In Our Grief

Where was God?  How did God allow this to happen?

In the wake of the deaths of the Butwin Family, lots of people are asking this question.  If God is good and God is all powerful, why didn’t God stop this from happening?  Why does God permit suffering?

Jews hold that God doesn’t work that way.  God does not interrupt the world to stop suffering.

This world of ours is, in fact, not fair.  Although we tell our children that it is (whether explicitly, through our words, or implicitly, by using reward and punishment to elicit the behavior we seek), this is not objective reality.  No adult can look at the world and honestly believe that only good happens to good people, and only bad happens to bad people—and always in proportion to their goodness and badness.  It is simply and patently not the case.  People do not always get what they deserve.

We use reward and punishment to teach our children, to encourage them to develop good behavior.  But that does not mean that God rewards for good behavior and punishes for bad behavior.  That’s what parents do, not what God does.

Human beings have free will.  We get to make choices in the world, some big, like where to live, and some small, like what to eat for breakfast.  This means that we sometimes make bad choices, and that accidents happen.  These are the prices we pay for our free will.

If God did not allow the mistakes—even out of goodness, out of benevolence—then our freedom would be false.  We would be like student drivers with an instructor at our side always ready to grab the wheel.  Our lives would not be our own; we would not be fully human.

God would have to stop me from driving off a cliff and also from choosing the sugary breakfast cereal, for they both have negative consequences.  If God controlled every action and response, there would be no consequence for our behavior.  And then we would cease to be human.  We would be mere robots, following our programming, completing tasks with no thought to the repercussions.

“That means that people are free to do some terrible things.  When they do, God will not stop them.  Because if God stops one crime, God must stop all of them.  God cannot reach down and save the victims of one tragedy and let others die” (David Wolpe, Teaching Your Children About God, 1993, 180).

Suffering is the price we pay for our humanity.

I do not believe that Jim made this choice.  As has been widely reported and was well known to his circle of friends, Jim suffered from a brain tumor.  I believe that this changed him.  Jim did not decide to end his family’s lives — his illness did.

Belief in absolute fairness is an important and positive developmental stage for children. For adults, however, the obligation is to pursue fairness -- justice.  “Tzedek tzedek tirdof,” we are commanded.  “Justice Justice you shall pursue” (Deuteronomy 16:20).  We seek fairness because we know it does not currently exist.

Although the world is not fair, neither is it cold.  Chesed, the “milk of human kindness” matters.  I have received a great outpouring of love from community members, fellow rabbis around the world, and complete strangers.  Jim and Yafit’s extended families have felt it.  I’m sure many of you have, too.

Tragedy is a challenge, an invitation for us to reach beyond ourselves, to reach up and out to others in need.  In this way we can use our free will for the good.