamayim, he has extra help and extra Siyata Dishmaya/ Divine assistance.
That is an added nuance so what it means to “roll,” it’s not a physical activity but rather, in your head, you direct things towards Hashem.
The basic explanation of the word גול Goll is to roll. But the root of this word Galeh can also mean “reveal.” A rabbi, the Maharash L’Bet Levi, quoted in the sefer Mikdash Me’at, says that when you go to the doctor, you have to share all your aches and concerns. “When I cough it bothers me,”
“I have an itch in my ear...”
Similarly, when a person sits down with a therapist, he has to share all of his worries, paranoias, anxieties, and all of his stories.
When you go to the professional, you have to tell him everything that is bothering you. And then, after you tell him everything that is bothering you, he can start coming up with his prescriptions.
And so, another way to explain this pasuk is…
גּ֣וֹל עַל־ה׳ דַּרְכֶּ֑ךָ
Reveal to Hashem all of your paths
Talk to Hashem, let it all out. Like it says, “If you have a worry in your heart share it with somebody.” And many commentaries say that this “somebody,” is Hashem. Tell Hashem all of the things that are bothering you, that you afraid to tell anybody else, about any challenges or concerns that you have. What you do about this or that? How will you handle that thing or the other? This sounds purposely vague, because everybody has their own “this,” and “that.”
Nonetheless, reveal it all to Hashem, because He is the doctor. He is the therapist. He is the mechanic. He is the contractor. He is the One that is going to take care of your problems.
And since you know that He is going to be the One taking care of it, you want to tell Him everything. The door stopper isn’t working, the air conditioner isn’t working etc. Whatever it is, He is the professional fix-it man. Reveal to Him all of your issues. Then,
וּבְטַ֥ח עָ֝לָ֗יו וְה֣וּא יַעֲשֶֽׂה
Rely on Him and He will do.
This pasuk, like all of the pesukim we have studied, has multiple explanations, and they are all beautiful.
-Roll the barrel, because the barrel will go with on its own. All you have to do is tap it to make sure it stays on track.
But it is not really weighing you down.
-Let the barrel roll with your bitachon.
-Reveal all of your problems to Hashem, and focus on Leshem Shamayim.
These are three beautiful explanations of this wonderful pasuk in tehilim.
Have a wonderful day.