Does G-d really need to Punish the Wicked? Isn't there a Better Way?
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Question:
I don't understand. If we are all G-d's children, and G-d's mercy extends to
all His creations, why did G-d need to bring on such great harm as blight, plague, and
the death of the first born to get the Children of Israel out of Egypt?
I understand the problem was that the Egyptians were wicked and needed to be
punished and the Israelites were enslaved and mistreated and something had to be
done to free them. But couldn't G-d have found a better way?
Answer:
The entirety of history is a process in which the world is slowly purified and becomes a receptive channel for G-d's light. When it is still coarse, G-dliness comes crashing in, because it is Infinite Light and the world cannot contain such a light. But as we approach the messianic times and the purification becomes more complete, miracles can land gently. The fall of the communist party was somewhat a gentler miracle -- a great miracle, but much gentler.
Today, amazing miracles are happening, far beyond the Exodus. But we all want to remain skeptics and prefer not to notice. If we open our minds and eyes, we will see extraordinary changes entering our world -- in peace and tranquility.
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Latest Comments:
There is no way to explain it..it doesnt make sense for an all loving omnipotent G-d to need to punish and kill his own children..It sits wrong with all of us..Some accept it as law others just shrug their shoulders and move on. I am sorry I cant. It is inconsistent with my view of Hashem. I cant follow a G-d that orders death and bloodshed..If that's Judaism then count me out, but i suspect judaism is much more. Jews have always been an obstinate bunch and I just wont accept any answer that condones or minimizes the death and cruelty in the Torah. Its written in black and white. So what is a Jew to do? If you listen to Orthodox Jewry, Chabad included, then we must accept it and move on. Hashem gave me a brain and a Neshama to say I cant.
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what is the answer to the question? or was this an answer to a different question?
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Train up a child in the way she should go...And then praise her for having put it all away (even though we are the one who "really" put it away...If only G-d did that.
Posted By Sonia
Doesn't science quantify all the ways in which G-d does exactly that? Life is a classroom in which we learn morality via exactly such reward and punishment.
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Thanks for the great advice! I mean really. I couldn't make her do time out after all because you're right, she thought it was a game.
I think G-d does that as well, when I studied Kabbalah seriously, and Rabbi Freeman, please correct me if I'm wrong, I realized that when G-d says "I", He means do this too.
Pretty much like your advice. Though we have to seek the guidance, it doesn't come to us.
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We are bigger than a four-year-old. We can put her through the motions we want her to do. We are free of any need to hit her. And how do you force her to stay in front of the wall if she is determined to do as she pleases? Just stand over her and if necessary gently place her hand on an object so she is "holding" it (enclosed in our own fist) and walk her over to where the object belongs, and keep doing that, very gently, despite her crying, until it's done, to show that we mean it, that she WILL put it away. And then praise her for having put it all away (even though we are the one who "really" put it away). And watch for the next time she puts away even one item, praise her specifically for that item and then encourage her to put away the rest. Watch for specific occasions to praise, and stop her at once if she does anything that is truly wrong. Avoid saying NO to harmless desires; save that for the biggies but enforce those biggies.
If only Gd did that.
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Dear Rabbi,
Purification is something I can understand. And I began to see your point clearer when you posted on June 9. Punishment is so vindictive a word to be used when talking about G-d. I cannot believe that G-d punishes, because it sounds so narrow and it acts on a past event. It does not move forward as Creation does. I always marvel at how the motion of creation moves in consistent ways regardless of scale. What applies to nations applies to four year olds.
I never believed in punishing my four year old child until the teachers told me she's purposely not doing as she's told to test how far they would take their "threats", ofcourse the worst they could do was tell mommy and mommy is not a threat--hmmm. Too much Chesed is creating a little Pharaoh in the house.
Time to be Moses to my own kid. "If you do not pick up that mess, seven minutes infront of the wall will befall you!"
Purification is a good word. Thanks a lot.
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Those soft miracles that we have now--
We had them in Egypt too.
In those days those ones were not miracles.
The world was more innocent then. They did not have the horrors we have now, so there were Egyptians who thought that all religions were the same, or rather than the gods of one country were the same as the gods of another country. This was a commonplace attitude then.
The things that happened in Egypt were not nearly as bad as the things that have been happening this past 90 years or so.
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This is definitely a valid point. So here's some explanation of how this process of purification works, as it is described in the writings of the Ramak, the Arizal and in the Tanya:
Purification means that the good stuff is separated from the bad stuff, like grain is separated from the chaff. So the good gets better, but the bad...
Eventually, however, once the bad is cut off from its source of vitality (the good), it must die. That's the drama of the curtains rising on the messianic times.
Today, we have some raw, outrageous evil in the world. At the same time, we have nations discussing moral issues that were never on the table before in history. Sometimes, in the same country you see the most dastardly crimes against humanity and unprecedented acts of kindness and generosity simultaneously (China's response to the latest earthquake, for example).
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I was paraphrasing the rabbi, not in order to call anyone undeserving, but to say that people are no better today than in the days of the Exodus from Egypt.
The rabbi had said,
The entirety of history is a process in which the world is slowly purified and becomes a receptive channel for G-d's light. When it is still coarse, G-dliness comes crashing in, because it is Infinite Light and the world cannot contain such a light. But as we approach the messianic times and the purification becomes more complete, miracles can land gently.
Well, judging by the events of the 20th century (and the 21st so far), the world is at least as "coarse" and "impure" as was Pharaoh's world.
No intent to belittle or denouce or say ill of anyone, certainly not you or your friend.
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Tzvi Freeman,
I love your writings and read each word of each artcle all the time. Please tell me details of "extraordinary changes" as you see them?
"If we open our minds and eyes, we will see extraordinary changes entering our world -- in peace and tranquility."
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