Modern culture is flooded with the idea that you must instantly find the silver lining during a crisis and think only positively. This seems to be both incorrect and psychologically harmful. In the broader Divine plan, even negative events serve a higher purpose. That does not mean we are expected to simply brush off our pain and pretend it feels good.
For example, the popular phrase “אין דבר רע יורד מן השמים – nothing bad descends from Heaven” expresses a truth about Divine reality. It is a statement about the nature of an event in G-d’s eyes. Nothing genuinely bad descends from Above. That is not the same as saying that everything feels good to the human being that experiences it.
Chazal teach us an important lesson about the way to respond to suffering. The Gemara (Pesachim 50a) discusses two different blessings upon hearing tidings. When we experience certain forms of good news, we recite Hatov VeHaMeitiv, acknowledging G-d’s goodness. When, G-d forbid, we receive word of tragedy or loss, we recite Dayan HaEmes, acknowledging G-d’s judgment. The Gemara continues that in the World to Come, which will usher in clarity and perspective into the Divine plan, only the bracha of Hatov VeHaMeitiv will exist.
Rav Mordechai Willig highlighted that even a very devout believer cannot simply substitute Hatov VeHaMeitiv for Dayan HaEmes on the grounds that everything will ultimately be revealed as for the best. That would be a bracha l’vatala, a wasted blessing. The appropriate bracha reflects the nature of the experience as we encounter it in the present. We cannot replace the blessing for painful news with the bracha for good tidings because we believe that everything is good at a deeper level.
Halacha recognizes that there is a difference between what we believe about Divine reality and what we experience as human beings. The ultimate understanding of how everything fits together belongs to le’asid lavo, the World to Come. We do not possess that understanding now. To insist that a person experiencing tragedy must already see the event as good is to demand a perspective that we do not have.
Sometimes, experiencing a challenge results in the emotion of anger. Anger is a normal human response to the experience of being hurt. When life brings loss, illness, or disappointment, we can feel that as anger. For a believer who knows that all comes from G-d, the anger can sometimes be directed at G-d, precisely because of one’s strong belief that He controls events. If anger is an emotional response to hurt, and one believes that G-d created the situation that caused the hurt, then anger can be the emotional response.
For some people, anger at Hashem feels so unacceptable that they cannot even acknowledge it to themselves. They may feel guilty for being angry, ashamed of their disappointment, or frightened that admitting these feelings reflects a failure of faith. Even if we suppose that they are correct and they should not feel that anger, believing that it is unacceptable does not work. Emotions do not disappear simply because we believe we should not have them. Suppressing the emotion does not resolve it. A person who is stifling the emotion of anger may find it increasingly difficult to engage with life, including the religious life that could provide meaning and comfort.
When we give ourselves permission to acknowledge what we feel, we no longer have to expend energy defending ourselves against our emotional reality. We can begin to understand our experiences and find ways to live with them. We can grieve without being ashamed of our grief, feel anger without being embarrassed by our anger, and continue living without having to pretend that we have made peace with everything that has happened.
None of this requires us to use our belief to silence our pain. We do not have to insist that a person who is suffering only see the good in what has happened, or make hurt seem to disappear in order to demonstrate faith.
We do not have to pretend that we are not bleeding in order to live with faith. Sometimes the most honest thing we can do, for ourselves and for another person, is to acknowledge the wound and make room for the pain it brings.
I hope that we are soon able to see with clarity that nothing bad descends from Heaven. Until then, embracing our emotions with truth is the most correct response, from both a religious and psychological perspective.
