By Rabbi Moshe Pogrow
At Har Sinai, the people saw all of nature tremble at the approach of G-d’s glory, but only they stood upright in the presence of G-d.
The people learned that when man enters the service of G-d with full knowledge and awareness, he ascends to an exalted level that has no parallel in the world, and his status before G-d is one of direct intimacy. Heaven and earth, the world and everything in it, may tremble, but he stands upright before his G-d.
Thunder crashes, lightning flashes, mountains quake, the air is filled with the sound of the shofar—yet Israel inclines its ear to listen only to G-d’s conversation with Moshe: “Moshe spoke, and God answered him aloud.”
The role of the people was not to see, but to hear—i.e. to hear with full awareness and the clear consciousness that the Word comes to them from outside, not from within themselves. They stand opposite G-d’s presence, and it is G-d who sends His Word to them.
Sometimes we see good people suffering while wicked people prosper. The Torah tells us that a tzaddik sometimes receives his punishment in this world so that he arrives in Olam Haba totally cleansed; a rasha sometimes receives a reward in this world for whatever small mitzvos he has done.
In Baruch She’amar, we praise Hashem for this middah with the words “Baruch chai la’ad v’kayam lanetzach.” Hashem is eternal, and has plenty of time to pay all His debts to tzaddikim and reshaim alike.
Adapted from Emunah in the Classroom
