Q:
Is it more important today for a young man, for purposes of shalom bayis, to wake up with a crying baby in the middle of the night or is it better to be fresh and on time for Shachris?
A:
Is it more important to sacrifice going to the minyan with energy and early in order to help his wife take care of the baby?
It depends on the circumstances. In some cases there is no question at all what is more important. I told you this story once, that Rav Yisrael Salanter was going to Kol Nidrei and he came late. And they were waiting and waiting for him. So finally they went to look for him.
Where was he? They found him sitting in a house rocking a baby carriage. Because the baby’s mother had gone to the beis hakenesses for Kol Nidrei and the baby was crying all by himself. So Rav Yisrael sat down and was rocking the carriage. A Jewish neshamah is in tza’ar! That’s pikuach nefesh almost. He’s shouting and crying for his mother, all alone.
And therefore many times you have to sacrifice some things for the sake of bein adam lechaveiro or similar things.
Now, I can tell you other examples where they made very great sacrifices of halachos. I’ll tell you one example. Rav Yisrael Salanter was once seen talking to a young woman, an eishes ish, a very long conversation on the street. And the talmidim were amazed. אל תרבה שיחה עם האשה – Don’t talk with a woman so much (Avos 1:5). A married woman! He was standing and talking for a very long time to her.
So later Rav Yisroel explained that he saw she was going down to the river. He knew she had lost a baby recently and he was afraid that she’s going down to the river for a certain purpose, to finish it, to go lost. And so he stopped her and he consoled her. He was telling her she’s still young and she’ll have children yet. It took a long time. And it was pikuach nefesh.
So therefore sometimes you have to do something. Otherwise you’re a chossid shoteh. The Gemara (Sotah 21b) says, who is a chassid shoteh? If he sees a woman drowning and he can jump in and save her but he doesn’t want to save her—he won’t take hold of a woman even in order to save her life—that’s a chassid shoteh. So sometimes, certain things, you have to know vu ein un vu ois.
(September 1994)
