While the topic of why bad things happen to good people—and vice versa—has occupied a place in the thought of religious people of many faiths across the millennia, it is plain that there is no consensus answer. We are faced with a palette of answers from which to choose, and each is open to objection. Sample explanations might run like this:
- The good person to whom bad things happen isn’t really good—and you aren’t in a position to assess their quantum of goodness;
- That person obviously didn’t pray hard, well or frequently enough to merit good things happening;
- That person may be good in this life but be possessed by a soul that was bad in an earlier existence, and which deserved a tough time;
- That person is really and truly good, and the bad things that happen are only to clear the way for them to enjoy a more pleasurable life in the World to Come;
- Bad things happen to this person so that some other person can have the opportunity to good things to them;
- The infliction of bad things has a cautionary effect, warning that worse things may come if the good person does not do—or desist from doing—a particular thing;
- Being made to experience bad things is only a test of how strong is that person’s faith in the face of adversity.
There are also correlative explanations as to why good
things happen to bad people.
At Avot 4:19 Rabbi Yannai raises the question but then
appears to deflect it:
אֵין
בְּיָדֵֽינוּ לֹא מִשַּׁלְוַת הָרְשָׁעִים, וְאַף לֹא מִיִּסּוֹרֵי הַצַּדִּיקִים
Neither the tranquility of the
wicked nor the suffering of the righteous are in our grasp.
Rabbi Yannai is quite correct. We cannot understand why the
wicked enjoy the good things in life while the good do not, or why people who
commit evil can sleep soundly in their beds at night while tzaddikim, the righteous,
are unable to rest. One might venture to suggest that the thrust of his mishnah
is not to tell us that we don’t have an answer but, by implication, to persuade
us to let go of these issues and not waste valuable time speculating about them
since we have neither the necessary data nor the Divine perspective that make
an assessment in each case possible.
As one might imagine, this issue has attracted the serious attention
of many of our Sages over the generations, none of which impressed Rabbi Baruch
HaLevi Epstein
In his Baruch She’amar al Pirkei Avot, he expresses
his astonishment that many have laboured over this issue when the answer is so
obvious. He cites a gemara at Niddah 16b that runs like this:
Rabbi Chanina bar Papa made the
following exposition: The name of the angel who is in charge of conception is
'Night', and he takes up a drop [of semen] and places it in the presence of the
Holy One, blessed be He, saying, 'Sovereign of the universe, what shall be the
fate of this drop? Shall it produce a strong man or a weak man, a wise man or a
fool, a rich man or a poor man?' Whereas 'wicked man' or 'righteous one' he
does not mention, in agreement with the view of Rabbi Chanina. For Rabbi Chanina
stated: ‘Everything is in the hands of heaven except the fear of God, as it is
said, And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you, but to fear
him …
This gemara answers the question entirely. God determines
what is going to happen to a person in terms of his or her health, wealth,
status and aptitudes—but it for that person to exercise free will and choose whether
to be a God-fearing (= good) person or not.
So how does Rav Schachter tackle the good-person/bad-things
issue? In truth he doesn’t—but he does write about the fact that we live an
imperfect world in which we have failed to eliminate Amalek and the forces of
evil, and about the importance of accepting God’s decree with equanimity as a
means of demonstrating one’s own emunah.
Maybe the Baruch She’amar’s approach comes close to
sweeping a complex philosophical issue under the carpet, but I can’t help
preferring it to a lengthy, learned and well-sourced response that seems to avoid
answering it full-on.
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