From Narrowness to Expansiveness - New Video

Give me an oooo and an ahhhh

C-Saw Niggun - Coleen Dieker and Rabbi Josh Warshawsky

How do we get from narrowness to expansiveness? When Coleen and I wrote this melody, we gave ourselves a musical challenge: Could we write a melody with just one chord? Thus the “C-Saw Niggun” was born, seesawing up and down the C major scale while just holding one chord - the C chord. What do you hear when you listen? Hopefully you hear grounding. Hopefully you hear openness. Hopefully you hear welcoming, calm, beauty, and community.

When we are in a place of constriction, these things often feel so far away. That is the essence of the passover story. God took us out of mitzrayim, literally “the narrows.”

Each one of us individually: “עָשָׂה ה׳ לִי בְּצֵאתִי מִמִּצְרָיִם” “God did this for me when I left the narrows (Ex. 13:8).”

And all of us as a collective: “בְּחֹזֶק יָד הוֹצִיאָנוּ ה׳ מִמִּצְרַיִם” “With a mighty hand God took us all out of the narrows (Ex. 13:14).”

In the Hallel service that we sing every day of Passover we sing out the words from the psalms, “מִן-הַמֵּצַר, קָרָאתִי יָּהּ, עָנָנִי בַמֶּרְחָב יָהּ” “From the narrow place I called out ‘Ya!’, and I was answered from the the expanse, ‘Ya!’”

What would it feel like to call out from a place of constriction, like our ancestors did when they were slaves in Egypt, and to finally feel heard from an expansive place, from a redemptive place. To hear an echo of your original call. Someone responding, “I hear you! I see you! I am here with you.”

As we enter Shabbat and the end of Passover, how might we expand the space where voices in need are heard?

Shabbat Shalom,

Josh

p.s. if you missed our other videos from the new album so far, here they are:

Yeviuni

Wedding Medley

Yom Shabbaton