Poetry And The End Of Days

On the 8th day of Pesach there are various minhagim related to the end of days such as Seudas Moshiach. What is the connection?




One source is in the haftara of that day when we talk about the end of days. והיה ביום ההוא יוסיף השם שנית לקחת את שאר עמו. We actually find a source as well in our daily psukei d'zimra. We talk about Avraham Avinu being faithful to Hashem, that we go down to Egypt and experience kriyas yam suf and sing. At the end of the song we say "השם ימלך לעולם ועד" to which the Anshei Knesses Hagdola added in our tfilla the pasuk  ועלו מושיעים בהר ציון לשפוט את הר עשו והיתה לה' המלוכה which means we go right from shiras ha-yam to the end of days and the geula! So on the last day of Pesach when we sang shiras hayam we immediately go right into the end of days. That would be the source for Seudas Moshiach.




It is interesting that in the haftora of the last day we read a pasuk in Yeshaya that says that at the end of days people are going to sing to Hashem הודו לה' קראו בשמו הודיעו בעמים עלילותיו. That sounds so "Tehillim-dik"! The Pasuk was lifted right out of Tehillim 105. That means that at the end of days we will sing a song of Tehillim and it will not change. This is because Dovid Hamelech is both the forebearer of Moshiach and the author of Sefer Tehillim. Whatever Moshaich will do was already expressed linguistically in Tehillim. Dovid indeed wears those two hats - Tehillim and Moshaich.


Poetry and song express a more elevated and lofty existence. Prose describes the more concrete reality. When we sing Shiras Ha-yam we are elevated to the lofty plane of the end of days. Psukei D'zimra is a song that concludes with another song [shiras ha-yam] and psukim that describe the end of days. The poetry we find in Tehillim is rooted in shiras ha-yam: There is a string of words that begin with the same letter אמר איוב ארדוף אשיג אחלק. Pairs like ימינך ה' נאדרי בכח ימינך ה' תרעץ אויב, or מי כמוך באלים ה' מי עמוך נאדר בקודש and many other poetic flourishes.




Our השם ימלך לעולם ועד [in shiras ha-yam] - "Hashem will rule forever", laid the groundwork for ועלו מושיעים בהר ציון - the end of days. That is why on the last day of Pesach when we crossed the sea and sang, we remember the end both in our haftora and in our minhagim.  




We should be zoche this Pesach to see the fulfillment of the nevuos of acharis ha-yamim!!!




Based on Hagadas Marbeh Bracha P. 184-185 by HaRav Yaakov Dovid Homnick Shlita