Al Tivtechu Bindivim

Good morning everyone. Welcome back to Learn to Daven - Day 79.

Yesterday we opened the first of the five Hallelukah psalms. David told his own soul to praise. Beautiful, uplifting, exactly what you'd expect in this part of davening.

And then, two verses later, in the middle of a praise psalm, he says this:

Al tivtechu bindivim - do not put your trust in princes. B'ven adam she'ein lo seshu'ah - in a human being, who has no salvation in him.

Which is a strange thing to find here. This is Psukei D'Zimrah. We're supposed to be building joy. And David drops in what sounds like a piece of hard-nosed political advice. Don't trust the powerful. Don't bank on the guy with the connections.

Let's look at the word he chose, because it's the key to the whole thing. Nedivim. Usually translated "princes," but that's not quite it. A nadiv is someone who gives - the root is nedavah, a voluntary gift, the same word used for a free-will offering in the Temple. A nadiv is a benefactor. A patron. The generous one. The person who can help you and sometimes does.

So David isn't warning you about tyrants. Nobody needs to be told not to trust a tyrant. He's warning you about the good ones. The generous ones. The person who actually came through for you last time.

And then he tells you exactly what's wrong with them, and it's not what you'd guess. He doesn't say they're unreliable. He doesn't say they'll betray you. He says: teitzei rucho, yashuv l'admaso - his spirit leaves, he returns to his earth. Bayom hahu avdu eshtonosav - on that day, his plans perish.

The problem with the benefactor is not that he's bad. The problem is that he's mortal.

That word at the end - eshtonosav - appears exactly once in all of Tanach. Right here. Nowhere else. The commentators connect it to eshtonos, thoughts or plans or calculations. On the day he dies, his plans die. Not just the man - the whole architecture he was carrying in his head. Everything he intended to do for you. Every promise he fully meant to keep. It doesn't get transferred. It just... goes out, with him.

Now. Why is this in the praise section of davening?

Rabbeinu Bachya ibn Pakuda - the author of Chovos HaLevavos, the Duties of the Heart, writing in Spain nine hundred years ago - devoted an entire section of that book to bitachon, trust. And he makes a point there that unlocks this verse.

He says: everything you might rely on has conditions attached. He goes through them one by one. Rely on your own strength - your strength changes. Rely on your wealth - wealth moves. Rely on a powerful friend - the friend has his own limits, his own needs, and his own lifespan. Every created thing you could lean on is itself leaning on something else. And Rabbeinu Bachya's conclusion is not "so trust nobody and be alone." It's the opposite. He says: the only thing that can carry the full weight of your trust is the One who isn't dependent on anything. Everyone else can carry some of it. Nobody else can carry all of it.

That's why the verse belongs in a praise psalm. Because al tivtechu bindivim is not cynicism. It's a load calculation.

Look at what David does immediately after. The very next verse: ashrei she'Kel Yaakov b'ezro, sivro al Hashem Elokav - happy is the one whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord his God. He knocks out the false foundation and instantly puts the real one in. He's not leaving you with nothing. He's moving the weight.

And here's the practical piece, because I don't want this to stay abstract. This verse is not telling you to stop asking people for help. Judaism is emphatically not that. You should have benefactors. You should be one. The nadiv in this verse is a good person - that's the whole point.

What the verse is telling you is where to put the bitachon. Trust - real trust, the kind you build a life on - is a specific thing, and it can only rest on something that doesn't have an expiration date. Use the prince. Thank the prince. Love the prince. Just don't build the foundation on him, because teitzei rucho - one day his spirit goes out, and if your whole structure was resting on his plans, your structure goes down with his plans.

You can be enormously grateful to someone and still know they're not the source. That's not ingratitude. That's accuracy. And accuracy, it turns out, is a form of praise - because the moment you correctly identify what a human being can't do, you've simultaneously identified Who can.

Tomorrow: the same psalm gives us a line we've already said once this morning - pokeach ivrim, who opens the eyes of the blind. We said it back in Birchos HaShachar. Why is it here again?