Journey Through the Daily Psalms

Sunday

S’u Sh’arim roshaychem, u’s’u pitchay olam

Lift up your head, oh you gates; lift them up you everlasting doors! (Psalm 24: 9)

We are the gates: we are the doorways. God enters the World through us when we “lift up our heads”… when we raise our consciousness. We begin the week with an intention to listen for the call to awareness that lifts us up out of our small concerns into a wide perspective and compassionate responsiveness. By answering that call, we become everlasting doorways between the finite and infinite realms.

To hear the chant, use the audio player. To download the chant, right-click the note and save (or download) the linked MP3 file.

Monday

Diminu Elohim Chasdecha

Our Stillness/Silence is Your Love God (Psalm 48:10)

Coming into relationship with God and opening to Divine Love is perhaps the best way of become authentic and of knowing the True Self. As we come into this relationship and open to the force of Love, God strips us of all artifice. We become naked to ourselves. In relationship to God, the Great Mystery, all the layers of defense fall away; all of our posturing dissolves.

To hear the various parts of the chant, use the audio players. To download a part, right-click a note and save (or download) the linked MP3 file.

Tuesday

Kumah Elohim Shaftah Ha-Aretz

Arise God, and judge the land. (Psalm 82:8)

As we explore the inner landscape, we find places of shadow — corners of the heart that are unhealed or hidden in shame. We call on the God-force within us to rise up, to reveal the Divine perspective so that the entirety of our inner landscape can be bathed in Awareness.

To hear the various parts of the chant, use the audio players. To download a part, right-click a note and save (or download) the linked MP3 file.

Wednesday

B’rov sarapai b’kirbi
Tanchumecha y’sha’ashu nafshi

When worries multiply within me, Your comfort soothes my soul. (Psalm 94:19)

When we become aware of the multitude of voices within, and place those concerns into the context of a vast inner spaciousness, then our harried souls can be soothed, comforted and allowed their Freedom.

To hear the various parts of the chant, use the audio players. To download a part, right-click a note and save (or download) the linked MP3 file.

Thursday

Tiku vachodesh shofar
Ba’keseh l’yom chagaynu
Ki chok l’Yisrael hu mishpat L’Elohai Ya’akov
Thursday Psalm Hebrew text
Sound a shofar at the New Moon…. at the moment of concealment/potential for our Celebration Day. It is a statute for Israel; it is a rule for Jacob. (Psalm 81:4-5)

We live our lives in the holy cycles of exile and return, forgetting and remembering, going out from ourselves and returning again to center. We cycle between being Jacob, the ego struggling to manipulate the world, to being Israel, the one who encounters God directly. Through our calendar and festivals we attune to the cycles of the moon whose waxing and waning reflects our own spiritual cycles. As awareness of those cycles deepens, the circles of our lives become spirals, connecting the mysteries of the universe with our own Center.

To hear the chant, use the audio player. To download the chant, right-click the note and save (or download) the linked MP3 file.

Thursday Psalm

Friday

Nachon kisacha me-az, me-olam atah

Your throne was long ago secured; beyond eternity are You! (Psalm 93:2)

As we prepare for Shabbat, we gradually release our grip on personally mastering this world. No matter how we have struggled, succeeded or failed during this past week, today we prepare ourselves now to let go of the illusion of control and surrender our cleverness to the vast Intelligence that has been in charge all along.

To hear the various parts of the chant, use the audio players. To download a part, right-click a note and save (or download) the linked MP3 file.

Shabbat

Ma-Gadlu Ma’asecha Yah, m’od amku mach’sh’votecha

How great is your work, oh God, how very deep are your thoughts! (Psalm 92:6)

On Shabbat we step outside of the ordinary stream of time; we leave behind the structures of Duality in order to drink from the extraordinary river of Delight that flows directly from the Source. We set aside our struggles and worries in order to simply appreciate and celebrate Life. Shabbat consciousness requires us to embrace a profound paradox. On the one hand we see the amazing beauty of God’s Creation, and in that same vision we encounter the unfathomable suffering and mystery of our world. On Shabbat we let go of our struggle to understand, explain, make excuses or figure it out. We embrace and accept it all and celebrate existence itself.

To hear the chant, use the audio player. To download the chant, right-click the note and save (or download) the linked MP3 file.

Shabbat Psalm

For the musical notations for all these Psalm chants, see The Magic of Hebrew Chant, pages 298-304.