Beshalach
The Sfat Emet on Parashat Beshalach, read on Shabbat Beshalach · Shabbat Shirah · Tu B'Shevat week — with one of this week's three questions for the two of you.
On the other side of the Sea, the people did not just thank God — they sang. Moshe sang. Miriam sang. The whole people sang together. The Shirah at the Sea is, in the Sages' reading, the prototypical act of sacred speech that lifts moments out of time. Sfat Emet hears the question: why a song? Why not a speech? Because what is sung is held differently than what is felt. A song outlasts the moment that produced it. A song can be repeated, taught, handed forward. Tu B'Shevat carries the same teaching in another form — we plant a tree we will not eat from for years, because what is rooted in time is what eventually nourishes the world. Some things in marriage have to be sung, not just felt. Some things have to be planted, not just hoped for.
What is one experience between us that we have already, quietly, turned into a song — something with a refrain, a shape, that we can call up at will?
The full week — the passage itself with its source, the other two questions, and the closing verse of hope — lives in the app. Together Tomorrow on the App Store.