One of the principles that the Hovot HaLevavot teaches is that Hashem knows what’s going on more than we do. We have limited vision and therefore sometimes get stuck in our situation.
This principle is clearly expressed in Parashat Yitro. When Yitro voices his excitement about what had happened to Bnei Yisrael the pasuk says וישמע ....את כל אשר עשה אלוקים למשה ולישראל עמו
And Yitro heard...everything that G-d did to Moshe and Bnei Yisroel His people.
It says כל- everything.
What did he hear? Why does it say he heard “everything?”
Because Yitro was there from the beginning until the end. He was in Pharoah’s inner chamber when they were plotting against the Jewish people. He watched all the suffering. While the story was unfolding before him, he had many questions. He didn’t understand what was going on. When he finally saw how it all ended, all the details of how each Egyptian was punished according to what he did or wanted to do; When he saw the whole picture he made the powerful statement that:
עַתָּה יָדַעְתִּי כִּי גָדול ה׳ יְמִכָּל הָאֱלֹקים כִּי בַדָּבָר אֲשֶׁר זָדוּ עֲלֵיהֶם:
Who is like Hashem..
That is so exacting in judging , measure for measure ?
We have to look at the full picture.
The Chafetz Chaim gives us a Mashal of two men. One came to shul, heard part of a pasuk ......שׁוֹמֵר ה׳ אֶת כָּל אֹהֲבָיו וְאֵת כָּל הָרְשָׁעִים
Hashem watches all the ones he loves and the wicked …….
and then left early. He was bothered by what he heard: G-d watches the ones he loved and the wicked equally?
Another man came late and missed the beginning of that pasuk-
..........אֶת כָּל אֹהֲבָיו וְאֵת כָּל הָרְשָׁעִים יַשְׁמִיד.
………G-d destroys all the ones he loves and the wicked.
He was confused as well... Hashem would destroy all those he loved and the wicked? He asked the rabbi how this could be. The rabbi told him - you didn’t hear the whole pasuk:
שׁוֹמֵר ה׳ אֶת כָּל אֹהֲבָיו וְאֵת כָּל הָרְשָׁעִים יַשְׁמיד
( תהילים פרק קמה)
Hashem watches over all those He loves /and destroys the wicked.
How can you question?, the Rabbi asked. You only saw a partial view.
If you come late or leave early you don’t understand the pasuk.
Another Mashal from the Chafetz Haim is about a Gabbai/Mesader who is a guest in a shul out of town. He watches as the Aliyot are given out and nothing makes sense to him. He complains to the Mesader of the shul, questioning the logic of who got the various Aliyot.
The Mesader asked the guest how long he’d been there. The guest answered that he was there for the weekend. The Mesader replied, “You came for one weekend and you think you can figure who needs to get which Aliyah? How can you know what’s going on here?”
The Chafetz Chaim tells us we too are only here for the weekend. How can we question? We are here for 70-120 years but there’s a 6,000 year plan.We can’t come in the middle of the story and start asking questions.
We have to see כל אשר עשה- -everything He did
But no one can see everything except Hashem.
The Rambam writes ( Commentary on mishnayot Berachot chapter 9):
כל מה דעביד מן שמיא לטב, וזה דבר שכלי אצל בעלי השכל ואפי' לא הורה הכתוב עליו, לפי שיש דברים רבים נראים בתחילתן טובים ויהיה אחריתם רעה רבה:
A person has to say: the principle that anything that Hashem does for the good is simply logical. We don’t need a pasuk for this. Our brains can figure it out.
Since it is logical , we quote Steve Jobs from a commencement speech he gave in 2005: You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something – because believing that the dots will connect down the road will give you the confidence to follow your heart even when it leaves you off the well-worn path, and that will make all the difference.
The Chatam Sofer says it’s incumbent upon us all to look back and connect the dots as we get older.
On my father’s 70th birthday our whole family gathered together at a birthday party and he went through his life, reflecting:
He had graduated from Yeshiva of Flatbush HS and was accepted to Columbia University. He decided, though, to take a year off and go to Israel to study in Bar Ilan first. That summer, there was a military skirmish in Israel. His father was apprehensive about him going, so he cancelled his trip. He contacted Columbia University to notify them that he’d be attending after all, but they would no longer admit him; he’d lost his spot. He attended Yeshiva University instead, where he met many rabbis of Pre-war Europe , started learning Gemara and it changed his life. At the time he was upset about Columbia, but later on he was able to see the positive, life changing impact it had.
This is a valuable exercise we should all be doing- we should sit around on Shabbat with our families and connect the dots!