Hashem’s Hidden Hand

We have just finished celebrating the holiday of Purim. We know that Hashem’s name does not appear in Megillas Esther. Each event could have happened separately but it was all in Hashem’s plan. We have to try to see Hashem in the Megillah, whether as the word “HaMelech,” referring to the King of kings, or in the very title Megillas Esther. Megillah is from the word legalos, to reveal, so the goal of Megillas Esther is to reveal what is hidden (hester).

But Hashem’s hand is hidden in other contexts as well. I would like to present two.

Ashrei is a very important prayer, and the most important pasuk in it is: “Poseiach es yadecha (You) open Your hand and satisfy each living thing according to its need.” There is one word missing though. In the other pesukim in Ashrei that talk about Hashem’s actions, there is always a subject: so we have “Someich Hashem,” Hashem supports, and “Atah nosein lahem,” You give them. But there is no subject in the sentence of “Poseiach es yadecha.” How can this be the most important pasuk if it doesn’t even have Hashem as a subject, either as “Hashem” or as “You”? But I think this is the point. Our needs are provided by Hashem, but His hand is hidden. This is the way of the world, and we have to see Hashem even when He is not directly visible.

The Pesach Seder closes with the song Chad Gadya. In the book It’s All About Change, by Rabbi Wallerstein, zt”l, we read how someone purchased a goat, which was eaten by a cat, which was bitten by the dog. A stick then hit the dog, fire burned up the stick, water put out the fire, the cow drank the water, the slaughterer killed the cow, the angel of death killed the slaughterer, and then Hashem smote the angel of death. Everything makes natural sense, except one step. How did the stick hit the dog? Sticks don’t hit by themselves; it should have said that someone came with a stick and hit the dog. But it does not say that. It must be that Hashem was holding the stick. Hashem does not just appear at the end; He is with us all the way through, even if we don’t see Him.

Pesach is the time of revealed miracles. But even at such a time we have to realize that we are not seeing it all, that Hashem’s hashgacha is guiding us even where we don’t see it.

In memory of my beloved father and teacher, Moshe Avraham ben Yosef Tzvi, Morris Stoltz, whose yahrzeit is 28th of Adar. May his neshama have an aliyah.