Hashem brings them together at one inn and the one who had killed intentionally sits under a ladder and the one who had killed inadvertently climbs the ladder and falls on the one who killed intentionally and kills him. Witnesses testify to this and the court sends him to exile, to an Ir Miklat.
Consequently, the one who killed inadvertently is exiled and the one who killed intentionally is killed.
In summary: Hashem arranged it all.
***
We don't know what took place in previous gilgulim but the yad Hashem is obvious here in that He sent Leiby directly to the person who killed him. Leiby could have met his parents. He could have asked someone else for directions. But Hashem set this up. Why? We don't know what cheshbonos were at work here. Not that this absolves the killer. But to think of this as happenstance (as the police commissioner did) is not only wrong but not at all comforting; on the contrary, it is much more frightening to believe that there are random acts of violence. G-d runs the world and all is accounted for.
The "Three Weeks" begin today. On Tisha B'Av, one of the kinos describes the "Ten Martyrs," the ten great rabbis who were brutally murdered by the Romans. The ten rabbis are said to correspond to the ten shevatim and they were killed, says the Medrash, for selling Yosef over a thousand years earlier! Great souls are sometimes snatched from us for reasons we don't know. There are accounts to be settled and the only consolation is that "ha'tzur tamim pa'alo" - Hashem's ways are perfect and precise.
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If there had been even a traffic light, possibly the 2 would have never met. While I agree that it was meant to happen, nonetheless, parents should wait before allowing their children to walk alone somewhere on city streets. I just flew several times in the last couple of weeks. Because of one guy years ago with a bomb in his shoe, all passengers leaving from America now remove their shoes to clear security. Because of one guy who tried to detonate his underwear on the way to Detroit, now American passengers in many airports are subject to invasive screening. We didn't wait until shoe and underwear bombings became commonplace. We also can no longer bring liquids and gels on a plane or sharp objects. All of these security measures were a result of a small but present danger that could put travelers at risk. Meanwhile, it makes traveling a less pleasurable experience.
ReplyDeleteThere are those who don't want to trample on childhood by saying that children should be supervised when walking, riding a bike, or swimming. To them I say, that those who accept the risks of the small but present dangers that exist can say that the tragedy was meant to be and could not have been prevented but what if a person is meant to die on a certain day but some action that he takes changes the decree? What about those who were not in the Twin towers on 9/11 because they were still in shul? What about those who make decisions that will provide safety to others such as those who postponed chassunahs during the NY blizzard in order to prevent others from endangering themselves? While Hashem runs the world and everything is accounted for, we realize that this child was not prepared to get lost and made a dangerous decision when he realized that he was lost. Maybe we should be teaching our children that not every stranger with a yarmulke is trustworthy. Maybe we have some real truths to convey to our children. Maybe a black woman would have been a safer choice to go to for help than a Jewish man. Rather than accept that Hashem wanted this child's life to end at the hands of the man who murdered him, we should realize that there is an evil in our midst that cannot be ignored.