Right and Wrong (4)

In any event, the idea of wrongfulness then descended downward until it concretized into acts of veritable wrong, injustice, and evil. And that’s where we come in.

Our being faced with and challenged by wrong is what allows us free choice, as we said, which gives us the wherewithal to reject it for our own good, and to eventually achieve true transcendence and perfection. So we see that as far as we’re concerned, wrong is meant to act as a prod for us to grow ethically and spiritually (much the way personal challenges often enable their sufferers to transcend their physical and emotional limitations) [1].

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Notes:

[1]       As he writes, “the Divine service that was granted to humankind rests on the idea that both right and wrong (actions) were created in the world and that humans were placed in the (ethical) middle so as to chose right (actions)” (Derech Hashem 2:3:1), so “it became necessary for there to be a yetzer harah that could control a person (and have him make wrong ethical choices), which he might nonetheless sometimes overcome as well” (Adir Bamarom p. 88).

(c) 2010 Rabbi Yaakov Feldman

Feel free to contact me at feldman@torah.org

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