Fearing the Satan
In Tehillim (49:6), Dovid Hamelech made the following statement: למה אירא בימי רע – What should I fear in the days of evil? It means, what should a man be afraid of when the time comes that he should be afraid. There are times when a man must be afraid. For instance, suppose a man is going chas veshalom to the operating room; that’s bimei ra. Like the Chachomim say, שהשטן מקטרג בשעת הסכנה – the satan begins to bring up his accusations in a time of danger. When things are going smoothly the satan still tries, but he is not listened to. But in a time of sakanah that’s when the satan opens a big mouth because he knows that's a glorious opportunity.
The Surgeon’s Scalpel
So when a man is now lying on the operating table – of course people go with confidence because they have chosen the best surgeon; he takes a tremendous fee so they have confidence in him. He has studied so many years and has practiced on so many people – what happened to his first patients we don’t know, but now, after all of his experience, he certainly justifies confidence in him.
And yet, as a man is reclining on the operating table and now they’re administering the anesthesia and they tell him “Breathe in,” so in his last moment he has to be very much afraid. Because even the best surgeon can make a little misstep. All that it requires of him to cut an important artery is if just for a moment he forgets that it’s there.
The Slippery Scalpel
You know, they study that. They’re forewarned, ‘watch out for this,’ ‘watch out for that’, because the body is full of important arteries of communication, important blood vessels and important nerves. So the
