Chasidut su Salmi 119:89
לְעוֹלָ֥ם יְהוָ֑ה דְּ֝בָרְךָ֗ נִצָּ֥ב בַּשָּׁמָֽיִם׃
LAMED. Per sempre, o Eterno, la tua parola è salda in cielo.
Flames of Faith
According to the Talmud, when God began the creation of the universe, He first created a middle point and that center then expanded until the entire universe was formed. According to the deeper wisdom of Torah, that starting point contained within itself the entire world in a form of latent potential. Mystics add that the creation process is constantly occurring anew. King David wrote that the Divine words that formed the Heavens still hover in the ether, since God renews the entire creative process every moment (see Ps. 119:89). Thus, even today, thousands of years after the happenings in the Book of Genesis, the central starting place contains within it a microcosm of the entire universe that emerged and will re-emerge from it. That point is Jerusalem.
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Kedushat Levi
Genesis 21,1. “Hashem took note of Sarah as He had promised, and He did for Sarah as He had said.” Bereshit Rabbah 53,4 understands this verse as reflecting the truth of what the psalmist said in psalms 119,89 לעולם ה', דברך נצב בשמים, “The Lord exists forever; Your word stands firm in heaven.” The author of the Midrash queries, rhetorically, if David meant that G’d’s word does not stand firm on earth? He explains that what the psalmist had in mind was that the promise G’d made to Avraham He had made in heaven, i.e. when the angel announced that Yitzchok’s birth would occur at a time prearranged in heaven. (In Genesis 15,5, long before the angel announced Yitzchok’s impending birth, G’d had take Avram outside his tent and had make him look at the heaven telling him that he would father children and that the would be as numerous as the stars in the heaven.) For our sages in B’rachot 7 the verse is understood to make the point that even when G’d makes a conditional promise, He will keep it. The Talmud there uses as its proof Deuteronomy 9,14 where G’d had suggested that He would trade the Jewish people who had made the golden calf for a new Jewish people founded by Moses.
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Kedushat Levi
When David in psalm 119,89 says: he means that G’d’s word, promising to do good things for Israel, refers to the period during which the “promise” is in limbo in heaven awaiting being converted into reality. [The word עולם, derived from נעלם does not only mean “forever,” but primarily “hidden,” seeing the distant future is hidden from us. Ed.] When used as “forever,” by David, it means that our faith in G’d fulfilling His promise is unlimited, our patience inexhaustible. When David, in verse 90 adds the words כוננת ארץ ותעמוד, “You have established the earth and it stands,” he refers to G’d having created the appropriate vessel designed to reveal this principle in the person of Avraham.
When we find the Torah using the expressions פקד and זכר respectively to describe different nuances of remembering, we find the expressions דבור and אמר, as similar nuances of “speaking,” or “saying.” The word אמירה, אמר is used when the statement made by one’s mouth was made discreetly, not publicly, whereas the word דבור,דבר is used when the spoken word was said in public. Rashi already refers to the fact that the expression אמר when used in the verse above refers to Sarah’s being pregnant, something private not seen by everybody, whereas the word דבר applies to Sarah having given birth, something very public. By that time Sarah had become the instrument used by G’d to show to one and all that He fulfills His promise.
When we find the Torah using the expressions פקד and זכר respectively to describe different nuances of remembering, we find the expressions דבור and אמר, as similar nuances of “speaking,” or “saying.” The word אמירה, אמר is used when the statement made by one’s mouth was made discreetly, not publicly, whereas the word דבור,דבר is used when the spoken word was said in public. Rashi already refers to the fact that the expression אמר when used in the verse above refers to Sarah’s being pregnant, something private not seen by everybody, whereas the word דבר applies to Sarah having given birth, something very public. By that time Sarah had become the instrument used by G’d to show to one and all that He fulfills His promise.
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