Can You Read Tehilim At Night?

0:06What's the deal with stocks and tea at night time? Okay, so the easy one is, I mean, you can give at any time. You can give at any time; you can even give on Shabbat—not physically, but make a promise to give it. Meaning, let's say you see an organization, a Jewish organization of some kind, and they say, "Listen, we're raising money," and they're raising money on Shabbat. they're not getting checks from people. Don't give them a check or cash at that moment—that's not allowed. But you can make a promise to give the money on Yom Kippur or Shabbat. Why? Because you're doing a mitzvah, and in essence, you're not fulfilling the mitzvah at that second; you are planning the mitzvah. And planning a mitzvah is allowed on Shabbat and allowed on Yom Tov. Okay, so you're saying, like, you can talk about, let's say, for example, you want to build a synagogue.

1:15You want to have a siyum haShas party or something that involves a mitzvah, you can plan it on Shabbat. You can plan it on Shabbat. Why? Because you're planning a mitzvah, right? You can do it at all times. Now, you're not giving them the actual money on Shabbat. You're planning to give it to them. You know, I promised them to give you twenty thousand dollars, but obviously not on Shabbat. I'm going to give it to you on Monday. So that you're allowed to do at any time, even at night, on Yom Kippur, on Shabbat, anytime. Whoever told you you can't give it at night is wrong. To heal him, on the other hand, is a little bit more difficult. Why? It has to do, again, you guys are all Kabbalists over here, apparently. It has to do with the mystical part of Judaism. Now, there is a concept in Judaism that's called the powers of impurity and the powers of holiness. Tumah is impurity. And Kedusha is holiness. Now, after there's a certain time of the day that the powers that are in the world of holiness have more significance. And there are times of the day that the powers of impurity, HaKadosh Baruch Hu, gives them their time that they have more presence, more power, if you will.

2:42That time is at night, but not the whole night. From the time of Arvit until Chatzot, until the middle of the night. The middle of the night doesn't literally mean 12 o'clock a.m. all the time. It depends on where you are in the world, and it depends on the time of year. This is because the Jewish clock is not exactly the same as the secular clock. You could download an app called CalJ, spelled C-A-L-J, on your phone. It tells you the times for when to pray in the morning, what the middle of the night is, whether you do Tachanun today or not, when the holidays are, and so on. CalJ. You could download it on the... uh stores, whatever the uh, the phone stores, um, app stores, uh, anyway, now from the time of Arvit till the time of Chatzot, that's when the powers of impurity have more significance, have more presence in the world, if you will, or essence, and are given permission to do more.

3:45So because of that, because of that, Chazal said that, the Chachamim said, actually, that you should not simply read the written Torah during that time because it bothers them and can create problems for you, if you will. Now, this only applies to simply reading it. not studying it, like, for example, if you just feel like reading Tehillim just because you feel like reading something, don't do it during that time. Let's say if Arvit is at eight o'clock p.m. and midnight is the middle of the night, during those four hours, don't do it if you just feel like reading the parasha, just reading it. Superficially reading it, don't do it between that time. Why? There are other things you can learn. There are other things to do. It can create different problems in your life. Now, studying and praying, you can do anytime. What's the difference? Reading the parasha, let's say, reading the parasha is just simply saying, okay, v'yatad tihiyeh lecha al azenekha.

4:59Pasuk says, and you shall have a shovel in addition to your weapons. That's reading. You just read what the Pasuk says, and that's it. Studying means, oh, this is what it says, oh, let's see what the commentary says. Oh, the commentary says such and such. Rashi says this, the Ramban says this. That's studying. That you can do anytime. Anytime you can do that. Reading, don't do it during that small window of time. Why? Again, like I said, there's a whole concept of impurity powers. Now, as far as Tehillim is concerned, if you're just simply going to be reading it just for the sake of reading it, it's better for you to go learn a shiur Torah or something else. But if you're going to be in a time where it's either you read Tehillim or you're going to go hang out with your friends and waste your time, go read Tehillim. Why? Because the amount of demons you'll create from hanging out with your friends is much worse than, you know, bothering them a little bit with reading Tehillim. Needless to say, if you're not going to do anything at all, it's better to read Tehillim. So,

6:09And if you need to pray for somebody, say chas v'shalom or something like that, you can do it anytime. You can do it anytime. So again, it's important to understand that there's a difference between superficially reading things, studying them, praying, and so on. Usually, most people are utilizing the Torah for a real reason, either to pray or to study. But the sages were very, very conscious of things we're not aware of and can't even see with the naked eye most of the time. and they were cautious on certain things. But again, if they were alive in this generation, I would dare to say that maybe they would not have told us to do this particular teaching, simply because if people are not doing something that's connected to the Zionist generation, most of the time they're causing trouble and making sins. So, uh, it's, it's—that's why I say if—and I asked, I verified this with my Rav—if somebody is either gonna read Tehillim with their, uh, you know, or they're gonna go hang out with their friends and have a beer, tell them to read Tehillim until their face turns blue. Why? It's much better to go read Tehillim than to go waste your time and do other things. But if you have other options...

7:26You can watch a shiur Torah, you can attend a shiur Torah, you can read Gemara, you can read a sefer Mussar, something like that. Then you should do those things during that time. Do those things during that time. where you'll also have newer features, allowing you to use the app while using other applications on your phone. You'll be able to share the shiurim directly from the app. You'll be able to donate online and support our kehillah and our Torah work that we're doing. And the most exciting feature is that you'll be able to actually ask questions directly on the app and get answers from the rabbis directly from the app. This is something unprecedented, and Baruch Hashem, we will be able to offer it. Thank you again for all of your support. Check it out. Make sure you have the kosher Torah that will re-energize your neshama each and every single day. Call to b'hatzlacha.