The Gaon Rabbi Yitzhak Zilberstein, rabbi of the Ramat Elachman neighborhood in Bnei Brak, was asked: Is it permissible to make people with serious illnesses happy with musical instruments during the Jewish holidays?
The verdict was published in detail in the newsletter 'Divrei Hemed':
Question: There are groups of entertainers who go to hospitals to encourage and cheer up seriously ill patients, and they have musical instruments. We wanted to ask, is it permissible to go and cheer up the sick with musical instruments, both during the Three Weeks and the Nine Days - or is it that during these days of mourning for the destruction of the Temple, one should not play musical instruments?
Answer: It is stated in Tractate Yoma, page 22a - There is nothing that stands in the way of protecting a person's life, and making a sick person happy is a great commandment, and as King Solomon said (Proverbs 18:14), "A man's spirit is sustained by his illness.".
And we also note that joy also causes healing, as we learned in Tractate Shabbat, page 13a: A gross step takes away one in five hundredths of the light of a person's eyes, and it is added to him during the Kiddush of the Sabbath. That is, the light of the eyes returns to a person during the Kiddush on Shabbat night when he enjoys the wine and looks at the candles. And there, the scholar Yaakov explained, according to what is said in Tractate Avoda Zara, page 28b: 'The armor of the de'ina is hung in the obnita of the divination,' meaning the roots of the eyes are tied and held in the heart, and since it is said that wine makes the heart glad (Psalms 141:15), and it is also said that the light of the eyes makes the heart glad (Proverbs 15:30), therefore the joy of the heart that is created from the Kiddush wine and the Shabbat menorahs heal the heart, and in turn bring medicine to the eyes.
Therefore, it is a great mitzvah to go and sing and make happy those who are seriously ill, even in these difficult days when we mourn the destruction of the Temple.
