"Dayeinu"--Really? A Guest Post by Mrs. Sally Mayer

We've all thought about how strange the song "dayeinu" is, when you think about it. Would it really have been okay with us if Hashem had brought us to the yam suf, but not split it? Our enemies would have gotten us right there! Or had He split the sea but not drowned the Egytians? Had they passed through, we would have still been chased and captured or killed! Ever since our son Moshe was born three and a half months prematurely at 1.4 lbs, and went through his five challenging months in the hospital, I have had a new perspective on dayeinu. As he was going through all of his many difficulties, we learned to thank Hashem for each step, even if the next step was unclear. If yesterday he needed 100% oxygen, and today he needed only 80% piped into his incubator, that was enough to say thank you for, even though we still didn't know if he would ever breathe room air. If he was able to digest 2 teaspoons of milk today, that was enough to praise Hashem, even though we didn't know if his digestive system would ever be able to take more than that. And every day of his life there with no infections, no further bleeding in his brain, no further complications, was a reason to be thankful, even though we didn't know if he would even survive. So yes -- "dayeinu" -- not because we would have survived if Hashem hadn't split the sea or drowned the Eyptians or provided us with mann, but because that would have been enough for us -- we would have been thankful for that and could not have presumed to ask for more. Al achat kamah vechamah are we thankful that Hashem didn't stop at each step -- that our son Moshe, now 3 years old, is a beautiful, healthy little boy, thanks to Hashem's great chessed; that Hashem not only took us out of Mitzrayim, but also split the sea, also gave us the mann, and everything else that came afterward. Each step is a gift of incredible kindeness from Hashem, a gift we did not deserve and could not have asked for more after receiving it.
It's a tremendous lesson for our lives all the time -- to appreciate and be thankful for steps in a process, even before the process is complete, and even, ironically, if the process may never be complete.

Note: Mrs. Mayer is Ma’ayanot’s Israel Liaison and was the Chair of our Talmud department and a beloved Talmud teacher at Ma’ayanot before making aliyah with her family five years ago.