This week I received the following email: My name is Rina [a pseudonym] and I live in Gush Etzion. A few months ago I was riding home in my car on a busy road. There was a lot of traffic and it became apparent after a few minutes that the traffic was caused by an accident on the road. Out of curiosity I peeked ahead to see what had happened. I was shocked to see a car that had been crushed and a body was lying next to the car covered with a blanket.
"I wonder who the dead person is," I thought to myself. "Is the person married or single? Does the person have a family or not? Who is going to be orphaned and doesn't know about it yet. Or which parents just lost a child? They will definitely be shattered when they hear the terrible news."
Since there was no movement on the road I got out of the car and with TREMENDOUS KAVANA I said tehillim to ask Hashem to have mercy on the person lying there and I even cried.
A few minutes later the cars started moving again so I drove home with the horrible sight still in my memory.
Two weeks later the phone rings in my home. On the other end of the line is a young lady whom I didn't recognize. "Was that you who stopped on the road 2 weeks ago on Tuesday and said tehillim?"
"Yes" I answered.
She continued with a voice choked with tears: "Listen I'm the girl who was lying on the road. Everybody was sure that I was dead, that is why they covered me with a blanket and waited for an ambulance. I experienced what they call "clinical death". My soul floated outside of my body and I witnessed everything happening around me. I saw my crushed car, everybody running around, the long row of cars behind. I even saw my body under the blanket. A the moment you said tehillim all of the letters flew around my eyes and almost drew me back down to earth.The ambulance came and they tried to resuscitate me. The whole time I felt the letters of tehillim surrounding me with a pleasant light and restoring my spirit. In the merit of your tehillim my life was saved and I am calling you to say thank you."
Rina continued: I didn't know what to say. I never imagined the power of tefilla - of my saying tehillim. What I couldn't understand was how this young lady knew who I am. After a few minutes more of conversation I learned that before the accident she was irreligious but because of her experience she was chozeret bitshuva and is now religious. She doesn't stop telling people to say tehillim.
It makes sense that after the accident she located people who were there and asked who the woman was who said tehillim. One person identified me and then she found out my telephone number.
Sweet friends - that power of tefilla is a special gift that Hashem gave to women. They are more emotional than men [usually] and tefilla is about emotion. In fact the gemara learns how to daven not from a Rabbi but from Chana - a woman. The Jewish people desperately need the power of women's tefilla. What can I say - from my side of the mechitza it's just not the same.
Zchus hatzidkaniyot yaazor vi'yagen vi'yoshea!!
Mitzva to share the story with another Jew:-)!
