Parshat Vayera - 5761 May
Man Question G-d? As Avraham
said (Bereshit 18:27), we realize that we are but "dust and ash."
Yet we have been given a soul and a mind, and a conscience, and the
ability at least to some extent to distinguish between right and wrong.
And we see in the Bible that some of our greatest heroes challenged
G-d, while never letting go of their faith in Him. The first of
these was Avraham Avinu, the Founder of our People, and the "pillar of
kindness" in the world. When
HaShem told him
of His intention to destroy Sodom because of its extreme wickedness, Avraham
immediately rose to their defense (Bereshit 18:23-25).
"And Avraham drew near and he said, 'Will You sweep away the
righteous with the wicked?' Will You sweep away and not forgive the place for the sake of
the (fifty, forty five, forty, thirty, twenty, ten) righteous people who are
there? It would be sacrilege
for You to do such a thing, to bring death upon the righteous with the
wicked; so the righteous will be like the wicked.
It would be sacrilege for You. Shall
the Judge of all the earth not do Justice?" A question
arises, "If Avraham was so concerned about the fate of Sodom, why did
he not also protest the Command he was given to sacrifice his innocent son,
Yitzchak, at the Akeidah?"
The Akeidah
is one of the touchstones of our faith, and has many deep aspects.
One answer that we may possibly give to the above question is that
Avraham viewed the world external to himself in one light, because of his
concern for the "other." And
because of his lack of personal ego, which he
extended to his immediate family as well, his sense of injustice was
not similarly aroused. The Prophet
Chavakuk, a "member" of the "Trei
Asar," the group of twelve Prophets who prophesied over a period of
time preceding the destruction of the First Temple till the Building of the
Second Temple, also challenges
the Justice System of G-d, when Nevuchadnetzar approaches to destroy
Yerushalayim and the Temple. Chavakuk cries out (Chavakuk 1:2), "How
long, O L-rd, shall I cry, and You will not hear, "Therefore
the Torah is weakened, and right never goes forth; And Metzudat
David explains that the apparent lack of justice will cause people to err,
and to believe that there is no "din," no law, and no "dayan,"
no judge, and that everything is random. Therefore,
Chavakuk, as it were, challenges Hashem and says (Chavakuk 2:1), "I will
stand upon my watch, and set myself upon the tower, RASHI
explains that Chavakuk drew a circle around himself and said, "I will
not move from here until I hear how HaShem will answer me concerning my
question of how He can permit the wicked to
prosper, and how I shall reply to those who question me on this
point, for it sheds doubt on the Justice
of HaShem." And HaShem
answered him and said, in essence, "the time of redemption has not yet
come, but it will surely come," and (Chavakuk 2:4), the "righteous
shall live by his faith." "Sefer
Iyov," the Book of Job, contains perhaps the classic discussion of
"theodicy," why the righteous suffer and the wicked prosper, in
the Bible. There is some doubt
as to the authorship of this work. One
opinion is that the author is none other than Moshe Rabbeinu himself, and
that Iyov may or may not have been a real individual, but the allegory is
written to deal with this theological problem. Job is
righteous, prosperous and has a large family.
HaShem says to the Satan (Iyov 1:8), "Have you seen my servant
Iyov, that there is none like him in the earth, …, who fears G-d and shuns
evil." The Satan
protests that the righteousness of Iyov is due entirely to his happy and
successful life, and that if his riches, family and health are withdrawn, he
would surely abandon his faith. HaShem
permits the Satan to reduce Iyov to a mourning shell of his former self.
But Iyov says (Job 2:10), "Shall we receive good at the hand of
G-d, and not receive evil?" Iyov curses
the day he was born (Iyov 3:1), "Let the day perish wherein I was
born,…" but not his Maker.
He complains (Iyov 16:12-14,17), " I was at ease and He broke me
apart, He took me by the neck and dashed me to pieces; …" "His archers surround me, …;" "He breaks me
again and again, He runs upon
me like a giant." "Although
there is no violence in my hands, and my prayer is pure." And yet we hear (Iyov 19:25-27), "But as for me, I know that my Redeemer lives, And that He will
witness at the last upon the dust;"
"And when after my skin is destroyed, then from my
underlying flesh shall I see G-d;" "And my eyes shall behold,
and not another's…" Beginning in
Iyov 38, we find HaShem's response to his loyal servant, who had not
deserted him, where HaShem tells him that He is the Creator and Supreme
Judge of the World, to Whom many options, beyond the understanding of mortal
man, are available, to redress any injustice.
Then Iyov says to HaShem (Iyov 42:2,5-6), "I know that You can
do everything…", "I had heard of You by the hearing of the ear,
but now my eye has seen You." "Wherefore,
I abhor my word, and repent, seeing that I am dust and ashes." At the end (Iyov
42:12-13, 16-17), we find, "So the L-rd blessed the end of Iyov more
than the beginning…" "He
had also seven sons and three daughters, … "
"After this, Iyov lived a hundred forty years,…"
"So Iyov died, being old and full of days." But the
injustice experienced by Iyov, that was only a test that he passed with
"flying colors," but that he might have preferred doing without,
was not refuted by G-d. And
Iyov's right to question the Justice of G-d was not denied. The fate of
Iyov brings to mind the Holocaust, and the many unanswered questions that
surround that horrific experience. We
are entitled to our questions. But,
as Chavakuk said, "The righteous
live by their faith."
Rabbi Pinchas Frankel |
