This is not to say that Judaism categorically frowns upon human envy. On the contrary, jealousy that inspires one to achieve greater heights, known as kin’as soferim, is permitted and even encouraged. However, envy that fosters a feeling of resentment can only bring pain and destruction.
Those great students of Rabbi Akiva died because they made improper, selfish use of the Torah. They were punished specifically during the sefirah period because they failed to uphold the honor of the Torah during this period during which we ready ourselves to properly receive it.
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Another reminder of our obligation to demonstrate care, concern, and sensitivity came with the recent earthquake in Nepal. The quake killed thousands of people and injured many more. We were all filled with a deep desire to help in whatever way we could. We were also filled with the kind of questions we ask any time there is a significant loss of life following a natural disaster.
What are we to make of these tragic occurrences? What lessons can we derive from the numerous manifestations of nature’s awesome might?
Clearly, there are no easy answers. It is always difficult to witness the suffering of others, particularly suffering of such magnitude, and offer any form of cogent explanation for their collective pain.
What we do know is that our sages understood that earthquakes, and possibly other forms of natural disasters, are an expression of Divine pain over the suffering of Klal Yisrael.
Why do earthquakes occur? When Hashem remembers His children who are suffering…. He sheds tears into the Great Sea and His voice is heard from one end of the earth to the other…. Some say He is clapping His hands together. Others say He is moaning. (Berachos 49a)
One could easily ask what connection there is between what occurs beneath the crust of the earth and our national plight. How is it possible to connect our troubles to the forces of nature and to the predicament of other nations?
Yehuda HaLevi (Kuzari II:36) teaches us that “Israel among the nations is like the heart among the organs of the body.” Just as the heart influences the whole body and is also influenced by the entire anatomy, so does Israel influence the world and the nations and is influenced, in turn, by what occurs in the world and among mankind.
In addition, one should view natural disasters and the horrors they foster as calls to teshuvah, as summonses to inspire us to improve our deeds and character so that we might become more sensitive to the plight of those around us.
“R’ Alexandri said in the name of R’ Yehoshua ben Levi, ‘Thunder was created only to straighten out the crookedness of the heart’ ” (Berachos 59a).
If thunder, which generates only a fleeting roar, has the potential to straighten out our hearts, then certainly natural disasters, whose impact is often keenly felt for many years after their occurrence, possess the capacity to penetrate our very essence.
Straightening the “crookedness of our hearts” was also a central element of Matan Torah.
There was thunder and lightning, and a thick cloud upon the mountain, and the sound of a shofar was exceedingly loud; so that all the people who were in the camp trembled…. And Har Sinai was completely in smoke, because the Lord descended upon it in fire; and its smoke ascended as the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mountain trembled greatly…. And all the people saw the thunder, and the lightning, and the sound of the shofar, and the mountain smoking; and when the people saw it, they were shaken, and stood far away. (Shemos 19:16, 18; 20:15)
