Just a Passuk in Ashrei

The question is, what does it mean קרוב ה' לכל קראיו לכל אשר יקראהו באמת.  If it is limited to אשר יקראהו באמת, then it is not לְכָל קֹרְאָיו.  

Wouldn't the passuk make more sense if it just said  קרוב ה' לכל אשר יקראהו באמת?

Medrash Eicha  shows that this form is found in six places in Tanach.  This one is on Eicha 3:25, טוב ה' לקוו לנפש תדרשנו.

(איכה ג') טוב ה' לקויו. יכול לכל? תלמוד לומר: לנפש תדרשנו. 

ודכוותיה: (תהלים ע"ג) אך טוב לישראל אלהים. יכול לכל? תלמוד לומר: לברי לבב. אלו שלבם ברור עליהם שאין בידן עון.

 ודכוותיה: (שם פ"ד) אשרי אדם עוז לו בך. יכול לכל? תלמוד לומר: מסלות בלבבם. אלו דשבילי אוריתא כבושין בלבהון. ודכוותיה: (שם קכ"ה) הטיבה ה' לטובים. יכול לכל? תלמוד לומר: ולישרים בלבותם. 

ודכוותיה: (שם קמ"ה) קרוב ה' לכל קוראיו. יכול לכל? תלמוד לומר: לכל אשר יקראוהו באמת. 

ודכוותיה: (מיכה ז') מי אל כמוך נושא עון ועובר על פשע. יכול לכל? תלמוד לומר: לשארית נחלתו. 

So according to the Medrash, the end of the passuk tells you pshat in the beginning; "Kol" is not "everyone."  What bothers me is that in the six pesukim brought, only the one in Ashrei starts with "kol." So bishlema  לקויו and  לישראל  and אדם עוז לו בך and עובר על פשע, fine, that is not לכל. But the passuk in Ashrei says לכל קוראיו. How can you say  "...יכול לכל, תלמוד לומר"  that you might think it's lechol? It actually says לכל!

The Malbim says that the passuk tells us about two types of avodah: Chol is those who do avodah mei'yirah, and Be'emes is those who do avodah mei'ahavah, and the pesukim that follow describe how Hashem's relationship with them differs. This means that there is an implied conjunctive adverb - X, and also Y.

145:18

קרוב, מביא עוד ראיה על ההשגחה ממה שהוא קרוב לכל קוראיו בתפלה לבד אם יקראוהו באמת בלא לב ולב, והגם ששומע לכל קוראיו מ"מ יש מדרגות באיכות מלואת בקשתם בין העובדים מאהבה להעובדים מיראה, בשני דברים, א, כי ...

145:19

(יט-כ)  ... רצון יריאיו יעשה ואת שועתם ישמע, ואז ויושיעם, רק אחר ששועו לישועה. אבל שומר ה' את כל אוהביו, את העובדים מאהבה הוא שומר תמיד בל תבא עליהם צרה, ולא יצטרכו לצעוק, זאת שנית שהעובדים מיראה אם יצעקו מני צר ועל רשעים שבאים להרע להם, אז רק יושיעם לבד, אבל לא ישמיד ויעשה נקמה באויביהם, אבל להעובדים מאהבה גם את הרשעים שרצו להרע להם ישמיד, שכפי מדרגת העבודה והקורבה לאלהים כן מדרגת ההשגחה:

The Radak has a pshat that I find most structurally convincing - the chol is to include a category, a cohort, that one might think that their tefilla is disdained. Then, after saying that Hashem does listen to their tefillos too, the passuk goes on to say that tefillah, no matter whose, requires emes. The Radak's Chol is gentiles; "all" means "no matter what nation they are-" tefilla is not limited to Jews. But no matter who it is, tefilla requires emes.

מאיזה עם שיהיה ובלבד שיקראוהו באמת שפיו ולבו שוים:

(דהיינו הרישא באה לרבות שזה מכל העמים).

Here is what the Baal HaTanya says, end of perek 37.

והנה, המשכה והארה זו, שהאדם ממשיך ומאיר מהארת אור אין-סוף ברוך הוא על נפשו ועל נפשות כל ישראל, היא השכינה, כנסת ישראל, מקור כל נשמות ישראל, כמו שיתבאר לקמן, ע"י עסק התורה נקראת בלשון קריאה, "קורא בתורה", פירוש, שעל-ידי עסק התורה קורא להקב"ה לבוא אליו כביכול, כאדם הקורא לחבירו שיבא אליו, וכבן קטן הקורא לאביו לבא אליו להיות עמו בצווותא חדא ולא ליפרד ממנו ולישאר יחידי ח"ו.

וזהו שכתוב (תהלים קמה יח): "קרוב ה' לכל קוראיו לכל אשר יקראוהו באמת", ואין אמת אלא תורה, דהיינו שקורא להקב"ה על-ידי התורה דוקא, לאפוקי מי שקורא אותו שלא על ידי עסק התורה אלא צועק כך "אבא! אבא!", וכמו שקובל עליו הנביא (ישעיהו סד ו): "ואין קורא בשמך כו'", וכמו שנכתב במקום אחר.

ומזה יתבונן המשכיל להמשיך עליו יראה גדולה בשעת עסק התורה, כמו שנכתב לעיל.

The way the Mezritcher Magid [סו"ס קעב (מלכות וז"א)] says a similar explanation, that there is keriyah, which is tefillah, and there is keriah with "emes," i.e., Torah. Both have an effect, but they work in different ways. So the end of the passuk is not modifying the beginning. There is a colon after Karov Hashem, and two disparate types of keriyah are listed.  The two latter pshatim also assume a conjunctive adverb.

The Baal HaTanya and the Maggid both stem from the fundamental shittah that Torah is dveikus. I wonder how Reb Chaim Volozhiner would feel about this pshat in the passuk.

UPDATE 11/5/23

I just heard a speech by R Eliahu Soloveichick at Landers in which he quotes his uncle bringing the passuk in Eicha  2:19

קוּמִי רֹנִּי (בליל) [בַלַּיְלָה] לְרֹאשׁ אַשְׁמֻרוֹת שִׁפְכִי כַמַּיִם לִבֵּךְ נֹכַח פְּנֵי אֲדֹנָי

Pashtus, the passuk is talking about tefillah. But the Gemara in Tamid 32b says that it refers to limud haTorah. If a person learns with great devotion, with sweetness and song, it is nochach pnei Hashem, it will bring him close to Hakadosh Baruch Hu. 

תנא רבי חייא: כל העוסק בתורה בלילה – שכינה כנגדו, שנאמר: ״קומי רוני בלילה לראש אשמורות שפכי כמים לבך נכח פני ה׳ (וגו׳)״.

The pashtus of the Gemara is straightforward, that this kind of limud hatorah that is called "rinah balayla," is especially great and brings you close the Hashem. But he says that we have to understand how this leads into the end of the passuk.

קוּמִי רֹנִּי בליל [בַלַּיְלָה] לְרֹאשׁ אַשְׁמֻרוֹת שִׁפְכִי כַמַּיִם לִבֵּךְ נֹכַח פְּנֵי אֲדֹנָי שְׂאִי אֵלָיו כַּפַּיִךְ עַל נֶפֶשׁ עוֹלָלַיִךְ הָעֲטוּפִים בְּרָעָב בְּרֹאשׁ כָּל חוּצוֹת.

What does limud hatorah have to do with raising up your hands for the life of your children? That is not Torah, that is Tefilla!  He says in the sefer Lzeicher Abba Mori that the conclusion is obvious. If one learns with devotion, it is a form of Tefillah.  It must be that this kind of limud haTorah is a form of Tefilla.

רינה של תורה בלילה היא תחליף לבקשת ספוגת דמעות.  וכי הקדוש ברוך הוא זקוק לתפילת צרכיו של אדם המבקש?

Torah learned with immersive devotion takes the place of the greatest tefilla.

Here is the drasha:

https://www.landertorah.com/shiur/14889/our-response-to-the-%D7%A2%D7%AA-%D7%A6%D7%A8%D7%94

Listen beginning at 10:16, the reference to the passuk in Eicha.

If so, I have to say that Rav Yosef Ber would 100% agree with the Baal Shem Tov's pshat in the passuk in Ashrei. There is tefillah, "קוראיו," and there is form of Tefilla that is learning Torah with devotion, which is "יקראוהו באמת." 

Reb Chanina Ben Dosa's Dream. For Vayeishev, the Parsha of Dreams

The Gemora in Tainis 25 brings a story about Reb Chaninah ben Dosa. He was desperately poor, and at one point his wife said she couldn’t stand the poverty and shame, and a heavenly hand miraculously appeared and proffered the golden leg of a table. This would have enabled them to escape their crushing poverty and live a comfortable life. That night, Reb Chaninah had a dream about sitting at a two legged table in olam haba, and the next morning he told his wife about his dream. She said she didn’t want to sit at a two legged table in olam habo, and so she rejected the heavenly gift and resigned herself to poverty. Indeed, a hand once more appeared and took back the golden leg. The Gemora ends with “gadol haneis ho’achron min horishon, de’gmiri dmishmaya meihav yahavi, mishkal lo shakli.” The second miracle was greater than the first: we have a tradition that from heaven they give, but they do not take back.

Several questions arise. Why indeed doesn’t Hashem take things back? And what changed Reb Chanina's mind? Didn't he immediately realize the cost of accepting the gift? And why did he leave the decision to his wife?

Regarding the first question, the Mahrsha there says that “taking back” is like reversing a gzeira letov, which Hashem doesn’t do, as we find in the story of Choni Hame’ageil and the excessive rain. But was this a good thing at all? After all, she quickly realized that it not a good thing!

Harav Dovid Zupnik zatzal, one of the gedolei talmidei Mir in Europe, told me two things. First, that he once saw a pshat in Ashrei, that Retzon yerei’ov ya’aseh means that Hashem grants brachos to do the will of those that fear Him, but Ve’es shavosom yishma ve’yoshi’eim, that if they realize they don’t want the brocho, then Hashem will take it back, as he did with Reb Chaninah. He later showed me that he found this pshat brought in the Har Tzvi, Orach Chayim tshuva 1:1.

(Harav Frank is talking about the Beis Yosef’s kashe in the beginning of Orach Chayim, the the Tur says you should say the parsha of Chatos but not Yehi Rotzon...ke’ilu hikravnu, because it doesn’t come be’nidovo. The Beis Yosef asks, so what good is saying it? The Beis Yosef answers that reading is mechaper a little, so if he sinned, it will be mechaper a little, and if not, it will be like reading chumash. Harav Frank asks, what does the ‘little’ business have to do with this question? He answers that according to the Beis Yosef, there are three dinim: If he knows he did an aveira, and brings a korbon mamosh, it erases the aveira completely. If he knows and reads the parsha, it is toleh until he can bring a korbon. If he doesn’t know, and reads, it is mechaper for unknown aveiros ‘a little.” Then he brings the Bach that says that saying the Yehi Rotzon is what makes the korbon, and he has to avoid chulin bo’azoro. Harav Frank says that this is like what he heard that the derech of Hashem’s hashgocho is to give a tzadik what he asks for even if it’s not good for him, as we find by Dovid in Sanhedrin 107a, that he asked to be tested and Hashem sent him Bas Sheva. So, too is the pshat in Ashrei: that Hashem grants what they ask, and when they see that what they asked for is a tzoroh and they ask that it be taken away, Hashem grants them this wish too. Here, too, we can make it into a korbon by saying the parshas korbon, but if it turns out that we don’t need it, we can erase the metaphysical korbon later.)

I later found that the Gri’z says this, with an additional kneitch, from R’ Chaim, in his Gri’z on Torah stencil in Tehillim 145, which is probably where Harav Frank saw it. Rabbi Zupnick later showed me another source of the pshat. It is in R’ Shlomo Kluger’s pirush on the siddur, found in the R’ Yakov Emden siddur, in the first Ashrei in Shachris. He says the pshat, and adds (as Rabbi Zupnick did) that this is what happened to R’ Chanina Ben Dosa.

Lehavdil elef havdolos, Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) once coined this witticism: "There are only two tragedies in life: one is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it.

Second, Rabbi Zupnik told me that he heard from the Alter of Slabodka that the Gemora that says "gedola hachnosas orchim" גדולה הכנסת אורחים  means that the degree of sacrifice done to accomplish a chesed elevates the character of the chesed accordingly, and so Avrohom’s request to Hashem that he be excused from hashro’as hashechina in order to receive the guests made the hachnosas orchim greater than kabolas pnei shechina. Here, therefore, for Reb Chanina, acquiescing to his wife’s needs, despite the great cost to his olam haba he knew it entailed, magnified the chesed. But then he had the dream, and he told his wife the precise price they would pay, she said that she was unwilling to pay that price. He also said that for Reb Chanina, there was no choice, because his wife had a legitimate claim that he take care of her.