What Makes You Mad?

Rabbi Melanie Aron

Yom Kippur 5762 - September 27, 2001

I do not think of myself as someone who has a temper, but I will admit to being impatient. Sometimes I worry that I penalize the messenger for the message. Sometimes I get frustrated when I feel that other people don't live up to their responsibilities. On occasion I allow little inconveniences or setbacks to get the best of me.

Sometimes I tell myself that I am aggravated, or frustrated, or worn out, but in truth what I really am is angry. And sometimes recognizing that I am angry and not trying to minimize the feeling, is a great help, but not always.

What about you?

Think back, what are the things that usually get your goat?

If I had to answer that question honestly, I would have to admit that some of the things that get me on a regular basis are:

Telephone operators who can't get me the right number for the hospital patient information line and

Other people missing deadlines, which then puts me over the edge in my own time management and causes me to lose time with my children.

And even, sometimes, the trails of dirty clothes in various parts of the house, when clothes hampers are available and accessible.

Then I think. Does getting angry get me connected to the sick patient I am trying to reach any faster? Does it really help me make up the lost time? Does getting angry teach my children what I want them to learn, or create the home life that I strive for?

Anger is a dangerous thing. Anger can destroy a family, or worse, cripple a family in all its dealings. I remember visiting a friend's house as a child, where everyone walked as if on egg shells. No one could do anything, feel anything, say anything, lest it made Dad angry and he explode. Children's stories don't have witches and monsters for nothing. An angry parent is a frightening sight.

In the Bible anger has terrible consequences- we all know the story of Cain and Abel, where anger leads to fratricide. Think also of Levi and Simeon, where indignation leads to the massacre of innocent people and Saul, where anger at David leads the king to call his own son, Jonathan, "the son of a miserable whore", and to throw a javelin at him, Jonathan, whom he loves, barely missing him.

The Bible contains a large number of words for anger, kaas, charon, rogez and cheimah, many of them are graphic words, referring to burning fire and billowing smoke. Some feel that Moses's anger is what kept him out of the Promised Land, and a number of commentaries note that God's favorites- Abraham and Moses and several of the prophets, are those who can talk God out of God's own anger.

The Bible in general warns us to curb our tendency to anger. In Proverbs we are advised, "a soft answer turns away wrath". Job observes that "anger kills the foolish man." The rabbis also pick up this theme. "Anger in a house is like a worm in a plant", says Rabbi Hisda." Getting angry is like worshipping idols", advises the Midrash. "Loss of temper is disrespect for the Divine presence", says Rabbah bar Huna. "Anger deprives a sage of his wisdom and a prophet of his vision", notes Shimon ben Lakish. "Anger begins with madness and ends with regret," teaches Ibn Hasdai.

Our speaker on the eve of Slichot, Dr. Fred Lusken, noted that most of us spend a lot of time with angry thoughts, probably a lot more than we realize. He quoted one study of people who wore a buzzer that went off at random time intervals and wrote down their thoughts at that moment. When these thoughts were collected, the vast majority were negative, angry, dissatisfied or critical. We spend a lot of our time, he commented, acting like two year olds who hear the word 'no' and don't accept it. He noted that the anger we carry around rarely does any damage to the object of our frustration, but that it often hurts those closest to us at whom we are not angry, those whom we love.

Rabbi Harold Kushner made a similar observation in his book, Living a Life That Matters. "Look at what you have been doing all these years", he says to someone who comes to see him in his office. "You've been standing here in Massachusetts holding a hot coal in your hand, waiting for your ex-husband to walk by so you can throw it at him. Meanwhile he has been living happily in New Jersey with his new family, and you've burned your hand waiting." Focusing on the negative, on what we lack, on how we have been mistreated, cheated or betrayed, puts us in an angry space, with consequences for our physical health and for our ability to act in a loving ways towards all others, not just the person who did us wrong. Learning to control our anger and frustration, learning to forgive, as Professor Luskin called it, enables us to soothe our bodies, and direct our energies in more positive ways.

Most of the time we would benefit greatly from learning to curb our anger, but is it really the case that we should never get angry? Doesn't Ecclesiastes say "There is a time to be silent and a time to speak out. A time to love and a time to hate?" Must we feel guilty for the anger we feel, when truly terrible things occur, when innocent people are hurt and killed?

Rabbi Stephen S. Wise, I am told, was a kindly man, good to the students at the Jewish Institute of Religion. But when he stood on the pulpit he was an angry man of God, full of righteous indignation. He was not angry because he had personally been abused or wronged in some way, insulted or belittled. No, his anger was for the sake of others, and it was there to rouse the slumber of a dormant generation.

Rabbi Stephen S. Wise was angry at the cowardliness of the American rabbis of his time who wouldn't come out for workers rights as strongly as he felt was necessary during the depths of the depression. He was angry with the American Jewish lay leadership who were hemming and hawing on the issue of Zionism and whether the Jews were a people or a religion. It was 1936 and he was angry with the American people as a whole for not being strongly against what he called at that time, Hitlerism. When he gave a sermon, he roared, and it was like the lion described in the prophet Amos.

But Stephen S. Wise was judicious in his anger. He did not lose his cool and hurt the causes he was championing. He sought justice, not vengeance, conflict, not for its own sake, but for the sake of a better world. He had learned the lesson the Talmud teaches through Rabbi Meir's wife Beruriah. Rabbi Meir had been attacked by highway robbers and was very angry. He prayed to God that the highwaymen should die. Bruriah spoke to him gently, Is that the way to pray? Are we not taught to pray for the end of the sin and not the destruction of the sinner?

Along with the feelings of loss, of confusion, of sadness that we have felt over the past two weeks, there have certainly also been feelings of anger. So far, as a nation, and most of the time, even as individuals, we have been able to restrain that anger from becoming rage. Preventing future terrorism means more to us than taking revenge, and so we understand that we must move slowly and act in ways that are productive. Those who are punished for these atrocities must be those who are implicated in aiding the terrorists themselves, not random others in our communities who for one reason or another seem to resemble them. Anger can be dangerous if misdirected, but it can also have its uses. Anger can also energize, and we will need energy in the days and months ahead.

The rabbis teach us, "A person is known by their cup, their purse and their anger." Their cup, how they drink, their purse, how they spend money and their anger. Sometime when I think of this teaching, I am embarrassed, for under ordinary circumstances the things that make me angry on a regular basis, are so petty. I worry, could I be like Jonah, all worked up over the loss of the plant that offered him shade, and totally unmoved by the destruction of Nineveh, city with 120,000 people who don't know their right from their left and also much cattle?

My husband, a better person than I, sometimes gets angry when he reads the morning paper and fairly regularly that anger turns into a letter to the editor. You can turn anger into legitimate political power, by finding the energy to write, to call, to lobby or protest.

Are you angry that so many lives have been lost? Then do something, something tangible, to help the survivors or to help our country safeguard its citizens in the future. Sharon Roth, a member of our congregation, recently flew to the east coast to work with the Red Cross in the New York area. Her past volunteering along with her professional training made her a valuable contributor. What are we doing with ourselves to enhance our ability to be of service?

Are you angry that so many jobs have already disappeared? Then get involved in groups looking to safeguard employment. There is more than one way to respond to a shrinking bottom line. There are legitimate questions to ask as to whether it would be better for more people to work less hours, rather than less people working more. Events may have spun out of our control but how we respond to them is very much within the realm of our choices.

Some of the people who got mad last year when they heard about children bouncing around in the court system for months at a time, signed up to be Child Advocates. They took training and committed themselves to volunteering for at least 18 months. Now they can feel that they have made a difference.

Last year enough people got mad enough about housing to force some action on the local level. The county and a number of municipalities got involved along with a broad coalition of community organizations. Mayor Ron Gonzales introduced a ten point program to increase housing in our community, in part through inclusionary zoning guaranteeing that new units of affordable housing be part of the Coyotte Valley development. Tenants rights will shortly be better protected, all because of the pressure from active citizens angry enough to become involved.

On Yom Kippur we recite the al chet for the times when we did get angry, and hurt another person inappropriately. We deeply regret our angry and pray that we may find ourselves changed, the next time we are in similar circumstance. But we need also to recite another al chet for those times when we didn't get angry, when we didn't allow ourselves to become upset at the plight of other people and we should have. Sometimes the Jewish response has to be passionate. Sometimes we need to be angry enough to break out of our normal routines and act for others.

On this solemn day we pray, help us God to find discernment in our hearts that we may be passionate but not aggravated in the year to come.