A man came to his Rav and asked for advice to save him from anger, since he was very prone to this. For anything that does not go exactly right for him, he gets very angry. His Rav told him to wait outside until he finds some advice for him. The man left the room of the Rav and the next man in line went in, and when this last man finished and got up to leave, the Rebbe asked him, “Did you notice the man who left before you?” The man replied that he did. The Rebbe told him, “I request of you that when you go out of here, find him outside, approach him, and find some way to provoke him until he is filled with rage.” The man did not understand what the Rebbe meant, but he had emunah in chachamim and he knew he had to do what his Rav instructed.
And so, right after he went out, he approached the man waiting outside and poured a cup of water on him. He was sure he would get angry and his screams would be heard in the room of the Rebbe. But the man remained calm and did not get angry. When he saw this, he began to hit him, but this did not help and the man remained calm. After a few minutes, the Rebbe called him to come in, and when he saw him wet and beaten, he asked him what happened. He told the Rebbe everything the man did to him, and the Rebbe asked him, “And you? Are you deaf? You didn’t hit him back?” The man smiled and said, “This was not hard, since he left the room and immediately approached me, and I understand this was the instruction of the Rebbe, and so I did not get angry.”
The Rebbe answered him, “Correct, this was my instruction, and since I see that when you know that things are done ‘with the instruction from on high’, you are calm. If this is so, you must always remember that everything that happens is an instruction from on high, that HaKadosh Baruch Hu is causing everything sent to you, and when you remember this, you will always remain calm.”
Two of the three principles of emunah are in our parsha, and they are: 'אנכי ה'', לא יהיה לך' – ‘I am Hashem’, ‘There shall not be unto you’ (20:2-3) and the third in the posuk 'שמע ישראל ה' אלוקנו ה' אחד' – ‘Hear Israel, Hashem is our G-d, Hashem is One’ (Devorim 6:4). They obligate us to believe in Hashem Yisbarach, and in His G-dliness, and His Divine Supervision [hashgacha pratis] that everything is only done by His hand. This is the reason why every Jew must say ‘Shema Yisrael’ every day with closed eyes, to show that we do not attribute anything to something seen with the eyes, everything is only by His personal and superior hashgacha.
-Tiv HaTorah - Yisro
