In today’s Tanya portion, we see that everything is bashert. Even anger. Those who carry anger, are likened to idolaters, because there should be no anger when there is faith in G-d. But we see that the Torah teaches us that there were times that Moshe was angry, what is the lesson we learn? That there are times when anger is appropriate to further a goal in keeping Jews on their Torah path and the like.
The Tanya discusses an instance where a gentile starts talking to a Jew who is praying. The Jew is angered. But you see that the anger serves a purpose here. Clearly says the Tanya the gentile was placed there by G-d so that the Jew would work on his kavanah/his concentration and focus on his prayers, to elevate himself. In this way, we don’t focus on the anger, we use anger is a motivator to improve ourselves.
Improving ourselves, that is what Noach is about. Before the flood, G-d kept the world going even as the world inhabitants were amoral and sinners. He went above and beyond the people’s merits in keeping them alive. But because they were not punished, they may not have understood that they had to repent. Comes Noah and tells them to repent for a flood is coming to destroy the world.
Then G-d enters a covenant with the survivors that He will never destroy the world again, as He did then. The sign of the covenant is a rainbow. Although rainbows are beautiful, they are a reminder that at that moment G-d sees fit to destroy the world for its malevolence, and because of the covenant He does not.
It is a call to us all and especially to those who see it, that they must change their ways, and encourage others to do so as well. Which leads us to the idea of seeing others sin, and its meaning.
I believe it is a psychological adage that the faults we see in others are a projection of the faults in ourselves. So, when we see faults in others, first we have to look introspectively at ourselves. The Rabbis tell us “kshot atzmichah techilah, v’acharkach acheirim/first repair yourself first, then you can repair others.”
Cham saw his father’s nakedness, he saw the faults and rather than acting to help his father, he told his brothers. What Cham saw was the fault in himself, and he neither helped himself or his father. The Torah tells us, Genesis 9:23: Shem and Yafet took a garment and placed it on both of their shoulders. They walked backwards and covered their father’s nakedness, their faces were turned backwards, so that they did not see their father’s nakedness.” The Torah seems to be redundant. The beginning of the verse tells us that Shem and Yafet walked backwards so that they wouldn’t see their father’s nakedness. If so, then why does it continue to say they did not see their father’s nakedness. The Rebbe states that they did not see faults in their father because they had no similar faults in themselves. Therefore, there was no lesson for them to learn from their father, there was no tikun/repair that they had to do in themselves, and therefore it was not a lesson that G-d placed before them.
Our lesson is that when we meet people and see their faults, they were placed in our path, so that we can see the fault in ourselves, correct it and help others correct themselves as well. It is about unity. That is why those who were involved in the incident of the Tower of Babel were afraid to be dispersed throughout the land, because they understood that there was divine reward in merely being unified.
We must understand that all that we encounter, we were meant to encounter. All we see wrong in others, we have to see in ourselves, correct ourselves first and then help others to get closer to G-d. Always remember that G-d loves us, and the rainbow is meant as a sign that we have to look within ourselves and repent. As King Solomon states in Ecclesiastes, which we just read, fear of G-d is the purpose of all mankind.
Good Shabbos.
-Suri