Did the Sabbath Compose Her Own Poem?
Ps. 92:1
Some Psalms are more popular than others, having been chosen over time as the official poems recited at funerals or feasts. Today’s psalm was already composed with popularity in mind and it is indeed beloved and well known, sung with gusto in most synagogues on Friday nights, as the Sabbath begins.
It is the Psalm of the Sabbath. And yet there is a lingering mystery about its authorship.
Did the anonymous poets of the Psalms compose it for the band of Levites at the temple? One mythical tradition ascribes it to Adam -- the first human, who composed it just as the first Sabbath descended on Eden - and upon earth. And there’s yet another wild mythic suggestion - that this psalm was composed by the Sabbath Queen herself.
Why all the mythic speculation?
It has to do with a single letter that frames the psalm at the top and often eludes translations:
מִזְמ֥וֹר שִׁ֗יר לְי֣וֹם הַשַּׁבָּֽת׃
A psalm. A song; for the sabbath day.
Ps. 92:1
The English word ‘for’ , most often used by translators, assumes that the role of the Hebrew letter ‘Lamed’ that precedes the Hebrew “Sabbath Day” identifies the psalm as dedicated to the sacred day. But there is more than one way to make sense of this letter.
Dr. AJ Berkovitz helps to unpack what this is all about:
“Of the 150 Psalms that populate Sefer Tehillim, 116 of them contain titles. Many of them, such as the hard-to-translate gittit and michtam, likely denote the ancient musical setting to which the psalm was performed. Other titles attempt to historically contextualize the content of a psalm.
Many of the remaining titles list a person associated with the psalm or the occasion upon which the psalm was sung.
The most common element within a title is li’David.
But, how can we best translate this? Lamed in biblical Hebrew can have a slew of meanings, such as: to/ for/ about/ from the genre of/one of.
Thus, li’David can mean that David composed the text that follows; someone composed the poem in honor of David; the psalm is about David; the following is from a collection of works attributed to David; or the poem is written in a genre associated with David. Oftentimes, we cannot determine the best meaning.
Psalm 92’s mizmor shir le’yom HaShabbat “A Psalm, a song lamed the day of Shabbat” should be easier to translate.
Presumably, the title indicates that Psalm 92 is to be sung on Shabbat. Verse 3 supports this assumption by listing the instruments that accompany the words of the poem.
While the simplest translation of le’yom HaShabbat is “for/on the Sabbath day”; namely, a poem the Levites sing to celebrate Shabbat, Jewish tradition revels in the creative possibilities of the ambiguous lamed.”
Dr. Berkovitz’s helpful framing invites a closer exploration of some of these creative possibilities, accumulated over the centuries as sages probed over the grammar - and the joy of Sabbath continued to be a major source of renewal and meaning-making for so many. Thinking about Sabbath has always yielded rich traditions of poetic inspiration.
Tractate Tamid in The Mishna, composed around the 3rd Century CE, long after the Jerusalem Temple was gone and Levites no longer sang on its marble steps each Sabbath - reimagines the purpose of this psalm and gives new meaning to this Lamed:
“On Shabbat they would recite “A psalm, a song for Shabbat day” - a song for the future, for the day that will be entirely Shabbat and rest for everlasting life.”
The authors of the Mishna, nostalgic for the temple that was and hopeful for a messianic future in which it will be rebuilt - reimagined this Sabbath psalm as a futurist intention, and the letter Lamed is used by them to propel the imagination into the better days - sabbath 24/7- that will one day be the way the world is.
Other sages, living around the same time, imagined this Lamed as telling us a different story - not so much in the future but rather way in the past.
Midrash Peskita Rabbati goes back to creation and imagines the saga that occurs in the first chapters of Genesis - including the creation of Adam and Eve, their eating of the fruit and expulsion from Eden -- as occurring within the first twelve hours before the first Sabbath even descends.
Adam and Eve were expelled and not sentenced to death, according to this legend, because the Sabbath interceded on their behalf!
In gratitude, and in return, Adam (Eve is not mentioned in this Midrash, alas) composed Psalm 92. Thus, the Lamed at the top of it is the grateful dedication of the first human poets - “to the Sabbath day.”
This Midrash is deeply moving as we can hear the deep appreciation for the fact that Sabbath exists - literally saving our lives each week from being subsumed by work and the never ending toil. Whoever wrote this Midrash imagines the original humans as the ones to already be in awe of the gift of rest and grateful for the weekly pause.
And there’s yet another and more radical tradition that exists to try and explain this Lamed.
In the Sabbath morning liturgy that is found in many prayer books there is a passage that anthropomorphizes Shabbat and claims that is was the Seventh Day itself that authored this psalm:
“And the seventh day praises and sings: ‘A Psalm of the Sabbath day, it is good to praise God.’”
According to this incredible tradition, which is at least 1,000 years old, Psalm 92 is a poem composed by the Sabbath - to itself.
Maybe that’s the elusive signature of the Sabbath Queen at play - leaving behind traces of the sacred and the feminine divine in the Patriarchal domain, as clues for us to decipher.
Whether authored by anonymous poets, Adam and Eve or the Sabbath Queen herself, it remains a favorite, with often quoted verses and tunes that continue to inspire our souls each Friday as the sun sets.
On this day, as we rise from the rubble of the Ninth of Av, it is a blessing to have this psalm of renewal, with a sabbath of consolation to look forward to.
Wishing us all many days of rest, renewal, eternal optimism and peace - not only on the Seventh Day.
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