Those Who Sing Pray Twice

Hanging to my left on the wall in my office is this card:
 
                "Those Who Sing Pray Twice."

Like most of what I am surrounded by (G!d forbid this should ever include the loved ones in my life), I take little day to day notice of. But I couldn't help gain some new insight into what this quote may mean in the light of this week's Torah portion, Parshat Chukat.

The most famous instance that we find B'nai Yisrael breaking into spontaneous song is after its perilous flight from Egypt and its subsequent crossing of the sea. 
The Song of the Sea begins:  
אָז יָשִׁיר-מֹשֶׁה וּבְנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל אֶת-הַשִּׁירָה הַזֹּאת  (Exodus 15:1)
Then sang Moshe, and all the Israelites with him, this song...

So too in Pasrhat Chukat do we find Israel breaking into song after another act of Divine salvation, this time from the hands of the Amalekites (disguised, according to Rashi, as Cannanites):אָז יָשִׁיר יִשְׂרָאֵל, אֶת-הַשִּׁירָה הַזֹּאת  (Numbers 21:17)
Then did Israel sing this song....(doo-daa, doo-da)

What is the connection? A line from Psalms gave me a clue:
לַיהוָה הַיְשׁוּעָה עַל-עַמְּךָ בִרְכָתֶךָ סֶּלָה.  (Psalms 3:9)
Rescue is the Lord's! On Your people your blessing (Alter translation)

The midrash on this psalm helped me understand somethng new. Midrash Tehillim unpacks this line to mean “for all the miracles you do for us it is our obligation to sing songs for you” According to the midrash then, a blessing = a song.     


As the card says:
                                      "Those Who Sing Pray Twice."

In a more modern context, from where does spontaneous song arise? In a beautiful interview, Roseanne Cash, the daughter of the legendary musician and songwriter Johnny Cash, comments on her music writing process:

"I think that when you're in that creative zone, you're tapping into the collective unconscious, and that there's a field there. I think that's the unified field, that creative vast unconsciousness full of beauty and love. And when you're in the zone, as a writer, as a painter, as a cook--any creative endeavor--you can draw on it. Sometimes I feel like the songs are already out there...
It's not that way with all of them...(but) some of them are infused with the radiance of truth, and those are the ones that I think come from that unified field, from God, from what I think of as God. That doesn't mean I'm extra special, by the way. That means everyone has access to it."

Collective unconscious, unified field, שמע ישראל. B'nai Yisrael breaks into song after rescue because it is for them, as it is for me, a moment in which my senses are in a heightened state of awareness. I'm more tuned in, and channel provides better reception. I'm in the zone.


May we all be blessed to sing our song, whether it rise up in times of plenty or in times of trouble. And may our songs be drawn from the Infinite well, a song that in turn draws us back to our source. 



                                        "Those Who Sing Pray Twice."

---