בס''ד
28th Tishrei,
5772
October 26th,
2011
Don Marquis, an American humorist jack-of-all-trades, once said, “If you
make people think they’re thinking, they’ll love you; but if you really make
them think, they’ll hate you.”
He’s right, and his being right is huge problem for us all.
You and I learn how to be good through others’ approval. When we’re children,
people’s response to us teaches us whether we’ve done right or wrong. So, the inclination
to care what other people think starts early and runs deep.
But with a constancy that bespeaks the immutability of human nature, making
people think does not win their kindness. Rather, when you speak up for
justice, when you poke holes in facades covering societal ills, when you
question the way things are, be assured that you will make a lot of people very,
very angry.
Anger is understandable. Human
beings are bad at change, and readily prefer the evil they know over the good
they don’t. Even when change is in our self-interest, it is our nature to
resist it. The people of Israel
to Moshe and Aharon, “…May the Lord look upon you and punish you for making us
loathsome to Pharoah and his courtiers…” (Exodus 5:21)
What this anger means, though, is that sometimes we have to lean against
our instinctual tendency to want approval. The opinions of others are not the
sign of our merit.
About Noah, the Torah says, “…He was a righteous and blameless man in his
generation…” (Genesis 6:9) I have no doubt that his contemporaries thought well
of him, and praised his holiness. But a more holy man would have fought for the
fate of the earth, pushed people to be better, and accepted the wrath he
incurred thereby. There is a reason we call ourselves “the seed of Avraham,”
and that Noah’s name is left behind.
Prophecy is not an easy path. Look at how Jonah resisted. How many rabbis have lost their pulpits for preaching an unpopular message?
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