Five years ago, Yair Levi stood on the Temple Mount and did something that could have gotten him arrested. Disguised as a tourist, because Jewish law does not apply equally on Judaism’s holiest site, the Israeli Levite opened his mouth and sang Shir HaMa’alot (the Song of Ascents), the very psalm that the Levites chanted on those same steps thousands of years ago. A Waqf guard closed in on him. Levi kept singing. “If they’re going to arrest me,” he thought, “I don’t care.” He was doing what his forefathers did. That was reason enough.
Today, Levi’s voice has reached millions, not just in Israel, but across America, in churches in Iowa and Texas, in concert halls in California, and in the offices of Nashville’s biggest Christian music producers. His song El Na Refa Na (“Please God, heal her”) sparked backlash across the Arab world. Hezbollah posted about it on Twitter. Benjamin Netanyahu responded. All because a Levite from Israel sang four words of Hebrew and the world answered.
A Jewish singer, rooted in the Geulah (redemption) movement, is now one of the most sought-after artists in evangelical Christian circles, and the nations cannot get enough. And this is precisely as it should be, before the final redemption.
The Sages teach that the Temple in Jerusalem was not for Israel alone. The prophet Isaiah declared: “My house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples” (Isaiah 56:7). The Levites stood in Jerusalem and sang, and the nations were invited to hear it. Yair Levi is doing nothing new. He is doing something ancient.
“I understood that what I’m doing today, flying all over the world and singing to a lot of non-Jews, is also something that my forefather used to do,” Levi said in a friendly interview with Israel365 News. “The Levite used to sing to all nations. Everyone was invited to come to Jerusalem, and they were singing there for everyone.”
Levi’s path to this mission was not obvious at first. Born into a traditional Sephardic family, where Jewish identity was never neatly divided between “religious” and “secular,” he became one of Israel’s elite combat soldiers, serving in a unit comparable to the Navy SEALs. It was there, staring down the question every Israeli soldier eventually faces, that his faith crystallized. “I was just starting to ask myself a very simple question: why do I need to risk my life? I can just move to France or the US with my family.” The only answer that satisfied him was the Bible. “If it’s not the land that God promised Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, there is no reason to risk my life. It’s even a shame to put your life at risk if it’s not your land.”
His music career ignited during COVID-19, when a song he wrote for his grandmother, El Na Refa Na, the same prayer Moses offered for Miriam, circulated around the world. The Chinese recording had to delete the name of God to pass government censors. A German band whose grandparents had been Nazis recorded a version. A Lebanese singer who performed the Arabic version was hauled before a court and fled to California. None of that was Levi’s plan. He wrote it for his grandmother.
From there, doors opened in Nashville. He is now signed to a Nashville label and has collaborated with Todd Smith of Selah, Mike Weaver of Big Daddy Weave, and the writer of “You Are Worthy of It All.” Together they wrote a song about Shabbat (the Sabbath). His song “Blessed,” built on God’s promise to Abraham, “I will bless those who bless you” (Genesis 12:3), is being sung in Sunday church services across America. His new song “Miracles” has 1.6 million views, not on Spotify or Apple Music, but on social media, where people have been filming their own versions.
He also teaches Hebrew to a global audience, one word at a time. A single video explaining Lech Lecha, the command God gave Abraham to “go forth,” but in Hebrew, literally “go to yourself,” drew a million views and prompted pastors to rework their sermons. “People are thirsty to understand the Hebrewness of their faith,” Levi said. “I can only open the door.”
Levi described his concerts as preparation. “I feel that my concerts are a rehearsal for the real thing,” he said. “We try to sing melodies that they know — in Hebrew.” He covered the Christian hymn “10,000 Reasons,” weaving it together with Psalm 136 and, after receiving formal approval from the songwriter, released it officially. The original writer sent a blessing, moved by what Levi had done with his song.
And then there is the woman in Santa Maria, California. She walked into the last minutes of one of Levi’s shows wearing a headscarf, flanked by family members who had traveled with her. She came backstage afterward and told him she had been living with cancer for years. She had driven four or five hours to be there. She listened to El Na Refa Na every day. It was, she said, her miracle. She asked him to sing it one more time.
“It’s not me,” Levi said. “It’s the words of God and the power of the words of Moses.”
The Temple Mount, where Jews still cannot pray openly as Jews, where Christians and Muslims are granted freedoms denied to the people who built the place, remains a wound at the center of the Jewish world. But Geulah, redemption, does not wait for perfect conditions. It moves like Nachshon ben Aminadav walking into the sea before it split. You jump in. And then the water opens.
Yair Levi jumped in five years ago on those stone steps, singing Shir HaMa’alot while a Waqf guard stood threateningly nearby. Today, the nations are singing it back to him.
