Saturday, September 04, 2004
Was sitting at the Shabbat table with family today, and they wanted to finish reading all the Tehillim [Psalms]. The way this works is, the entire book is broken up into several small booklets, each containing five or six Psalms.
This is normally not the kind of thing I go for, if I'm in a synagogue and the time is limited. Because my reading is that slow, and I want to do it right. This is especially true when the booklets handed out are the Zohar, which is written in Aramaic, slowing my reading down to 40% to 50% of its already slow pace. And is incomprehensible. At least with Tehillim, one can seize some meaning here and there.
But this was a Sephardic dinner table, which meant noone was going anywhere, anytime soon. So I took a couple.
HaShem had mercy on me, as I discovered that most of the Tehillim I was reading were from pesukei de-zimerah (which we read each morning before sha'harith) and the Psalms from Kabbalath Shabbath (which we read each Friday evening). So they were not so tough.
No real point here, except that among them was a choice passage, which showed the real Providence of the situation:
You will arise and show Tsion mercy, for the time to favor her, for the appointed time will have come.
For your servants have cherished her stones and favour her dust. (Tehillim 102:14-15)
Which means, basically, according to the Gaon of Vilna, that the ingathering of the exiles and the triumph of Israel will come as a result of the Jewish people coming here, loving even the stones and the dust here, and doing mitsvoth that are dependent upon being here (Kol HaTor).
Pinḥas Ivri 21:09