This brachah is the grand finale of the birchos hashachar

We’ve come to the end, to the very last brachah. You’d expect this brachah, appearing after we’ve thanked Hashem for all of our physical needs and recognized our spiritual uniqueness, to be a grand finale. And on the face of it, it seems anticlimactic to thank Hashem for removing the sleep from our eyes.

Shouldn’t this brachah, which was once said when washing one’s face, be found toward the beginning of the set of brachos? And haven’t we already thanked Hashem for opening the eyes of the blind? What does this brachah add? Finally, what’s the connection between this brachah and the yehi ratzon that follows it, asking Hashem to enable us to follow in the Torah’s ways?

Windows to the Soul

We thank Hashem for removing the slumber from our eyes — the window of the soul. Since our eyes are the gateway to such holiness, the Vilna Gaon emphasizes that we must daven that we use our eyes solely in pursuit of Torah, and not to follow our desires.

We daven each day, “V’ha’eir eineinu b’Sorasecha — light up our eyes with Your Torah.” Rav Chaim Friedlander explains that we’re asking Hashem to enable us to see the world with the correct perspective and value system; it’s so easy to deceive ourselves, to convince ourselves that values antithetical to the way of Torah have some aspect of truth.

Everything we see impacts who we are, and becomes the compass through which we direct our pursuits in life — to such an extent that Chazal teach us that we should not even look at the face of a wicked person. Therefore, notes Rav Bernstein in Laboker Rinah, after we’ve rinsed our eyes, and are ready to face the world, we need help from Above to ensure that we use our eyes for the correct purposes.

Now we can understand the juxtaposition of this brachah to the yehi ratzon that follows, in which we request that our direction in life should be in the service of Hashem. This brachah serves as the segue into our daily lives — now that we’re awake, we need to make use of our eyes to lead us in the path of Torah and mitzvos.