When the Enemy is Within

 

Many Arab advisers were jealous of the Rambam’s privileged status in Saladin’s court, and they plotted against the Rambam.  They approached Saladin and demanded the Rambam be replaced with a better, Arab doctor.

The Sultan proposed a test. He would give both doctors a week to concoct a poison that would be lethal to the other person. Each one would also have at their disposal any medicines they wished, in order to concoct an antidote for the poison made by their opponent. Whoever lived through the experience would win and become the Sultan’s physician.

At week’s end, the two doctors stood in front of the Sultan. The Arab doctor presented his poison to the Rambam. With a brief examination, The Rambam was able to quickly create the appropriate antidote, after which he consumed the poison and the antidote in quick succession. And it seemed to work.

Now it was the Arab doctor’s turn to ingest the Rambam’s concoction. He spent considerable time examining the Rambam’s poison.  Then he made what he hoped would be the antidote and swallowed both. The doctor was pleased when nothing happened to him. But then he got nervous: perhaps the Rambam’s poison was slow acting. Perhaps it would only cause death when a certain food was consumed along with it. So over the next few days he removed items from his diet, first meat, then wheat, until he was barely eating anything. Within a few weeks the Arab doctor died of a heart attack.

Upon hearing the news of the Arab doctor’s death, The Sultan summoned the Rambam to declare him the winner. He told the Rambam how impressed he was that his concoction was such a sophisticated, slow acting and deadly poison. The Rambam set the record straight: He was no killer. His concoction was nothing more than a harmless cocktail of sweet wine. The doctor had died due to complications from his own anxiety and paranoia. 

Parshat Bechukotai contains the curses that will befall the Jewish people should we veer from the path Hashem has set for us. Of the 48 curses there is only one punishment that is mentioned no less than three times:

26:17: you will flee, with no one pursuing you.

26:36: the sound of a rustling leaf will pursue them, they will flee as one flees from the sword and they will fall- but without a pursuer

26:37: They will stumble over one another as in flight from the sword, but there is no pursuer.

Rabbi Baruch Halevi Epstein asks in his commentary Tosefet Bracha: Why is fleeing from nobody considered to be such a bad punishment? I would imagine that fleeing from an actual enemy should be worse, yet it’s the situation of Ayn Rodef, when there is in fact nobody in pursuit that gets emphasized as a particularly difficult punishment.

Rabbi Epstein explains that Hashem promises us that there is hope for Divine intervention on behalf of those actually being pursued by an enemy. However there is no such promise when the enemy from which we flee is a figment of our imagination. Put another way: when confronting real enemies, we can devise a plan that entails both confrontation and prayer to Hashem. But when Ayn Rodef, the enemy is not physical, it is a different and more difficult situation; for the enemy that needs to be vanquished comes from within ourselves. 

May is Mental Health Awareness Month. Today many people feel pursued by depression, anxiety, stress and other pressures that negatively impact our mental health. We must remove the stigma that many people feel surrounding mental health challenges. Just as we don’t feel embarrassed to go to a cardiologist to address heart issues, we should not be embarrassed to visit a mental health professional to address mental health concerns. If we acknowledge the challenge, remove the stigma and encourage treatment of mental illness, then we can do our part to remove the curse, thereby ushering in the blessing of peace, including peace of mind.