#744: How Much Anger Is Kosher?
Rozhiner Rebbe on Parashat Hukkat, Bamidbar/Numbers 20:11
וַיָּרֶם מֹשֶׁה אֶת־יָדוֹ וַיַּךְ אֶת־הַסֶּלַע בְּמַטֵּהוּ פַּעֲמָיִם וַיֵּצְאוּ מַיִם רַבִּים וַתֵּשְׁתְּ הָעֵדָה וּבְעִירָם׃
And Moses raised his hand and struck the rock twice with his rod. Out came copious water, and the community and their beasts drank.
Gimme Some Torah #744
Anger is not completely forbidden. It would be unreasonable to expect people to restrain their anger all the time. First, anger is sometimes justified. Second, it’s not mentally healthy to hold in or sublimate one’s anger at every turn. In fact, I imagine that trying to bottle up anger only leads to even more of it.
Having said that, anger is not completely permitted, either. Excessive anger obviously harms the recipient. It also harms the person expressing the rage and all the bystanders who happen to hear it. Over-the-top anger pollutes the spiritual environment, just as radiation pollutes the physical world.
The following story about Rabbi Israel of Ruzhin (bio) and his son illustrates the need to control one’s anger:
The righteous Rabbi Israel of Ruzhin was once present when one of his sons got angry at a prominent hasid of the House of Ruzhin. And when the son saw that his righteous father was silent about his actions, he returned and expressed his anger toward the hasid with an even more vehement and triumphant tone.
The Ruzhiner intervened and said to his son: We have learned from our Master Moses, peace be upon him, that he struck the rock twice (Num. 20:11), and this was considered a great sin for him, and he was condemned not to enter the Promised Land with his people.
From this we learn that a person is allowed to lose his temper and become angry with another; but if he expresses his anger twice in a row, it is a sign that he is an angry person, and this kind of anger is a very reprehensible quality.
The Ruzhiner also said in the same context: The Sages said in the Talmud (B. Berakhot 7a): “God is furious every day (Psalms 7:12); and how long does the Holy One’s anger last? It lasts for only an instant. And how long is an instant? It is one fifty-eight thousand, eight hundred and eighty-eighth of an hour (about 62 milliseconds).” This teaches us that no one is allowed to get angry at another person for more than a brief moment, just like God. (From Parpera’ot LaTorah, Menahem Becker, ed. (Jerusalem: Omen Publishers, 1986), vol. 4, p. 167)
In my opinion, the most important observation in that story is that there is a difference between a person who gets angry and an angry person. A person who gets angry from time to time is just a normal human being with normal human weaknesses. But an angry person is someone who derives some kind of sick pleasure or warmth from being angry. That kind of person deserves our compassion and needs some help.
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I am the rabbi of Temple Beth El in Somerset, New Jersey, and the author of The JPS Jewish Heritage Torah Commentary.
The commandment to love our neighbor as we love ourselves is essentially a call to practice empathy. I have written about empathy, most recently in #349 and #303. Thanks for reading!
Very enlightening, thank you. But what does the Torah say about empathy, when it is appropriate and when it should be withheld? Have you written on this?