I saw a nice thought on this week’s Parasha, Beshalach where Moshe Rabbenu cries out to G-d in tefila, but Hashem asks, “Why are you crying out to Me? The Jewish people have to go and move forward. Tefila/Prayer, is not the right thing for now. They need to have Bitachon and travel into the sea.”
The question is why did Moshe even pray? Hashem had told Moshe that He would harden Paroah’s heart, that he would chase after them and that Hashem would be glorified through Paroah. Moshe knew that there was a guarantee from G-d, so why was he praying? Why wasn’t he just relying on Hashem?
The answer is that when someone else is in trouble, we aren’t supposed to use our Bitachon. We are supposed to help the person. That is an important fundamental. When someone comes to you and tells you that they need Sedaka, you can’t tell them you have a great book on Emunah for them. That is not what you’re supposed to be doing at that moment.
You are not supposed to rely on Hashem to take of that person, and you are not supposed to feed him Bitachon. You’re supposed to feed him food.
Rav Yisrael Salantar once said the following:
There is a rule in Middot: Sometimes a person has to use a particular middah one way for himself, and the exact opposite way for another person. For example, running away from honor is a wonderful trait. But that is in regard to yourself. You should run away from honor for yourself, but when it comes to someone else, we don’t say, “It’s not good to have honor, so therefore I’m going to spit at you.”
As it says, “Who is honored? The one that honors others.”
Another example is being a celibate. Separating from worldly matters is a wonderful thing. It’s good to manage with less, and have a simple wedding. But when it comes to somebody else, we are supposed to go all out. We can’t tell somebody else to use fake flowers for their wedding. If you want fake flowers, wonderful. But if you’re making somebody else’s wedding, make it nice.
This may be difficult. The Chazon Ish says that on one hand, we have to be very humble, easy-going and tolerant, for ourselves. If someone blocks your driveway, you shouldn’t explode- you should be tolerant. But at the same time, never block someone else’s driveway.
Although you are supposed to be tolerant when someone parks in your driveway, you can’t demand tolerance from somebody else, when you park in his driveway. You have to have the sensitivity that it is wrong to block somebody’s driveway. So, we have to be able to use our character traits in one way for ourselves, and in another way for other people. Rav Yisrael Salantar ends this lesson off with Bitachon. Bitachon is a wonderful middah. It’s says that someone that has bread in their basket and worries about what they’ll eat tomorrow is wrong. But does that mean that if someone comes to ask you for food, that you only give them enough food for today? No! You have to give them enough food for today, tomorrow, and for the rest of the year.
This is the interesting point of using the same middah one way for yourself, and one way for others.
Rav Yosef Chaim Sonnenfeld takes this thought and applies it to a pasuk that we have quoted many times. (I wish I had kept track of the different explanations given on this.)
ברוך השם יבטח בה׳
Fortunate is the one that relies on Hashem
והיה ה׳ מבטחו
And Hashem is his reliance.
That is seemingly redundant. If you rely on Hashem, it seems obvious that Hashem is your reliance.
But Rav Yosef Chaim Sonnenfeld tells us the following:
ברוך השם יבחח בה׳
Fortunate is the one that relies on Hashem
And Hashem is his reliance.
Hashem is his reliance, but not his friend’s reliance. He doesn’t send his friend to Hashem when the friend comes to him for a favor. He takes care of his friend himself.
The Michtav M’Eliyahu asks-
How can we have this dichotomy of Middot? It doesn’t make sense. But he explains that Hashem created poor people, as it says in the Gemara Masechet Bava Batra, in order to give us the opportunity to support them. When a poor person comes to you for money, it’s as if Hashem sent him to you and said, “Please take care of this person- I need you to take care of him.”
So, you can’t tell G-d, “You sent him to me, but I’m sending him back to You.”
No. We have to train ourselves in chessed. Rav Dessler says that if bitachon were to be allowed to be used for others, there would be no room for chessed.
Of course, we know that everything is from Hashem. And of course, we know that Hashem doesn’t need us. But Hashem set up the world in a way that it seems that He needs us, because otherwise there would be no room for us to do acts of kindness.
Therefore, it would be a contradiction of the whole opportunity for Sedaka and Chessed if you’d start preaching bitachon to others.
If someone comes your way and needs something, it is your job to give it to him. Hashem sent him to you. You can’t send him back. He is your job. That is the difficulty of Middot. The word middah means a measure. Bitachon is a measure as well. We can use the wrong measurements sometimes, like putting too much salt, or too little sugar in something. We are supposed to put heavy doses of bitachon on our own problems, but when it comes to someone else’s problems, that is not the time to start invoking the bitachon card.
When someone else has a problem, you go run and take care of it.
Have a wonderful day.