When is the shechina with us? When we are with the community.
But how can one be "with the community" when studying on one's own? Torah study, in Jewish terms, even when done alone is a communal exercise. Through the text one connects with the Jews who carried these sacred texts with them through 2000 years of exile. To study talmud is not really to engage with a text but to engage with one's people through the text. The text lives only in as much as it represents the living soul of the people who invest in it.
An easily missed part of this daf tells us that the merit one receives from going to a wedding comes from the words one speaks to those celebrating. Through words, that are part of the ongoing conversation of our people, we redeem ourselves and the world.
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