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    One of the most beautiful and joyous prayer services we have in our liturgy is the Kabbalat Shabbat service on Friday night. This universally accepted service is rather new to our tefillot. It consists of several paragraphs of Tehillim or Psalms and the magnificent liturgical poem, Lecha Dodi, which the congregation sings together. What’s the origin and meaning of the Kabbalat Shabbat service and what’s its role in our liturgy?

    As we mentioned, the Kabbalat Shabbat service is relatively new in comparison to the rest of our tefillot which were established at the beginning of the Second Beit Hamikdash. Indeed, Kabbalat Shabbat was established in the 1500’s by a group of kabbalists in Safed, Israel. They based this new service on the rabbis of the Gemara who would dress in their best clothing and say to each other, “Lecha dodi likrat kallah”, “Let us go greet the Shabbat queen.” Although it has been accepted throughout all Israel, many communities wanted to make a distinction between this service and the rest of our tefillot. This is the reason why it is recited from the bimah and not from where the chazzan usually stands.

    Kabbalat Shabbat begins with six paragraphs of Tehillim, each corresponding to a different day of the week. Each of these paragraphs share a common theme: God is the Master of the universe. The last paragraph, Psalm 29, is the most significant of the six. The great and renowned kabbalist, Rabbi Yitzchak Luria Ashkenazi (1534-1572), also known as the Ari or the Arizal, writes that there are many profound mystical ideas found in this psalm. He informs us that when it’s recited with great concentration, it causes great spiritual benefit in the heavens.

    Although today there aren’t many people who possess the requisite knowledge of Kabbalah to achieve this heightened level of concentration, we can still accomplish lofty goals with this psalm. According to our Sages, if we recite it with great joy and concentration and focus on the meaning of the words, then our prayers are treated as if they had been uttered with the necessary level of concentration required to have the desired affect on the heavenly realms. Due to the special significance of Psalm 29, we always stand while reciting it.

    The climax of the Kabbalat Shabbat service is the beautiful piyut or liturgical poem, Lecha Dodi. Written by one of the leaders of the Safed kabbalists, it’s imbued with profound kabbalistic meanings that are beyond the reach of this author. However, in my research I found at least two ideas that, perhaps, we can appreciate. The first is the idea that the kallah or bride in this poem is not the Shabbat, but rather the Shechina or Divine Presence. During the week the Shechina resides in a lower level of heaven and on the Shabbat it moves to a higher realm. This move is an occasion of great joy, very much like a bride walking down the aisle on her wedding day. It is this wedding-like joy, where we, so to speak, share in the happiness of God Himself, that we try to achieve when we recite Lecha Dodi.

    The second idea is that when we recite the final paragraph of Bo’ei Kallah, where the custom is to rise, turn and bow, what we’re really doing is greeting our own personal neshama yeteira or extra soul which each person receives for the duration of Shabbat. This, then, is another reason why Lecha Dodi is to be recited with great joy.

    As we have seen, the Kabbalat Shabbat service established by the kabbalists of Safed is richly endowed with deep mystical significance. The role of this beautiful weekly service is to help us appreciate and celebrate the fact that God has created the world; that He has made the Shabbat His special day; that His Divine Presence enjoys a special place on Shabbat and that we receive a special gift of a neshama yeteira on Shabbat. Hopefully, keeping these ideas in mind as we daven Kabbalat Shabbat will allow us to enhance our Shabbat experience and enable us to soar to new spiritual heights.