IT’S TIME TO SING

There are moments in Jewish history that feel like closure — but at the same time, we’re never quite sure whether they really are. The realist in us immediately whispers a note of caution: don’t celebrate too much, don’t get carried away, something else is bound to happen. Disaster, after all, always seems to be lurking just around the corner.

And that leaves us with a genuine dilemma. When a moment feels like a high point, what is the right response? Do we allow ourselves to celebrate, to feel relief and gratitude — or do we hold back, bracing ourselves for whatever might come next?

This past week brought a moment that captures that tension perfectly. The body of hostage Ran Gvili was returned to Israel from Gaza, and after two-and-a-half years of crying, praying, and hoping, all the hostages are finally home. It is an extraordinary moment — and in truth, even more than that.

With Ran Gvili’s return, for the first time since 2014 there are no Israelis, alive or dead, being held in Gaza. That fact matters. It matters emotionally, nationally, and spiritually. It is a moment of genuine relief, a moment of gratitude — a chance, finally, to breathe again after so many years of tension and uncertainty.

And yet, nobody seriously believes the story is over. Even as this chapter closes, the background noise grows louder. Another military confrontation with Iran seems to be hovering on the horizon. The United States fleet is positioned in force in the Gulf. There are ominous rumblings, stark warnings, and unmistakable signs of preparation.

The prevailing sense is not that we have reached the end of the journey, but that we have simply arrived at one more milestone along a very long and uncertain road.

So the question is this: should we be celebrating or not? When a moment like this arrives, do we allow ourselves to pause — to feel relief, to acknowledge goodness, to be grateful for what has been achieved? Or do we immediately brace ourselves for whatever may be coming next, worried that if we relax even briefly, we are somehow being naïve?

The answer to that question sits right at the heart of Parshat Beshalach, and it’s worth paying attention to because it speaks to far more than just the mood we should be in this week.

It emerges from the song the Jewish people sing immediately after the most dramatic miracle of all — the splitting of the Red Sea, their escape to safety, and the sight of the Egyptian army disappearing beneath the returning waters, the threat from their genocidal intent finally and decisively removed.

And yet, when you stop to think about it, the timing of the song is deeply puzzling. This was not the end of the journey. Not all the dangers have passed. Amalek is still waiting in the wings. Hunger and thirst lie ahead. The Torah has not yet been given. The Promised Land has not yet been reached, let alone conquered.

So why sing now? Why not wait until everything has been settled, until every loose end has been tied up, and only then sing a song?

The answer is that the song they sang was not a victory song. It was a song of perspective. It acknowledged the good that had taken place even when the journey was clearly not over.

The splitting of the sea was never meant to signal that Jewish vulnerability had come to an end. It was meant to teach the Jewish people how to see history itself.

You can live focused entirely on the long game, telling yourself that nothing is really worth celebrating until everything is finally in place — and that happiness must wait for some future moment of complete resolution.

Or you can recognize that history unfolds through a series of twists and turns, some of them painful, some of them uplifting, and that when a good turn arrives, it deserves to be marked and celebrated, even as we ready ourselves for the next challenge and the next pressure point.

And once you understand that, you sing. Not because the danger has disappeared, but because fear and anxiety no longer get to define the moment.

That, perhaps, is the deepest lesson of Shabbat Shira — and one of the most enduring lessons of Jewish history itself. Judaism does not ask us to wait for perfect endings before expressing gratitude. It teaches us to find our voice even while the story is still unfolding, and to sing precisely when we find ourselves in the middle of the journey.

This idea also offers one of the most compelling responses to those who struggle to acknowledge the State of Israel as a profound miracle in the life of the Jewish people. The argument is familiar: Mashiach has not yet come, they say, and the Beit HaMikdash has not yet been rebuilt. In other words, when those things happen — then we will celebrate.

The instinct behind that position is understandable, but it misses something deeply Jewish. Az Yashir Moshe teaches us a foundational lesson: we celebrate at every stage of the journey.

We sing and rejoice as each chapter unfolds. We do not need to wait for Mashiach, for the rebuilding of the Beit HaMikdash, or for history to finally settle down before allowing ourselves moments of joy, gratitude, and thanksgiving.

The clearest expression of this idea appears in a song we all know very well — it’s one we sing every year at the Pesach Seder: Dayeinu. Dayeinu is a strange song when you think about it. At every stage of the Exodus, the song’s lyrics say: If God had only done this — it would have been enough.

If God would have just taken us out of Egypt — Dayeinu.

If God would have just split the sea — Dayeinu.

If God would have just given us the manna — Dayeinu.

If God would have just brought us to Sinai — Dayeinu.

And then we sing the hearty chorus. It’s the jolliest song of Seder night.

But of course, it wouldn’t really have been “enough.” Without the next step, the story would be incomplete.

And that’s precisely the point. Singing Dayeinu is not about stopping the journey. It’s about pausing the march long enough to sing. At each stage, we acknowledge the joy of *this* moment, celebrate *this* victory, recognize *this* kindness — and then we move forward, ready for whatever comes next, and when the next step arrives, we sing again.

Judaism understands something about human psychology that we often forget: we have a habit of living nervously. We are anxious by default, concerned by reflex, always scanning the horizon for the next threat. And while vigilance has kept us alive, it has also clouded our capacity to fully experience goodness when it arrives.

Shabbat Shira pushes back against that instinct. It tells us that faith does not mean denying danger, and it certainly does not mean pretending everything is fine. Faith means recognizing moments of light even when the road ahead remains uncertain. It means refusing to let anxiety steal every ounce of joy from the present.

The Jewish people didn’t sing at the sea because the journey was over. They sang because, for one moment, they understood that they were not walking alone — and understanding that was reason enough to lift their voices. And then they kept going.

And perhaps the most important point of all is this: living life this way is not just emotionally healthier — it is the true secret of greatness. Rabbi Yitzchok Hutner writes in one of his letters, printed in Igrot u’Ketavim (letter 128) – in response to a student who was struggling with his inability to fully conquer the challenges of his life – that the popular image of spiritual greatness is deeply misleading.

We tend to imagine the great figures of Jewish history as people who rose steadily and smoothly, without interruption or setback. In reality, Rav Hutner explains, the very opposite is true. The towering rabbinic luminaries we admire most did not become great through uninterrupted success. Their lives were marked by struggle, disappointment, and repeated failure.

What distinguished them was not that they never fell, but that they knew how to recognize progress when it appeared, to draw strength from each hard-won achievement, and to celebrate moments of growth even while the larger journey was still very much unfinished.

Those who knew Rabbi Avraham Yitzchak HaCohen Kook describe something striking about him. Even during the bleak early years of the Yishuv, when poverty was widespread, ideological tensions were sharp, and the future of the Jewish return to the Land of Israel felt anything but secure, Rav Kook was known to sing.

Not only at moments of celebration, but while walking the dusty roads of the country, visiting struggling farmers, and carrying the weight of endless communal conflict on his shoulders. His students, among them Rav David Cohen — the Nazir — describe how song and melody were not a diversion from Rav Kook’s seriousness, but an expression of it.

Rav Kook wrote explicitly that joy and song are not rewards reserved for the end of redemption, but forces that help bring redemption into being. In his writings, he explains that when a person waits for everything to be fixed before allowing themselves joy, the song may never come at all.

The ability to sing in the midst of uncertainty is not denial — it is faith. It is a way of affirming that even an incomplete moment of progress is worthy of gratitude.

That is the key difference between despair and faith. Despair says: when the story is finished, I will rejoice. Faith says: this step forward is enough to sing — and now, strengthened by that song, we take the next step.

That, in its deepest sense, is Dayeinu thinking. Not stopping the journey, but pausing long enough to recognize the goodness of this moment, before continuing on.

And so the message of Shabbat Shira is not meant only for great leaders or towering spiritual figures — it is meant for all of us. Ran Gvili has been brought home, to where he belongs. We have our country. We have our community. We have one another. And we have hope.

The next challenge may not be far off — Jewish history rarely grants us long periods of calm — but that cannot be a reason to withhold gratitude or joy. Right now, there is enough to sing about. And strengthened by that song, with full hearts and spirited souls, we can face whatever comes next.