Welcome to Embrace Shabbat. This week’s strategy is to focus on singing zemirot on Shabbat. We will share two beautiful thoughts that will serve as an incentive to focus more on singing zemirot Shabbat.
The Sfat Emet on Parshat Noach quotes the Midrash that explains a passuk in Tehillim: הוציאה ממסגר נפשי- take me out of the shackles of my soul, להודות את שמך, to praise Your name. He explains this idea with a passuk in Yechekel: ששת ימי המעשה יהיה סגור. There are two gates that are closed during the weekdays, that are only opened on Shabbat: the gates of heaven and the gates of a person’s heart. When the gates of heavens are opened, our hearts are opened as well; when those gates are locked, we are not able to praise Hashem. הוציאה ממסגר נפשי- when those locks are unlocked, both the locks from the gates of heaven and the locks of my soul, then להודות את שמך, I can praise Your name.
The Sfat Emet explains further with another passuk in Tehillim: פתחו לי שערי צדק, open for me the righteous gates, אבוא בם, I will go into them, אודה, and I will thank Hashem. Those gates, the שערי צדק, are open on Shabbat. In other words, on a regular weekday we don't have the capability to praise Hashem and unleash our true feelings. Only on Shabbat, when the נשמה יתירה comes down, then the shackles of our regular, mundane soul are unleashed and we are able to properly praise Hashem. That is our first incentive: on Shabbat, we have an ability to praise Hashem through the zemirot, something that we don’t have on a regular weekday.
Furthermore, there is a beautiful peirush from the Sefer Noam Elimelech: In the last mizmor in Tehillim, David HaMelech says the word הללוהו six different times in conjunction with different instruments. Those six הַֽ֭לְלוּהוּs refer to the six days of the week. Then comes the seventh one: כֹּ֣ל הַ֭נְּשָׁמָה תְּהַלֵּ֥ל קה. That כֹּ֣ל הַ֭נְּשָׁמָה is the praise that comes from a human being without any instruments; it is just a pure song. He also notes that the last passuk is repeated twice. Simply speaking, we say it twice because it is the end of Tehilim and at the end of a unit, we often repeat. The Sefer Noam Eliezer says that the reason why we repeat this passuk is because we have two neshamas on Shabbat. Because this seventh הלל refers to the הלל of a human being on Shabbat, we say it twice for the double Neshama and the double power that we have to praise Hashem. This praise comes without an instrument. A person is able to praise Shabbat on his own, without the need for additional assistance.
This idea is also brought down in the Sefer Torat Chesed, where he says that people might think that singing a song on a weekday is better than on Shabbat because it can include instruments. In truth however, the human song on Shabbat is greater. He says: יותר טוב כל האדם that is נשמע ביום השבת. There are no other sounds- it is just the pure human soul praising its creator. No physical activity, no instruments, no mundane aspects- it is a pure soul unleashed, and able to praise its Creator. Shabbat is the special time to sing and let out our Hallel.
The Midrash says that the words כֹּ֣ל הַ֭נְּשָׁמָה תְּהַלֵּ֥ל קה refer to כל הנשימה, every single breath. Rav Wolbe used to say that at the conclusion of David HaMelech’s Tehillim, he reached the ultimate understanding: a person should say a bracha on every breath that they take. (In practice, we would be saying brachot all day and Hashem does not require us to do this.) It is interesting to note that the Gemara in Mesechet Brachot comments that his passuk is the source for blessing on smell because smell is something that the soul benefits from. The passuk כֹּ֣ל הַ֭נְּשָׁמָה is the passuk of Shabbat because that is when a person reaches the level of understanding that they need to say thank you for every breath. Rav Wolbe used to say that if someone, lo aleinu, has an asthma attack or another breathing ailment, they would appreciate every single breath. That is the level that we can get to on Shabbat.
There is a story told of Rabbi Avigdor Miller, whose grandson once walked into his kitchen and saw Rabbi Miller’s head under the water in the sink. Rabbi Miller had filled the sink up to the top and put his head inside. He pulled it out after a few seconds or minutes and was gasping for air. His grandson did not understand what his grandfather was doing! Rabbi Miller said that he had just heard that the air in New York is polluted and for a moment, he didn’t appreciate New York air. Therefore, he wanted to show himself what it felt like to not even have “polluted air”. That way, he would appreciate Hashem’s air.
That is the ultimate כֹּ֣ל הַ֭נְּשָׁמָה. For every soul and every breath, I need to say thank you. This concept is infused into Shabbat, when we are gifted with our neshama yetaira. הוציאה ממסגר נפשי, the locks of my soul are taken off זה השער להשם- the gates are open, צדיקים יבואו בו.
Have a Shabbat Shalom.
