A DAT from Mar Abba – Find Your Song
I want to talk about Zusha.
More specifically, I want to talk about a gathering that took place this year in the narrow stone alleys of Nachlaot, Jerusalem, on the last night of Chanukah.
I don’t know exactly how it started. One moment there were a few dozen people gathered in the winding lanes of that ancient neighbourhood, my father’s (z”l) neighbourhood, and the next moment there were many hundreds, packed like sardines (with cellphones). And then someone began to play, and someone began to sing, and within seconds the whole crowd was singing together, their voices rising up into the cold Jerusalem night air, the glow of Chanukah menorahs flickering in the windows of the stone buildings above their heads.
לית יחודא בעלאי עלאי ותתאי בר מנך
“leit yichuda bila’a ila’a u’tata’a bar minach”
I can’t, can’t do this without you
We’re in this together
Don’t leave me on my own
The song was Zusha’s “Don’t Leave Me On My Own” – and I want to tell you that I have been to many concerts and farbrengens, to hakafot and chasunas, to the most inspiring shuls around the world, and to the highest dancing on Simchat Torah and Purim. And I have never felt anything quite like what I felt watching that holy gathering in Nachlaot.
Why? What was it about that moment?
I keep coming back to the pasuk from tehillim in Kabbalat Shabbat:
שִׁירוּ לַה’ שִׁיר חָדָשׁ, שִׁירוּ לַה’ כָּל הָאָרֶץ
“Shiru l’Hashem shir chadash” – “Sing to the Lord a new song; sing to the Lord, all the earth.”
What does it mean to sing a new song? The Psalm issues the directive but gives no instructions. We can be taught what to sing, when to sing, how to sing. But a new song – one that is truly ours, that rises from somewhere deep and real – that cannot be taught. It has to be found.
The band Zusha – Shlomo Gaisin and Zach Goldschmiedt – has spent their career doing exactly that. They take the ancient words of our tefillot and our niggunim, the melodies of the Chassidic masters, the davening and teachings of Jews from around the world, and they breathe something startling and alive into them. It is not a Judaism of nostalgia. It is a Yiddishkeit of right now – of searching and finding, of a people that refuses to let its songs go stale.
“Don’t Leave Me On My Own” was written in the aftermath of October 7. Its lyrics draw on the words of Reb Baruch of Mezibuz, who taught that every single Jewish soul is an irreplaceable thread in the fabric of klal Yisrael. “Without you,” the teaching goes, “there is something missing in the unity of the upper and lower worlds.” Says Goldschmiedt: “Don’t think that Klal Yisroel can continue without you. If you were created, you play an integral role, so get active, get involved.'”
That is what I heard those hundreds of Jews singing together in Nachlaot on the last night of Chanukah. Not a song. A call to action.
And it strikes me that this is precisely what DAT is about.
A school can teach children the notes, the sheet music, the musical theory of Judaism. We can introduce them to the melodies, suggest which songs to sing, fill their days with tefillah and Torah and mitzvot. We can do it with love and care and creativity. And we try to, every single day. But at the end of the day, every one of our students has to find their own song – claim it as their own, sing it in their own voice, bring something new and alive to the Jewish conversation. It’s my only real, enduring wish for all of our children and students.
That is what we are building here. That is what 33 years of DAT have been building.
On the evening of Tuesday, May 19th, we are bringing Zusha to Denver in support of Denver Academy of Torah – to our community, to our families, to every Jew in this city who wants to stand together and sing. The theme of our Annual Event this year is Stronger Together, and I cannot think of a more perfect expression of that theme than a room full of Denver Jews, every single one of us, raising our voices together.
לית יחודא בעלאי עלאי ותתאי בר מנך
“leit yichuda bila’a ila’a u’tata’a bar minach”
I can’t, can’t do this without you
We’re in this together
Don’t leave me on my own
Come. Bring someone who needs to be there. Bring someone who didn’t know they needed to be there. Be a part of this. Help support this special school.
There are so many ways to get involved and help make May 19 an incredible moment for our community. You can register and learn more at https://datcampus.org/2026-annual-event/.
Shiru l’Hashem shir chadash. Let’s sing a new song together.