We continue discussing whether one can or can’t hate a wicked person.
I once heard Rav Wolbe say, in the name of his rebbe, Rav Yerucham Levovitz, that only an Adam Gadol/ great man can hate a rasha.
Why? Because when you hate a wicked person, you aren’t hating the person, you are hating their deeds, and only a great man can differentiate between the two.
There is a Gemarah in Masechet Berachot ( daf י, amud א) that backs up this point:
There were some ruffians in Rabbi Meir’s neighborhood, who caused him a lot of pain, and Rabbi Meir prayed for them to die.
His wife Bruria reproached him, saying that if his reasoning was that it says, “Let the “sinners” be obliterated,” it actually says, “Let the “sins” be obliterated.
Therefore, she told him, “Pray for them to return in Teshuva, and then they won’t be wicked anymore.”
Sure enough, he followed his wife’s advice, he prayed for them, and they returned in Teshuva.
So we see that the Gemara sides with Rabbi Meir’s wife, that we should not pray for the wicked to die, but rather pray for their wickedness to go away. Furthermore, when you have a right to hate the wicked, it actually means the wicked in the wicked person, and not the person himself. Only a great man can make the distinction.
Rav Wolbe also told a story about the Elder of Kelm. He always had a very pale complexion during the week, but on Shabbat, his face would change, and he’d get a reddish look to him.
One Shabbat, his face stayed pale and his students didn’t know why. They waited until after Havdala to ask him what happened, when he told them: Peretz Smolenskin had died. He explained that this man had been a communist, anti-religious Jew who had caused a lot of problems and was a true threat to religion.
Then why the pale face?
He told them, “Imagine the pain of this neshama, when he gets to the world of truth and discovers that he’d been fighting for lies his whole life. Imagine the pain that his soul will go through.”
Thinking of this, the Alter of Kelm could not enjoy Shabbat.
That is a great man. As bad as the man was, he had a Jewish soul that would suffer. The Alter of Kelm felt bad, he felt for his pain.
That is a great man, and that is why we simple people don’t necessarily have the right to hate anybody. Because we cannot make that distinction between the person and his deeds.