From Prayer to Song

By Rabbi Shaya Hauptman

For two long years, the Jewish world carried the words of King David on its lips: אנא השם הושיעה נא, “Please, G-d, save us.” We said it together when the news first broke. We whispered it as hostages’ names were read aloud. We said it again at candlelightings, at rallies, and under our breath as we scrolled through headlines we didn’t want to believe. Those sentiments became our heartbeat, the emotion that connected Jews from Jerusalem to Johannesburg and from Chicago to Sydney.

On Hoshana Rabbah, the very day before the two-year Hebrew anniversary of October 7, our prayers were answered. The last of the living hostages came home. It wasn’t a simple joy. It was a joy laced with tears, gratitude, and exhaustion, the kind that knows how precious life is because it’s lived with loss. And it arrived on a day when we sing King David’s Hallel, words of praise and thanks that hold both plea and song at once: אנא השם הושיעה נא, “Please, G-d, save us,” and זה־היום עשה השם נגילה ונשמחה בו, “This is the day that G-d has made, let us rejoice and be glad in it.”

Over these two years, the Jewish people did something remarkable. We didn’t look away. We carried one another’s pain and made it personal, as if every hostage were our own brother, sister, parent, or child. Communities gathered in synagogues, schools, and public squares. People who hadn’t prayed in years found themselves saying Tehillim. Strangers felt like family. When the hostages returned, we didn’t just celebrate their release, we felt a piece of ourselves return too.

I watched a video where one of the freed hostages, Segev Kalfon, shared a dream he held in the darkest place. He dreamt he would stand surrounded by his captors and cry out, “Shema Yisrael, Hashem Elokeinu, Hashem Echad.” In that dream, he didn’t picture food or escape. He pictured faith. But what was most remarkable to me was how, while in captivity, he rejoiced for another hostage’s release before his own, saying, “I was happy for him. I imagined how it would feel when it happened to me.” That’s a rare kind of strength, the kind that celebrates another person’s freedom even while not knowing what his own future holds.

Last week reminded us that gratitude doesn’t erase sorrow, it elevates it. Joy doesn’t replace grief, it sanctifies it. For one shining moment, we were allowed to stop, breathe, and rejoice, not because the story is over, but because we saw a glimpse of redemption in the middle of it. We, the Jewish People, were one heart, first breaking together and then beating together again.

This week, when studying Parshat Noach and considering our own holy work at The Ark, the following comes to mind. Throughout our history, G-d has chosen leaders by watching how they care for those who are overlooked. The test isn’t power or polish. It’s compassion. Noach was given the work of feeding and tending the world’s creatures in the ark, cleaning and caring day and night. G-d cares for all, and He entrusts the future to those who do the same. The past two years have called out that same compassion in us. We stood with suffering families, we prayed for strangers, we held space for grief, and we wouldn’t let go of hope. May we carry that forward, continuing to care for those in need, as G-d Himself does. And may we merit in our Ark, just as in Noach’s ark, to see success in our hallowed work and help those we care for see the salvation they so desperately need, making every day a day to sing זה־היום עשה השם נגילה ונשמחה בו, “This is the day that G-d has made, let us rejoice and be glad in it.”