Yesterday's Daily Bitachon
We continue with our discussion of a higher level of Bitachon, and trying to bring it down to us.
Yesterday we quoted the Hovot HaLevavot, and today we will quote the Bet HaLevi in his essay on Bitachon.
He talks about the הבוטח מעולה
The high level rely-er, whose Bitachon is so strong that he feels that G-d is definitely doing what’s good for him, to the point that he annuls his own will. He has no will.
It’s a higher level than Gam Zu LeTova, because he has no wants.
He quotes a pasuk from Tehillim, where David HaMelech says,
אם לא שויתי ודממתי נפשי
I’m at the point of equanimity, and my desires are silent.
He’s not grappling with any needs or issues that need to work out. There is no grappling.
כגמול עלי אמו
Like the baby who’s weaned from his mother.
The Bet HaLevi says that after a baby has been nursed for a year, and is finally put in the high chair to eat for the first time, if you could ask him what he would like, mashed peas, mashed bananas, or mashed sweet potatoes, the baby would look at you and say, “I have no idea. You are my mother, you know what is good for me. Just serve it to me. I have no opinion because I never ate before. Mom, just put food in my mouth.” The Bet HaLevi says this was David HaMelech.
בטל מעצמו כל רצון
He annulled all wills
רק אשר יעשה ה׳ הוא רצונו
Only what G-d wants was his ratzon
Because no one knows better than G-d what’s good for me. Therefore, I give myself over to G-d.
This is an extremely high level, it’s level of the Tenaim, the rabbis of the Gemarah. We can’t even fathom that level. It was Rabbi Akiva and the like.
David Hamelech, of course, was on that level. He’s the one that said it. But, as we have said previously, hishtadlut and bitachon are a constant work and there is no set system . At one point in his life, David HaMelech said ( perek 119)
העבר חרפתי
Remove my disgrace.
אשר יגורתי
That I was afraid,
כי משפטיך טובים
for your judgements are good.
The Bet HaLevi says that David HaMelech, asked for forgiveness for his disgrace, that he was afraid. How could he be afraid, if the pasuk says the one who relies on Hashem is in a fortress?!
Last night, I passed by the Torah Center to get something and when I came out, there were some men nearby, leaning on a car, and they looked scary. I was afraid. Now, if I was in an armored tank, with police escorts on each side, armed with rifles, I wouldn’t be scared.
David HaMelech says to himself, “What am I scared of? I have G-d with me? Everything G-d does is for the good. Why was I scared?”
This is beyond our level.
But we have to know, as we go through these times, that there are points in the day that we might get nervous or concerned, and think, “What will be?”
But there will come a time that we will look back, like David HaMelech, and say
“Remove my disgrace. What was I afraid of?”
Now, we might be afraid, but we’ll look back on this one day and see that there was nothing to be afraid of. Hashem was handling and taking care of us.
We all know the “Footsteps in the Sand” poem from early 1900s.
We don’t need that poem, because we have a Rashi that says, in the times of Amalek, when we asked if Hashem was with us, Hashem answered,
“Am I with you?? I’m carrying you on My shoulders!!”
So even if we can’t really feel it right now, we have to know, at least intellectually, that there will be a time that we will wonder what we were nervous about.
BeEzrat Hashem that time will come soon.
Have a wonderful day.