In one of the talks of Rav Reuven Feinstein, rosh yeshivah of Mesivta Tiferes Yerushalayim in Staten Island, New York, and son of the gaon, Maran Rav Moshe Feinstein zt”l, he sought to illustrate for his students the essence of the trait of trust, and presented it through a well-known American story that occurred and was publicized throughout the United States.
One of the great and famous spectacles in America features expert champions who walk upon a thin rope stretched between skyscrapers or above a vast river. Step by step they traverse the rope, to the roaring applause of thousands of spectators crowding every vantage point along the route.
The performer walking upon the thin rope knows that a single tiny, miscalculated movement would cast him into certain death. Often, he holds in his hand a powerful loudspeaker, and while walking he speaks to the crowd, exciting them with various feats that he performs while in motion—such as an aerial somersault upon the slender wire.
In one breathtaking performance by a great expert who had already accumulated countless hours of walking upon such ropes, the champion stood upon the rope and asked the thousands of cheering admirers whether they believed that he could cross the entire thin rope safely.
“Yes!” the people shouted hoarsely—after all, he was world-famous and had proven his abilities dozens of times.
The champion continued, roaring from atop the rope: “Do you believe that I can take a bicycle here and now, and ride it across this rope from end to end?”
“Yes, certainly!” came the response again, for he had demonstrated even this many times.
Suddenly, a bicycle was brought to the acrobat, who stood at the beginning of the rope. With a skilled leap he mounted the bicycle and began the dangerous and dizzying ride along the length of the wire, dozens of meters above the ground.
With one hand he held the handlebars, and with the other the loudspeaker, continuing as he sped back and forth to shout to the excited, applauding crowd below, “Do you believe that I can reach the destination safely?”
“Yes!” they all cried out together.
“And now,” the man continued to excite the crowd, “I will ask a more difficult question: Do you believe that while riding the bicycle between heaven and earth, I can place another person upon my shoulders and bring us both safely to the end of the route?”
“Yes, of course!” the crowd shouted, having already placed full trust in the expert acrobat, who had proven that whatever he asked, he performed immediately.
“Well then,” the champion continued, “which of you is willing to come up here to the top of the tower, and I will carry him upon my shoulders for a delightful ride across this thin rope?”
Here the man was disappointed. No response came from the crowd—absolute silence. Not one person from the enormous audience, who only moments before had shouted loudly of their complete trust in him, was willing to risk himself in any way.
In the end, all suddenly saw a young boy leap, without any fear or trepidation, onto the champion’s shoulders. Together they rode back and forth upon the bicycle several times, and completed the entire route with great success.
After the two descended to the crowd below, everyone rushed to the boy and asked him: “How were you not afraid to jump into such a dangerous stunt?”
The boy smiled and said: “This champion is my father! My father—I trust with my eyes closed. He will guard me carefully in every way.” It turned out that this child had grown up accustomed to a father who walked upon ropes, carrying him upon his shoulders in various feats, and thus the child had become used to trusting his father completely.
[These non-Jews, of course, do not know and do not recognize the supreme Heavenly Power that guards and oversees them at every step according to His will, and they boast before the entire world of their own strength and might. But as for us, Klal Yisrael, we know and recognize (Chullin 7b) that without His decree, a person cannot so much as move even a small finger.]
This story, Rav Reuven concluded, vividly illustrates the mitzvah of emunah and trust in two important lessons:
1. At times a person may chirp with his mouth about faith and trust out aloud, yet when it comes to actual deed—when it concerns himself—it becomes clear that he is still very far from complete trust (see the sweet words of the Chazon Ish, Emunah u’Bitachon, ch. 2, sec. 2).
2. One trusts a father with eyes closed—and all the more so, should we trust our Father in Heaven. When trust is complete, the Jew senses that the Borei Yisbarach is his Father, and therefore he has nothing to fear. As David Hamelech a”h, said - כְּגָמֻל עֲלֵי אִמּוֹ כַּגָּמֻל עָלַי נַפְשִׁי Like a weaned child with its mother, like a weaned child is my soul within me (Tehillim 131:2)—like an infant sheltered beneath his mother’s apron, where he feels the safest place on earth. This is the perfection of fulfilling the mitzvah of emunah according to its law—faith that brings us to the life of the World to Come, Amen!
