Gateway to Tefilla - The 3rd Halleluka - The Sweetness of Singing to Hashem

this torah class is brought to you by torahanytime.com okay as we prepare for parashat yusoy habalenolatova we're going to continue in our share on tefila the sherman feel are sponsored by reversal rose and family ben levy yitzchak and this month's learning the learning of his dedicated memory of mayor ben david um by mr and mrs david israeli of great neck is nisham ishmael be a male 7 for his whole family sadek so today we're going to be learning about the third halaluka halaluka ki toivzamra and we're going to be learning some of the thoughts of victor miller i do have to say that rob schwab's approach to thila has you know i don't want to go over the top changed my life yes it has changed my life it has changed the way i dauben my is infinitely more meaningful based on rip schwab's approach because now i have a structure i know what i'm doing and um according to rip schwab again sugar zimmer has five parts nega are the braiding of thila which is followed by ashrae where we praise that even for things that don't seem good in this world is the crowning glory of world history the akhira sayamim and therefore the five hallelujahs correspond to five eras of achros the first one corresponding to the era before the coming of the meshiach and it's telling us to trust only in god and don't be hopeful to false messianic fervor altiv but rather yearn for hashem the second halalukah is a reference to the coming of mashiach and it's the song of the ruach ashrae is the song of the guf the first hallelujah is the song of halali nafshi and the second halaluka is the song of the ruach ruach is a reference to the coming of meshiach and in this hallelujah we talk about all the blessings that will occur in the coming of mashiach there will be rain and god will teach us the new torah and according to rabb schwab the snowfall is the martial to how god will influence us with torah it won't be beyond our faculties it will be one crumb at a time now let's see the thoughts of harabah victor miller hallelujah it is good to sing to god now rav miller learns hallelujah means to be excited about praising hashem why should we be excited because it is good to sing to god now what does it mean it's good it doesn't mean that's good but lollipops are good and salami sandwiches are good and pizza is good and it's also good to sing to hashem no no means it is good and this is the only thing that is good not that it's one of many good things it's the only good to sing to our god our god means he's specifically associated with cloud israel this is a principle of miller says that is enunciated 165 times in the hamish now listen carefully what does not mean sweet why is it good to sing to hashem the answer number one is it's sweet now that means it's appropriate these these are two reasons why it's good to sing to hashem number one kinayim it is sweet what exactly is sweet about singingtashem says of miller there's sweetness in this world there's sweetness in the world to come praising hashem sweetens one's physical life a person wakes up in the morning says you know what huh a lousy day nothing nothing good i don't even expect anything good to happen today he gets up he brushes his teeth he gets dressed he walks out to shul and he's grumpy and he comes home and he eats breakfast and he's thinking you know nothing good is happening today nothing good is happening today there are billions of good things happen but he doesn't take the time to appreciate any of them and if you don't appreciate something it's as if you don't have it i'll give you a massage if i told you hey pal you know for the last 50 years there's a treasure chest under the floor bed in your bedroom see really and you run upstairs you open up and sure enough there's treasure there with a billion dollars what good did it do for you for the last 50 years it did you no good you know why because you didn't know about it so it's the same thing in life if a person has benefits and they don't think about it and they don't appreciate it then they don't get any benefit from it so if a person doesn't stop and say no then why would a person be happy they could see if they don't think about it and if a person doesn't say then why would a person get any joy from wearing clothing if they don't stop and appreciate it and if a person didn't not just say the person before davening they take a cup of water and they say baruch hashem like and they drink the water wow what a great day it is i had a cup of water today and what if a person never stopped and inhaled and said coil hanashama tahal ka halaluka so they could be inhaling the whole day and never get any joy from it so therefore it is very sweet to sing to hashem because by swinging singing to hashem it sweetens your life because it forces you to appreciate what hashem gave you praise hashem sweden's physical life because by expressing gratitude for whatever he receives a man gains a keen appreciation and a deep enjoyment of thousands of true material pleasures which other men possess but ignore and therefore do not enjoy it is impossible to drink deeply from the cup of happiness unless one invests effort to study what he has and to express deep gratitude ceaselessly to the giver you think god wants us to make a hundred blessings a day for him it does nothing for him god says i want to give you a hundred forms of happiness a day therefore by you thanking me for all of these benefits it's making your life a better life so it sweden's one's physical life and secondly it also sweetens the afterlife because you gain a heightened awareness of hakadosh baruch and anyone who sings to hashem in this world is rewarded that hosing hashem in the world to come the endless joy of the afterlife is reserved for those who utilize this earthly life to acquire true knowledge so the the first reason why it is good to sing tashem is number one because it's sweet it sweetens your physical life and it sweetens your afterlife and number two it's good to sing to hashem is because it's fitting not only is it sweet but it's true meaning god deserves it god deserves that we devote our entire life just to thank him and to praise him so not only is thanking hashem going to bring us happiness and success in this world and the next world but it's truth it's truth it's fitting you can never overdo it the league doula as much as you're going to thank and praise hashem you haven't even begin to scratch the surface whatever we say is an understatement he's fearsome in praise now let's focus on the following line yerushalayim hashem the builder of jerusalem is god this is a very important principle you know why we praise only hashem because whatever happens in the world he's the only one who did it david looked out from the window of his palace and he saw jerusalem full of buildings big and small and could have caught thought look i conquered the city from the ivusi and i built it up it used to be a gentile city and i brought the jews back here and i made it a metropolis but david said who built yerushalayim yerushalayim hashem he gave us the city he gave us the idea to build it up he gave us the artisans and the materials he gave skill to the workmen he's the builder now he gathers the dispersed of israel david sees all the happy throngs of jews in jerusalem where jews were free of fearing their enemies because of all the fortu fortifications and because of those walls that dove had built the city was teeming so david could have thought look i built up you shalim i brought the jewish people back no david said nidhi israel and he gives the happiness he gives us the security to all of claudia so who lives there now this is very this is amazing you know some people they have large families so they have you know five kids seven kids ten kids and then they could have um you know a hundred grand grandchildren kanai nahara i have a great uncle he has uh you know over a hundred great-grandchildren someone who has over a hundred great-grandchildren i know you know i i've read about uh women sometimes you know in williamsburg and they have um they get married very young and they before they pass away they have over a thousand descendants do you think this lady in her 90s knows the name of all a thousand of her great great grandchildren highly doubtful i i don't know if too many great-grandparents could name all their great-grandchildren so there's so many star let's talk about the stars the enormous number of stars and their random seemingly random disposition are part of a grand and calculated plan their number and their positions are ordained purposely by the creator the existence of each of the trillions of heavenly bodies and its precise position position in space are four ordained and are essential they show hashem's power number one the almost infinite number of stars far beyond anyone's ability to calculate so the number of stars are infinite and the distance the vast distance between the stars traveling at the speed of light one's lifetime would not provide a person enough time to get from one star to the next so you think about it think about a creator who created an infinite number of stars and the space between one star and the other would not even provide someone traveling at the speed of light a lifetime would not provide the amount of time it would take when you think of that you see you have a little yuras harimamus of the sheer power of the of the creator their infinite number of stars let's say somebody were able to fly from start to star now that would take forever and he would just write down one two three four if when he got to star 7 000 and he could name the name of every star you'd it would be a marvel and yet the creator created trillions of stars and he knows each one of their names and he can in one moment and he knows each one's characteristic and he doesn't lose sight of anyone name doesn't just mean the name pluto neptune it means specification size chemical composition color no detail is lost to the creator then we say noisein shellag katsamer this is one of my favorite ideas why do we say god gives snow he gives snow where is he giving us something is he giving us a gift yes snow is a gift like the gemara says in tightness snow is better for the mountains than five rains especially snow is good for the mountains it clings to the sides now what's the metaphor he gives snow like wool like wool means number one snow is white like well because snow is white like wool it re it repels the sun rays like white and therefore rav miller writes in one of his other books that it's very important that snow is white if it would be blue it would melt very quickly and it would be too much water for the earth to absorb absorb and it would cause flooding and it would just run off and never be absorbed so god made it white white repels the sun and it melts very very very slowly so it covers the earth and it provides water for the earth for months and months and months every farmer knows that if his farms if his fields are not covered in a blanket of snow then they will dehydrate in the winter furthermore cesar miller it's also fluffy like snot like wool and it doesn't conduct heat and it's such a it's a perfect insulation because without the snow the top soil would freeze and if the topsoil freezes all the denizens and all the microorganisms would die and they would not be able to till the soil and the soil would die so god puts a blanket of snow on the ground and that blanket doesn't melt and it insulates the ground so that all the worms and all the microorganisms could stay alive and continue to care for the soil and it protects the roots otherwise all the roots will die and the snow blankets the earth like wool it's like a sweater god gives a sweater a sweatshirt a blanket a coat to the earth even the beasts spend the winter under the warm mantle of snow thus david voices a great praise the creator who gives such a precious gift which serves as a blanket for the earth all winter and in the spring when the new plants need moisture the blanket melts away gradually and gives drink to the soil noise inshallah summer kefir can eat for your father he scatters frost like ashes i would like to offer just one basic interpretation that god scatters the frost like ashes similar to what we said in the past if you ever were on the highway after a snowstorm if the car in front of you makes a short stop and all the snow on his roof goes into the car behind him it's very dangerous there could be like a foot of snow on top of the car in front of you and it's not even falling from so high up imagine if instead of little pieces of snow snowballs came down from heaven they would basically be like meteor meteors they would make holes in the roof they would make holes in the car they they would casa shelby could injure or kill people even if they would be the size of a a pebble big hail you know when i was in texas all the pickup trucks have little dents in them from the hill at hell's a lot in texas but what does god do he makes these little fuzzy fluffy light crumbs come down from heaven like ashes so it not only doesn't it hurt it actually feels good when the snow hits you on the skin so maybe that's what it means kefar ka fairy fazer he scatters frost like ashes bro miller says frost covers the soil protects it from the cold but not like the puffed up air-filled snow like ash is scattered over a bed of coals to prevent them from burning out the frost caked over the soil protects it from the extreme cold the effect of snow is not perfect for as soft and can melt but the surface of the snow which is covered by a layer of frost protects both the snow in the soil now we know that this chapter of tehillim um ends off that god teaches the torah to call israel what's that got to do with the snow so last week we learned from schwab that when mashiach comes god will reveal to us the raw torah on high which is such an awesome body of wisdom that we cannot uh that we cannot assimilate it we cannot understand unless god feeds it to us in little small pieces like this now but rav miller says something really beautiful this chapter of tehillim ends off that god gave the jewish people the great gift of the torah the torah and prophecy are the greatest of gifts but there's an important reason why they're mentioned at the end of all the benefits given by hashem why do we first have to talk about the rain and talk about the snow and talk about all the other gifts god gives us and only then thank hashem for the torah and the answer says rav miller it is impossible for one to be sufficiently grateful for the gift of torah unless he is first fully aware of the gifts that the creator gives us in common with all men one cannot be grateful for the benefit of being a jew unless he is first grateful for the benefit of being a living human being just like we know daracharat's kadmala torah so too the awareness of the regular physical benefits have to precede the awareness of spiritual benefits before you could be grateful to god for the torah you first have to be grateful for sleep for food for drink for air for the senses and all the gifts of life because because it's easier to appreciate the physical benefits it requires less less effort and less intelligence and it's more basic even the intellectual benefits of the physical phenomenon they precede appreciation for the torah because these are benefits that apply to all of mankind therefore after enumerating the praises of hashem and specifying at length his kindness is we thank hashem for the rain and for the snow and for eyesight and for clothing we say and you know what hashem thank you for the greatest benefit of all maggi devara of lyakov the benefit of the torah that he gave to call israel but before that we talk about the praise of prophecy which is also a demonstration that the shrina rests with claus israel maggi devarav even though devarav includes the words of the torah and the stories of the torah but devarav also refers to the prophecy and prophecy is also another great gift that only klaus israel were worthy of that hashem communicated directly with our ancestors abraham yaakov and we say maggid he tells not he told magid constantly even today hashem speaks to israel through the words of torah and they are just as important to us and just as obligatory as if we heard them today from his mouth so this is the great chapter next time you say hallelujah it is good to sing to hashem number one kinayim it makes life sweeter number two kinava it is true god is deserving of it and hashem should give us siata de shmaya to take advantage of the opportunities of all these beautiful chapters of tehillim and we shall always be zaika to sing to hashem okay everyone have a wonderful shabbos all the best shabbat shalom cult of you've just experienced another torah class brought to you by torahanytime.com