What does Hashem, our rabbis, our peers, and those
on a lower rung than our peers (i.e. children etc.) have in common?
Each represents a separate rung on the ladder of
humility and a separate challenge.
It’s a well known law of spiritual physics that
Hashem and the arrogant person are mutually exclusive. There’s no room for both of them in this world. And while this is traditionally learned as a decision
on Hashem’s part to refuse to have anything to do with the arrogant among us,
the truth is that the Baal Gaiva (arrogant person) has already beat Hashem to
the draw, so to speak. By the very
arrogance of his nature he has already pushed Hashem out of the picture in the
process of his taking center stage in his own personal drama. For as we said in EmunahSpeak:
Who Do You Put in the Center of Your Picture?, We
can choose to put ourselves front and center, and title the picture, ME,
as in only ME.
But while we are tested by our interaction (or lack
thereof) with Hashem and all the rest, Rabbi Lazer Brody tells us that the real
test of humility is on the peer level.
More specifically, it’s in how one handles the good fortune of his
friend.
How happy are we when things are going good for
yenem?
Do we go with the flow of the blessings that have
come his way or do we hit the inner voice speed bump that articulates the three
words that set one apart from another’s success:
Why
not me?
Why didn’t I
have a baby, a promotion, a raise, a shidduch, a cure, and anything/everything
else to which one presumes a superior claim?
When a person gives a kiddush for a new baby girl or
celebrates a shidduch with a L’chaim or any other manifestation of simcha, it
is a sign of true humility to subsume oneself in the joy of the Baal Simcha. In doing so, one bows before HaKodesh Boruch
Hu’s Hashgacha, and the more we identify with our friend’s good fortune the
closer we come to Hashem.
And anything
that brings one closer to Hashem is good.
And if, chas v’shalom, the joy
of his fellow fails to resonate within him to such an extent that he cannot relate to it in any form, then we’re talking five
star gaiva here, a gaiva that pulls him even further away from Hashem.
And anything that takes one away from Hashem is bad.
