DIM'ATI (featuring Itamar Borochov)

You keep count of my wanderings;
put my tears into Your flask, into Your record book.
—Psalms 56:9

My wife, Annie Lewis, and I set to music this verse from Psalms as a hope and a fervent prayer that there is meaning in our suffering, that God is with us listening, even when we feel most alone.

Earlier in this chapter of Psalms, the poet cries out from the pain of their suffering. In this verse, they turn back to God to say: Even as I wander about in the wilderness, you keep track of me; you are aware of the extent of my struggles, the depth of my cries. To You, each of my tears is worthy of remembering, of holding close. The poet has faith that God is affected by each tear that is shed.

This psalm is also a forceful reminder that the cries of the oppressed are noted and remembered by God, and they will come to be heard, even as those in power may seek to deny or normalize the oppression. It is on us, as we emulate God, to bear witness to the pain and tears of our siblings and neighbors and to fight for justice.

Midrash Bereishit Rabbah links the image of God carrying a flask of tears to that of the skin of water that Hagar carries out into the desert, after she is sent away by Avraham. In the psalm, the rabbis of the midrash hear echoes of Hagar’s anguished cries as her waterskin dries up in the wilderness of Be’er Sheva and as she sends her child, Yishmael, to sit under the shade of the bushes, where she is certain he will die, his suffering too great for her to bear.

In this verse, the Midrash hears echoes of the cries of Hagar and Yishmael- cries that are heard by God, tears not shed in vain. But by putting these verses side by side, the Midrash is also implicitly comparing God carrying a flask of the tears of humanity to Hagar in exile, with nothing but a skin of water; as if to say that when humanity suffers, God, too is displaced and suffers alongside us. God weeps beside us in our wanderings and finds comfort in accompanying us as we shed our tears. To paraphrase Emma Lazarus, “God can never be fully free until we are all free.”

We wrote this melody during the first year of the COVID pandemic, in honor of all the chaplains and first-line medical professionals working to bear witness to the suffering so many people endured during the pandemic. Even as people were physically isolated and in pain, caregivers were doing God’s holy work, promising, “You are seen. I have taken account of your cries; I have noticed your tears. I weep with you.”

In his book, Man in Search of Meaning, psychiatrist and Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl shares the story of meeting with a Chassidic rabbi who had lost his entire family in the Shoah. The man was distraught, worried that whereas his beloved children had died innocently, al kiddush Hashem, sanctifying God's name, he was unworthy of reuniting with them in heaven. Frankl joined with the man on his own theological terms and offered this verse as a proof text that God preserves all of our tears, that God had surely noticed the man’s suffering and that it would not be in vain.

Wherever you find yourself, however distant you may feel from the Source of Life, may you always know that you are seen, you are known and loved; that God is with you, even in your suffering.