Inspiration, Shirah, and Organization
Years ago, I had the tremendous z’chus to have a seder in Sha’arei Teshuvah with Harav Beryl Weisbord shlit”a, the mashgiach of Ner Yisroel. We had a certain conversation frequently, with variations. It generally went something like this: “Rebbi, we’ve just read the Rabbeinu Yonah, who says that I have to improve my davening! His words are so serious! I want to make a kabbalah: From now on, every word of tefillah I say has to have proper kavanah, if it takes me an hour!”
I was very young then - I think I was 35. You can probably guess what the rebbi used to say to me. “Dear yingel, that's so beautiful what you want to do, but this not the way to do it. That won't work. Take small steps. Here - once a day, pick a bracha to concentrate on. One bracha. Try it for a week, and then we'll talk again.”
We cannot make kabbalos that are far above our madregah.
Now there was something else the rebbi might say. “You feel you want to pray with a lot of kavanah? Pray! Don't make any kaballah, you don't have to make a fuss about it, don't have to tell anyone – just do it, just daven. It's almost time for Maariv now, yingel. Use that inspiration. Just for today, make this tefillah the very best davening you've ever had.”
Just for today you feel like skipping lunch and learning straight through to mincha – go ahead. Just for today you think you might like to visit some people in the old-age home you're passing – go ahead and visit. Act on your inspiration.
Listen to a Rashi:
"Az yashir Moshe – it's in the future tense; Moshe will sing. Says Rashi, It means, it rose up in his heart to sing...and then he did it."
A little further on, Rashi adds a second peirush:
"But our sages said in a Midrash: This is a remez to techias hameisim from the Torah. In the future, Moshe will sing."
So: Moshe thought to sing; then he did it. Two stages. When Israel looked out at the bodies of the Egyptians who had been so cruel to them, who had died, when they finally saw and understood the whole panorama of Hashem's providence over them throughout their exile in Egypt from beginning to end – they wanted to sing to him. Do you think that the B’nei Yisrael stayed on that level for the rest of their lives? But right then, that is how they felt.
I want to ask a question. Why should we follow our inspirations? Most of the time I don't feel this way. I'm not on that level; it's not really me. The truth is, it is really me. People are very complicated, with contradictory natures, yeitzer hatov and yeitzer hara. Which of them is dominant depends on the issue. For something that is way beyond my level, I still have a yeitzer hatov to do it. But it's usually buried way down deep underneath a much more powerful yeitzer hara. Nevertheless, it is really there, and it’s really me. When it manages to pop up, to peek out for a moment, we have to take advantage! As they say, “Make hay while the sun shines.” Chap arein! Do it! If you do it, that will strengthen that yeitzer hatov; next time it will come back a little bit sooner.
There's a gemara in Sanhedrin that tells a sad story. Chizkiyahu Hamelech was worthy to become meshiach. When he woke that morning, and he saw that Yerushalayim was saved. The huge, invincible army of Sancherib had been completely wiped out in one night! And he thought of leading Israel in singing Shirah. He should have. I don't know why he didn't. Maybe he thought they weren't ready. But right then they could have done it.
The mishnah in the fourth perek of Pesachim mentions three things that Chizkiyahu did that our sages did not approve of. First, to appease the king of Ashur, he cut off the precious doors of the heichal and sent them to him as tribute. And then when the siege did come, he blocked up the Gichon spring. A normal thing to do in a siege, to deprive the enemy of a water source. But our sages did not approve. He was an incomparably great man, King Chizkiyahu. He might have become meshiach! But he should have had more trust in Hashem. This was a wrong approach - that wasn't the way we were going to win that war.
These first two mistakes seem to be some level of lacking in bitachon, or maybe a failure to appreciate history in the making. The third thing listed there in the Mishnah seems to be of a very different type. Iber Nisan b'Nisan; on the first of Nisan, when it's too late already, he proclaimed a leap year and made it into Adar Sheini. Sounds like a violation of some detail, some kind of technicality.
Listen. It's not different. Nisan had arrived, the month of ge'ulah, of redemption. He decided things weren't ready; spring hadn't quite arrived yet.
You can't do that. When ge'ulah comes, you have to jump on board. You're not allowed to push it away.
I'm going to finish with the other explanation that Rashi brought: remez l'techias hameisim from the Torah. What is techias hameisim? It's when death will be removed forever, when the yetzer hara will be destroyed. Today a man is complicated, with negative parts burying some of the good. Then it'll be different. The yeitzer hara will be stripped away. All the good parts of us, the parts that are now mostly buried, they'll all be revealed; that's all there will be then. Az yashir – that's the time when inspiration and singing Shirah will come naturally to us.