Q&A: A Righteous Person Forsaken
A Righteous Person Forsaken
Question
Hello Rabbi Michael,
How can one explain the verse, “I was young and now I am old, yet I have not seen a righteous person forsaken, nor his offspring begging for bread,” when in practice we unfortunately see and hear about people who, on the face of it, are God-fearing and righteous, and nevertheless are forced to rely on gifts from others, or pass away before their time, God have mercy, and their children are left needing to beg for bread?
(I live in Bnei Brak, and there charity organizations distribute many fundraising leaflets there about such people, unfortunately.)
I thought of answering that apparently not everyone who looks righteous really is, but if so it is hard to understand what King David is coming to teach us here at all, since we can always say that we do not really know anything. And on that assumption, it would seemingly have been better had he himself not said this verse.
I would be happy to hear your answer on the matter.
Answer
Indeed, this is a very difficult verse. Perhaps it can be interpreted to mean that King David is not trying to establish facts and convince us, but rather to declare a priori that this is the situation: he is saying that even if you see someone who is forsaken, apparently he is not righteous. And if you think he is righteous, you are probably mistaken. He is saying that it is not possible for a righteous person to be forsaken, not that he in fact never saw such a case. His claim is that if you saw such a thing and you are troubled by it, know that you cannot really know. You have never truly seen a person whom you know to be righteous and who was forsaken. So the presumption is that he is not righteous. He is not coming to prove something to us, but to teach that this is the Holy One’s way of governing the world: everything that happens to us happens justly.
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Questioner:
In my opinion, the above answer is a bit difficult, because the opening of the verse, “I was young and now I am old,” implies that he is describing a reality that he personally witnessed during his life.
I looked into this more online and found a nice and innovative answer, which interprets the word “seen” the way it is used in the Book of Esther: “For how can I bear to see the destruction of my people?” where the meaning there is to see and stand by passively. If so, King David is saying that he never stood by when he saw a righteous person forsaken, and always took care of those who fear God and their children.
Another answer I heard from a friend is that perhaps this was the reality King David saw in his own lifetime, but he is not saying that this is the reality forever.
Thank you very much in any case.
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Rabbi:
Nice.
Discussion on Answer
I haven’t seen a wicked person forsaken in that sense either. And in the long run kingdoms of justice also fall. Kingdoms simply do not last forever. That is the nature of the world.
I saw an interpretation that explains the verse based on its continuation: “nor his offspring begging for bread.” David did not see a righteous person whose offspring as well (his son, grandson, descendants) were forsaken. That is, in the end the truth comes out, and the righteous person (or his descendants) will receive what is due to him. And indeed we see that in the long run wicked kingdoms like Communist Russia and the like eventually fall.