Musar sobre Amós 3:16

And a person is obligated to reflect and know that the troubles that find him and the afflictions that come upon him are not according to the greatness of his iniquity and the multitude of his sins. Rather God, may He be blessed - in His pity upon him - afflicts him in the way of the rebuke of a father upon his son, as it is stated (Deuteronomy 8:5), “And you shall know in your heart, that, as a man chastens his son, so the Lord, your God, chastens you.” And our Rabbis, may their memory be blessed, explained (Yalkut Shimoni on Torah 350), “Your heart knows the deeds you have done and the afflictions I have brought upon you; that it is not according to your deeds that I have afflicted you.” And it is stated (Job 11:6), “and know that God has overlooked for you some of your iniquity.” And it is stated (Ezra 9:13), “though You, our God, have been forbearing, [punishing us] less than our iniquity.”
But when reproof comes upon the enemies of the Lord, may He be blessed, they are finished with one iniquity - for the punishment comes all at once, as it is stated (Psalms 34:22), “One misfortune is the deathblow of the wicked.“ So the rest of their iniquities remain upon their souls, as it is stated (Ezekiel 32:27), “and their iniquities shall be upon their bones.” However when reproof comes to the righteous, it comes little by little, until the termination of their iniquities, as it is stated (Amos 3:2), “You alone have I known from all the families of the earth; that is why I will call you to account for all your iniquities.” And our Rabbis, may their memory be blessed, explained (Avodah Zarah 4a), “It is comparable to a person who lends money to two people, one of whom is his friend, and the other one is his enemy. [In the case of] his friend, he collects from him little by little; [whereas in the case of] his enemy, he collects from him all at once.” And it is stated (Proverbs 24:16), “Seven times the righteous man falls and gets up, while the wicked are tripped by one misfortune.” Its explanation is that they stumble upon one misfortune and are finished. And it is stated (Jeremiah 10:24), “Chastise me, O Lord, but only in judgement; not in Your wrath, lest You reduce me to naught.” Its explanation is, “but only in judgement”- with the trait of mercy and and the property of Your kindness. [This is] from the usage (in Numbers 29:18), “in their count according to [their] judgement,” [which means] according to [their] property; [and in] (Psalms 112:5), “who conducts his affairs in justice,” [means] with measure. And they compared it to another parable regarding this matter and said (Midrash Tehillim 18), “One who does not know [how] to hit will hit his son in his eyes and in his face; whereas one who knows [how] to hit will hit his son in such a way that it will not cause him damage.” And likewise is it written (Psalms 118:18), “The Lord surely chastised me, but He did not give me over to death.” And it is stated (Job 2:6), “but only spare his life.”
And He only brings vengeful afflictions upon the evildoers. But probing afflictions only come upon the righteous; for they accept them with love and they increase the refinement of their actions. So [these] afflictions are for their good and their benefit, and the increase of their reward - as it is stated (Psalms 11:5), “The Lord probes the righteous one.” And our Rabbis, may their memory be blessed, compared it to a parable regarding this and said (Bereishit Rabbah 58:32), “When the owner of the flax knows that the flax is strong, he hits it much in order to make it soft and good.”

I say further, now that it has been explained that the soul effects its action in itself and on things beyond itself, and that just as it knows things other than itself, it knows its own self, and whatever it can do to others, whether to know others or to make known any knowledge to others, it can do it for itself, to know itself, and to cause itself to know additional knowledge. Behold, it would appear from our words that just as the intelligent person can teach others, he can teach himself and does not need someone else to teach him. But the soul sets a firm foundation and is in itself a foundation, and because man has within him the power of being able to warn himself, he is liable to receive punishment for the evil which he does and reward for the good. For he has the power to warn himself and does not require anyone else to warn him. Animals cannot warn others and they cannot warn themselves, and so is it with children and with those lacking in knowledge and with the deaf and the dumb. With them there can be no punishment, for they are not able to warn themselves, nor do they have a reward. For they cannot do righteous deeds by intention. But because there is in man the power to warn other souls, we must say that that is the power which guards him, and if the guardian blunders and the one guarded is lost or perishes, then the guardian must be punished. Similarly, if the rational soul blunders and he does not guard himself and perishes, we say that he perishes through his own sin. And he, therefore, receives the additional punishment of not having guarded himself. This makes clear what is said (Ezekiel 33:6), “But if the watchman see the sword come and blow not the horn and the people be not warned, and the sword do come and take any person from among them, he is taken away in his iniquity, but his blood will I require at the watchman’s hand.” Since the soul is both the guardian and the guarded, if it perishes, it perishes by its own sin, and, moreover, because it is also the guardian of other souls, it will be punished, and this is an important explanation of reward and punishment in the world to come. Know that the quality of being guarded cannot belong to those who are lacking in intelligence. For the Creator joins only with rational men, as it is said (Amos 3:2), “You only have I known of all the families of the earth.” Therefore, since the Creator does join in the companionship of rational men and brings them near to himself, he punishes them but does not punish the wicked ones who are far away from him. It is said (Leviticus 10:3), “Through them that are nigh unto Me I will be sanctified.”

Similarly, before Israel received the gift of the Holy Land, they underwent a period of tiresome wandering in the desert dependent on the largess of G–d on a daily basis. The desert experience was a sample of the sanctity of ארץ ישראל. Our sages said that the Tabernacle itself was also called מקדש, Temple (Eruvin 2a). This may account for the fact that whenever the Israelites sinned, punishment followed at once. In line with this is the statement that no one was allowed to spend the night in Jerusalem while in a state of sin, i.e. his sin had to be atoned for before nightfall through immediate יסורים, afflictions of some kind (Bamidbar Rabbah 21). Isaiah 1,21, says of Jerusalem: "צדק ילין בה," righteousness would spend the night there. What is meant is "justice and righteousness" should prevail there, but G–d collected His debt only in installments, a little at a time in order to fulfill His promise of רק אתכם ידעתי מכל משפחות האדמה, על כן אפקוד עליכם על כל עונותיכם, "Only you I have singled out from all the families of the earth; therefore I will call you to account for all your iniquities" (Amos 3,2).

When our sages tell us that there are three gifts that can be obtained only through (submission to) afflictions, and one of these three is the land of Israel, we have experienced as a nation that we were very close to G–d when we first took over the Holy Land (received that gift). Subsequently, G–d expects more of us; when we disappoint His expectations we are dealt with as severely as a father deals with his son, since he has the son's rehabilitation at heart. Being punished for transgressions immediately after one has committed them is the greatest sign that one is beloved of G–d. In such a situation it is an error to expect G–d to employ His attribute of being נושא עון, suspending punishment for a while. I have explained this at length in my treatise on the letters of the alpha-bet under the heading of the letter ק. When someone who resides in the land of Israel experiences afflictions this is an expression of G–d's love, seeing G–d wishes him to be cleansed of his sins immediately and not to accumulate more sins by deeming himself in G–d's good graces when there is no cause for this. This is precisely what Rabbi Eleazar in Ketuvot 111 tells us when he states that anyone who resides in the land of Israel is devoid of sins.

We have explained earlier that man is the imprint of the Torah, [much as Torah is the imprint of G–d]. When we speak about "Torah" within this framework, we predominantly mean the revealed Torah, referred to by the Torah's statement והנגלות לנו ולבנינו. The בני העליה, of whom there are but a few, are the ones referred to in the Torah as כי אתם המעט, "For there are very few of you." (Deut. 7,7). This is why G–d deals with those few on a different basis i.e. that of the attribute of Justice, seeing that the root of their souls is in the domain of the תורה הקדומה, the Torah that had preceded Creation by two thousand years.

For this reason let him arouse himself to the best of his ability to pray with tears before the Holy One Blessed is He. This is elaborated upon in the Zohar, Parashas Vayikra (15a): One day Rabbi Shimon ben Yochai was sitting in the gate of Lod. He lifted his eyes and saw the sun shining. Then its light became blocked, after which it again shone and again was blocked and again shone and again was blocked. This recurred three times. Meanwhile the light dimmed and the sun became black and green. Rabbi Shimon ben Yochai said to his son Rabbi Elazar, “Follow me and let us see what this means. Surely an evil decree has been issued and the Holy One Blessed is He desires to inform us of it. For whenever a decree is issued On High it is suspended for three days until the Holy One Blessed is He has informed the righteous, as it is stated, “For Hashem, God does not do anything without revealing His secret to His servants the prophets” (Amos 3:7).

The select few manage to penetrate to an even higher level, i.e. the level of the yud in its full sense equivalent to the שקל הקודש, as we explained earlier. The reason the Torah calls for a contribution of only half this שקל הקודש (Exodus 30,13), is that most people are not able to attain a higher level than that represented by such a half שקל. Psalms 68,18, describes this dual yud when mentioning רבותיים instead of רבבות. There was no need for the Torah in פרשת כי תשא, to describe the שקל as a half שקל and spelling out that a whole שקל contains 20 geyrah, except to remind us of the fact that G–d's input into a human being is limited to ten parts out of of twenty. This means that the "holy" component of a human being to start with is only 50%. Man can be compared to a two sided coin. The scriptural hint for this is תתהפך כחומר חותם (Job 38,14), "it turns over like clay under the seal" (which has a seal imprinted on it). The body thus is viewed like the coin, i.e. the receptacle for the imprint the soul makes upon it. In its most elevated state the soul is to be viewed like G–d's imprint on the body. This is what our sages meant when they said that the soul resembles G–d in five ways. This is also the deeper meaning of our sages in Shekalim 4, saying that G–d showed Moses a fiery coin since He Himself is compared to consuming fire (אש אוכלה, Deut. 9,3). The Jewish people purchased the daily communal sacrifices from the money raised by these contributions (half-שקל). This is perhaps why these sacrifices are described as, אשה לה' "a fire offering to G–d (Numbers 28,3).