How special is the recitation of Pesukei D’zimrah (Verses of Praise) every day! Their secrets are so lofty, reaching the Heavens, to “cut away” (l’zameir) the mental and spiritual hindrances to prayer. A person who comes late to the synagogue, such that he must skip sections of Pesukei D’zimrah, loses much benefit. Even worse are those who willfully read other things, such as Tehillim or Ma’amados and the like, or they sit in the gallery of the synagogue prattling about all sorts of things, and then skip reciting Pesukei D’zimrah. Woe to them over the disgrace to the Praises! Such people are like a person who exchanged pearls for pennies or shards of pottery. So is this matter: for even learning is not good when it is instead of reciting the Verses of Praises. How good is a word in its time! (Mishlei 15:23). So every person should think to himself, if he were standing in the presence of a king of flesh and blood, servicing him and praising him, would he interrupt that to honor anybody else? Certainly not! For the king’s honor is greater than anyone else’s, and it is not befitting to set the king’s honor aside for the honor or anyone else. Now, if that is true of a king of flesh and blood, how much more so is this true of the Holy One, blessed is He. Furthermore, from the beginning of Pesukei D’zimrah until the end of the prayer it is like a single chain that links Earth to Heaven, and so it definitely not proper to interrupt that in the middle.