Dear Mordechai,
I appreciate all the emails you send, but only Hashem can save my marriage. Thanks anyway.
Ayalla
Usually people who send me emails like the one above include their marital history attempting to prove why their case is a lost cause and why nothing they could do would make a difference.
“It’s in Hashem’s hands now. Only He can help.” While I admire a passionate testimony of emunah, I’m not sure that this is proper service of Hashem. This is really a complex matter. Let’s take a look.
On the one hand, Ayalla is right; her marriage is in Hashem’s hands. But then again everything is in Hashem’s hands. So what’s the point of any effort? If Hashem determines all, why try to achieve anything. Whatever will be will be, right?
This brings us face to face with an age-old question: Is everything predetermined or do you have free will? Do your choices make a difference in your life or is the script already written? If you think through this question, it’s very challenging. Hashem runs the world. But most people will admit that their life experience includes never-ending choices (and those choices make a difference).
So which is it? Do our choices matter or does Hashem determine our fate?
Ayalla, in the email above, feels that the script is written for her marriage. Whatever is in Hashem’s plan is her fate and there’s no point to her effort. Therefore, she davens and waits. “Only Hashem can help.” But if that’s the case, then why are we here? Were we created because Hashem needed another piece in
His giant chess game? Is He simply toying with our lives? Do we really have no role?
As is so often the case, the key to discovering the answer is in reframing the question. You see, the classic question is: do we have free will OR is everything predetermined? But why does it have to be an either/or question. Why can’t it be both? Maybe we have free will AND everything is predetermined.
One of my best friends freshman year in college was named Noah. There were 9000 students at Penn. He was from Florida. I was from Philadelphia. We met by chance while running against each other for student government. We were close until he transferred to Yale second semester sophomore year. We were 19 years old.
For the next 10 years. Noah and I stayed in touch but our paths never crossed. He graduated from Yale and moved back to Florida to work in the family business. I stayed at Penn and then moved to New York to work on Wall Street.
So why did Noah come into my life? Why were we friends? What’s the meaning of our friendship? Were we just two people passing through each other’s lives? Or was there some cosmic meaning to our meeting?
One day, out of the blue, 10 years after Noah and I were elected to student government, I got a call from Noah’s sister, Ari, who moved to New York. Ari didn’t know anyone in New York and Noahsuggested that she get in touch with me.
Today Ari and I have 5 beautiful children and Noah is my brother in law.
As I look at the events that led me to the life I lead today, I can’t help but feel that there’s a Force beyond me setting every stage I land on. I have no doubt: I’m NOT in control. And if you look at the complex tapestry of history, you have to admit that we’re not alone. I think that’s why the past is called “history;”because it’s His-story—Hashem is the author. We are His subjects.
And so Ayalla is right. Her marriage is in Hashem’s hands. But, as you might expect, there’s more to understanding this matter. In the same way that Hashem gave me my wife, Hashem took from me 3 children. That certainly wasn’t my choice; further evidence that He’s in control. That would never have been the history that I would have written.
But that tragedy changed me. Rather, I should put it this way: I CHANGED after that tragedy. It was my choice. I became a more compassionate person, I was eventually inspired to become a more dedicated husband, and I consumed wisdom about the psychology of the human experience and interpersonal relationships. None of this changed the circumstances around me (in other words, my children were gone forever), but my choices changed what was within me.
You see, you and Hashem are co-authors. It’s true, He writes HIS story. But you write the inside story. He decides what happens around you. You decide what happens within you. He decides what people come your way. You decide what kind of person you become.
And therein lies our most important mission in life. That’s our job. And that’s what it means to have emunah: to simultaneously leave the results to Him while taking full responsibility for our inner growth.
Sometimes the winner is really the loser and the loser is really the winner. What do I mean?
Someone who makes a lot money in business but did so through unethical practices appears to have “won;” they acquired the riches, but they soiled themselves in the process. Since the real goal is our inner life, they really lost. And in the depths of their being, I believe they know it.
Let’s say you invest your heart and soul into founding a soup kitchen for the poor and it fails. You have to close it. But in the process you formed genuine relationships and learned to be more understanding of those less fortunate. The soup kitchen is gone. It failed. But YOU succeeded.
We tend to make judgments about people’s lives very quickly. Are they successful? Fortunate Blessed? It’s not always so obvious. Who knows what happens to someone on the inside as they pass through the events of their life. The real success and failure of our life is not visible to the naked eye. We are the trophy. Who we become is our success or failure. And, that’s our choice.
I’m sorry Ayalla, but ironically, sitting around and waiting for Hashem to transform your marriage is not a healthy expression of emunah. It’s actually an avoidance of your responsibility, which is to use your marital situation to transform your inner life. You’re in charge of half the script. Write it!
Do we have free will or is everything predetermined? The answer is YES.
HIS story is predetermined. The inside story is up to you.
Mordechai
Founder & Director
Prefer to Listen? Go here:
http://www.shalombayis911.org/19-free-will.asp
