Skip to main content

Thought for the Day: This World Is Nothing But An Entryway To Olam HaBa

I worked at Fermi Lab about 23 years ago.  At that time, the lab was completely open to the public.  Still, we were a national lab, so there were times we had to practice security in case of who knows what.  On those rare occasions, all outside communication was disabled and no traffic was allowed to enter nor leave the site.  Theses drills could last a couple of hours or more; no big deal.  One time, thought, my boss came to my office and told me, "Don't worry, we've gotten you special clearance so you can go home to take your son to the hospital."  I didn't worry, I panicked; I had no clue what he was talking about.  This was pre-cell phone days, so I just jumped in my car and headed home.  It turns out that my son, who was just a couple of weeks old, had developed a staph infection in his belly button.  My wife had called the lab, gotten the security office, explained the situation, they called my boss, and... you know the rest.

I got home, the doctor (who was also a close friend) was there with an uncharacteristically worried look on his face.  Apparently, infections in the belly button of an infant is very bad news; very bad.  Dr. Dan told us that he needed IV antibiotics right away; so off we rushed to the hospital.  Dr. Dan told everyone that my son was his god son and we got the VIP treatment.  Once we got the room, however, Dr. Dan told my wife and I to go to the leave and to to the other end of the hall while he got the IV started.  An infant has very tiny and fragile veins; starting and IV is tedious and very painful for the infant.  My wife and I spent the next half hour listening to him scream in excruciating pain and knowing we could do nothing.  It was horrible and I have trouble talking about it even to this day.

We allowed that, of course, because he was two weeks old and had a whole life ahead of him.  It changed him, it changed my wife, it changed me; but there was no choice, not even a fleeting thought to do anything different.  We would do exactly the same today.

The shulchan aruch paskens that a person should accustom himself to say, "kol mah d'avad rachmana, l'tav avad" -- all that HaShem does is done for the good.  It doesn't mean that it's fun or pleasant.  Chazal were precise: it's for good; ie, it will result in good, not that it is good right now.  And it doesn't matter if that decision needs to be made when the person has only entered this world a few days before or is likely to leave this world in only a few days time.  What's the point of inflicting painful, sometimes excruciatingly painful, on a patient who may have only days, hours, or even minutes left in this world?  The same reason to inflict painful, even excruciatingly painful, treatments on a two week old infant; he has a whole life ahead of him.

Chazal, characteristically blunt and precise, often use the word "rechem" (womb) and "kever" (grave) interchangeably.  If you know that this world is nothing but a preparation for the next world, then the kever is a rechem.  If you think that this world is all there is, then the rechem is a kever.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Thought for the Day: Love in the Time of Corona Virus/Anxiously Awaiting the Mashiach

Two scenarios: Scenario I: A young boy awakened in the middle of the night, placed in the back of vehicle, told not to make any noise, and the vehicle speeds off down the highway. Scenario II: Young boy playing in park goes to see firetruck, turns around to see scary man in angry pursuit, poised to attack. I experienced and lived through both of those scenarios. Terrifying, no? Actually, no; and my picture was never on a milk carton. Here's the context: Scenario I: We addressed both set of our grandparents as "grandma" and "grandpa". How did we distinguish? One set lived less than a half hour's drive; those were there "close grandma and grandpa". The other set lived five hour drive away; they were the "way far away grandma and grandpa". To make the trip the most pleasant for all of us, Dad would wake up my brother and I at 4:00AM, we'd groggily -- but with excitement! -- wander out and down to the garage where we'd crawl

Thought for the Day: David HaMelech's Five Stages of Finding HaShem In the World

Many of us "sing" (once you have heard what I call carrying a tune, you'll question how I can, in good conscience, use that verb, even with the quotation marks) Eishes Chayil before the Friday night Shabbos meal.  We feel like we are singing the praises of our wives.  In fact, I have also been to chasunas where the chasson proudly (sometimes even tearfully) sings Eishes Chayil to his new eishes chayil.  Beautiful.  Also wrong.  (The sentiments, of course, are not wrong; just a misunderstanding of the intent of the author of these exalted words.) Chazal (TB Brachos, 10a) tell us that when Sholmo HaMelech wrote the words "She opens her mouth Mwith wisdom; the torah of kindness is on her tongue", that he was referring to his father, Dovid HaMelech, who (I am continuing to quote Chazal here) lived in five worlds and sang a song of praise [to each].  It seems to me that "world" here means a perception of reality.  Four times Dovid had to readjust his perc

Thought for the Day: אוושא מילתא Debases Yours Shabbos

My granddaughter came home with a list the girls and phone numbers in her first grade class.  It was cute because they had made it an arts and crafts project by pasting the list to piece of construction paper cut out to look like an old desk phone and a receiver attached by a pipe cleaner.  I realized, though, that the cuteness was entirely lost on her.  She, of course, has never seen a desk phone with a receiver.  When they pretend to talk on the phone, it is on any relatively flat, rectangular object they find.  (In fact, her 18 month old brother turns every  relatively flat, rectangular object into a phone and walks around babbling into it.  Not much different than the rest of us, except his train of thought is not interrupted by someone else babbling into his ear.) I was reminded of that when my chavrusa (who has children my grandchildrens age) and I were learning about אוושא מילתא.  It came up because of a quote from the Shulchan Aruch HaRav that referred to the noise of תקתוק