Shabbat Archives - Bayit: Building Jewish

This rendering of Psalm 92 was written by Rabbi Ben Newman. In his Kabbalat Shabbat siddur he notes that the psalm’s function is “[t]o inspire feelings of relaxed celebration and the joy of gathering in community for a break from our workaday week. Also to open the channels in our psyche to let creativity flow.”

His instructions are: “Take a deep breath. Listen to the music. Tap your foot to the rhythm. When you are ready, join the musicians in singing the song. Lose yourself in the music.”

This can be used for solo davenen (prayer) or in community. If you want to play along or share this with other musicians, the chords are Bm, F#, G, D, F# — and if you happen to know the first track of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Hamilton, you’ll recognize the chord progression.

Recorded at Shtiebel. If you can’t see the embedded audio, try visiting this post at its own URL: https://yourbayit.org/92-newman

תהילים צ”ב / Psalm 92: Relaxing into the Shabbat Vibe

A ballad, a Song, a ditty for shabbat.
An anthem, a chorale, some funky rock.

A hymn a chant, and a lullaby
As the shabbos day is drawing nigh

It is good to give thanks to Yah our God
To sing to your exalted name

How great are you works Adonai
How deep are your thoughts oh one on high

The righteous will blossom like a palm,
Grow like the cedar of Lebanon

Their gray hair shall be their crown
New and ripe their songs will sound.

Showing that Yah is constant
My rock the One who is no nonsense.

By Rabbi Ben Newman, with a hat-tip to Lin-Manuel Miranda for the chords.

One of the challenges of convening a group for prayer over Zoom is shifting gears into sacred space.

How can we sanctify the space where each of us is planted, knowing that as we shelter-in-place during the pandemic, our desks or dining tables or coffee tables serve purposes both secular and sacred? The table from which I’m joining the Zoom call might be the same table where I paid bills an hour ago, or folded laundry, or homeschooled my kid. How can we skillfully make that space feel holy when it’s time for prayer?

And how can we sanctify the placeless place of the Zoom room itself? A Zoom room doesn’t have the comfort or majesty or familiarity of a synagogue. We may associate Zoom spaces with committee meetings and other secular activities, not the sacred purpose of prayer. And a Zoom room isn’t a “place,” exactly, any more than the internet is a “place.” How can we make that “place” holy and fitting to hold a community gathering in prayer?

At a recent digital Shabbaton convened to explore these questions, we used this chant by Rav Kohenet Taya Mâ Shere for both of these purposes. We sang it as a call-and-response. (Participants were muted, but the two of us sang the back-and-forth, inviting the community to sing along with the response half of the chant.) We sang it explicitly to sanctify the physical place from which each of us was calling in and to sanctify the Zoom space.

We used this chant as our melodic and thematic throughline. We sang it at the start of services, during the d’var Torah (The Mishkan’s Next Digital R/Evolution, on this very theme), and again to close the service and seal our time together. The call-and-response linked us together across nine different states and two different countries. And the words reminded us that where we are is holy — where we are in the world and in our homes and in our bodies, and where we are in the space of the internet and our hearts’ interconnection.

מה נורא המקום הזה/ Mah nora hamakom hazeh

How awesome is this body!

How awesome is this place!

How awesome is this journey

Through time and space.

(If you can’t see the embedded audio player, try going to this post directly at yourbayit.org/makom/.)

Chant by Rav Kohenet Taya Mâ Shere. Her albums include Wild Earth Shebrew, Halleluyah All Night, Torah Tantrika and This Bliss; find her music at her website.

Post by Rabbi Rachel Barenblat and Rabbi David Markus.

Posts

Psalm 92 by Rabbi Ben Newman

Mah Nora HaMakom Hazeh – a chant for (digital) sacred space