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Chapter Twelve: ON ANGER

Anger is a bad quality and just as scurvy is a disease of the body so is anger a disease of the soul. And our sages have said : "He who loses his temper is exposed to all the torments of hell" (Nedarim 22a) as it is said : "Therefore, remove vexation from thy heart, and put away evil from thy flesh" (Eccl. 11:10), and by "evil" they mean Gehenna, as it is said : "The Lord hath made everything for His own purpose, Yes, even the wicked for the day of evil" (Prov. 16:4). And not only this but an angry man is afflicted with piles as it is said : "The Lord will give you there an anguished heart and eyes that pine, and a despondent spirit" (Deut. 28:65). What ill is it that dims the eyes and pains the soul— Surely you will say "Piles".

Our Sages said further : "He who loses his temper, even the Divine Presence, is unimportant in His eyes (Nedarim 22b), as it is written "The wicked in the pride of his countenance (saith) 'He will not require', All his thoughts are 'There is no God' " (Ps. 10:4). And it (anger) also causes him to forget his studies of Torah and increases his folly as it is said : "For anger resteth in the bosom of fools" (Eccl. 7:9) and "A fool will not understand" (Ps. 92:7), and, "But a fool unfoldeth folly" (Prov. 13:16). You may be sure that his sins are more plentiful than his merits, as it is said : "An angry man stirreth up strife" (Ibid. 29:22) and his punishment is very great as it is said : "A man of great wrath shall suffer punishment" (Ibid. 19:19).

And you often see people who when they are angry and persist in their wrath, are not conscious of what they are doing and do many things in their anger which they would not do if they were free from anger, for anger draws out the intelligence of a person from within him until his angry deeds multiply and he is plunged into strife and quarrel. Therefore, it is impossible that the wrathful person should be saved from great sins. And so did Elijah say to Rabbi Judah : "Fall not into a passion and you will not sin" (Berakoth 29b). And the Sages said : "By three things is a man known" (Erubin 65b) and one of them is his anger, for when a man is angry his true nature can be recognized. If his wrath is stronger than his wisdom and he does things in the moment of his anger without regard to his wisdom, then you can see the character of his wrath. But if his wisdom is stronger than his anger and he de does not say or do anything when angry that he would not say or do when he is free from anger, then you can see the extent of his wisdom. And the Wise Man said : "Three, the Holy One Blessed be He loves and one of them is he who does not anger" (Pesahim 113b). And our Sages said : "Nor is an impatient person fitted to teach" (Aboth 2:5), for because of his great anger, the pupils fear him too much to ask the things of which they are in doubt lest he be wrathful with them. And even when his pupils do ask the impatient teacher questions he has neither the mind nor the patience to explain to his pupils all that is needed to make the matter clear. Then, too, he will answer questions in anger and thus the pupils will not understand the matter clearly. As for the pupils, it is their duty even when their teacher is angry with them, to ask their questions and listen carefully and not be hurt by the anger of their teacher nor quarrel with him. Concerning such pupils our Sages taught : "So the forcing of wrath bringeth forth strife" (Proverbs 30:33). Any pupil whose teacher is angry with him repeatedly but bears the teacher's wrath in silence will merit to discern between civil and criminal law. And a master said : "There is nothing more difficult than civil and criminal Law" (cf. Berakoth 63b).

The angry man does not find favor in the eyes of his fellow creatures; he is in fact hateful in their eyes. And thus, his deeds are not received favorably by his fellow creatures. Even if he possesses knowledge of the Torah and has many good deeds to his credit, people cannot learn from him.

The angry man is a burden on his household, who are always compelled to hear his wrath and his complaints, and his temper brings him very near to a calamity, for he casts too much terror on his household. As we learn in the Talmud (Gittin 7a) concerning Rabbi Hanina, the son of Gamliel; his household was brought almost to the point of feeding him a piece of meat cut from a living creature.

The wrathful man is not gracious or generous. He is constantly seeking revenge and always bears a grudge. Anger brings a man into quarrels for when he is angry with his companions, they quarrel with him and he quarrels with them. And when there is a quarrel, there is, of course resulting envy and hatred. And you already know the evils of a quarrel, as will be further explained in the chapter on quarrels.

Wrath restrains the heart of a man from all good deeds. For when a man is angry, he is insensitive and has no mercy upon the poor. Concerning the Lord, may He be Blessed, it is said "In anger, remember to have mercy" (Habakuk 3:2). But this is far from the ways of man.

Anger vitiates the intent of a man in his prayer, and the Divine Presence cannot dwell where there is anger.

The angry man cannot be very wise, for wrath causes reason to flee from the mind, so that he cannot answer as is proper, and he cannot rebuke as is proper, and all his words are not prompted by intelligence. The angry man bars from himself all corrections and rebukes, for no man feels free to reveal his errors and his shortcomings, inasmuch as every man fears him, — fears to tell him the things he does wrong, lest he be wrathful with him. And even if some person should rebuke him, the angry man will not receive correction because of his anger. In general then, an angry man does not acquire any good quality unless he first removes his anger from his heart. Just as the angry man does not accept rebuke from others, so is he not able to administer rebuke to others, for the Torah has said, "You shall surely rebuke your neighbor, and thus not bear sin because of his wrongful conduct" (Leviticus 19:17), which means that first you must rebuke him gently, and in private, and with soft speech, pleading with him that you are thinking only of his own good. And then, if you do this, sin will not accrue to you. But if you rebuke your companion right at the beginning, with an angry voice and with wrath, and you shame him, then you are sinning for your companion will not receive correction from you. For this is human nature, if a man comes to his companion with force then his companion will be stubborn and unyielding to him, and will not listen to him. Concerning this the wise man said in Koheleth, "The words of the wise are heard gently" (Eccl. 9:17), that is to say, the wise man speaks gently.

And you already know the account of Hillel and Shammai (Shabbath 31a) that the three converts to Judaism said concerning them, "The short-temperedness of Shammai wanted to drive us out from the world, however, the modesty of Hillel brought us under the wing of the Divine Presence" As for Hillel, because of his great modesty, no man could make him angry, for he who holds himself back from anger, will acquire the qualities of modesty and compassion, while from wrath comes the quality of cruelty, as it is written : "And my anger shall blaze forth and I will put you to the sword" (Ex. 22:23). And always in the case of anger we find vengeance, "For the Lord's anger will flare up against you and He will shut up the skies" (Deut. 11:17).

Anger causes impudence in man, and because of anger, he will not yield and will not confess the truth. And the wise man said, "If you want to choose a faithful and good companion, make him angry and if he confesses the truth to you at the moment of his anger, become his friend, but if he does not, then leave him."

Anger leads to mistakes. Who is a greater man than Moses, our teacher? Moses, upon him be peace, was angry in three places, and he made what would generally be termed "mistakes". As it is said : "And he was angry with Eleazar and with Ithamar" (Lev. 10:16), and it is written : "Why did you not eat the sin-offering in the sacred area?" (Lev. 10:17). And it is said : "Listen, you rebels" (Num. 20:10) and it is said : "And he struck the rock" (Ib. : 11). And it is said : "Moses became angry with the commanders of the army" (Num. 31:14), and it is written : "And Eleazar the priest said to the troops who had taken part in the fighting This is the ritual law' " (Num. 31:21). Which teaches that Moses forgot the law (while angry) (Leviticus Rabbah 13:1). And so, you can understand that if these things happened to Moses peace be upon him, when he was angry, what can happen to fools who are angry! And therefore Solomon said, "Be not hasty in thy spirit to be angry" (Eccl. 7:9).

And you must be very careful not to do damage in your anger, for our Rabbis said : "He who rends his garments, breaks his utensils in his wrath and scatters his money should be in your eyes like one who worships idols" (Shabbath 105b). For this is the artful craft of the Evil Desire. Today he says to a man, "Do thus." And on the morrow he says to him, "Go ahead and serve idols." And the man goes and serves. This is the reason it is written "There shall not be in you a strange god" (Ps. 81:10). Now which strange god can be inside of a man? You must necessarily say, "It is the Evil Desire." Look and see how the Evil Desire strenthens itself in a man in a time of anger.

Rabbi said : "There are four temperaments : Easily angered and easily pacified; his loss is cancelled out by his gain. Hard to anger and hard to pacify; his gain is cancelled out by his loss. Easily angered and hard to pacify is a wicked man. Hard to anger and easily pacified is a saintly man."

And these four qualities apply to a righteous man when he grows angry with good people, or because of worldly matters. But if a man finds it difficult to grow angry with people who do wicked deeds, and is easy with them, that is an evil quality, for he appeases the wicked. All the more wicked is the man who easily gets angry with the righteous, and finds it difficult to be angry with the wicked, — who finds it easy to appease the wicked, but finds it difficult to appease the righteous. Such a man is completely wicked.

Even though anger is a very bad quality, nevertheless, a man should conduct himself at times with the quality of anger. For example, when he rebukes the wicked, and when he desires to cause a spirit of awe and respect to dwell on the members of his household, and when he wants to obtain respect and even fear from his pupils. Even he who is angry with the wicked, must weigh the extent of his anger, for Moses, our teacher, upon whom is peace, said when he spoke wrathfully against Reuben and Gad : "A breed of sinful men" (Num. 32:14). And, therefore, we find that his descendant (the Levite mentioned in Judges 18:30) became a priest to idols, and this even though Moses was angry because he strove for the glory of God. Everything requires a proper measure in all a man's ways. A man should speak carefully how to do the commandments, whether he rebukes out of anger or rebukes joyously.

A man who has the quality of anger, but controls that anger and wrathful manner as though he were not at all subject to temper, concerning such a one it is said : "He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty ; and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city" (Prov. 16:32). And you must remember that slowness to anger, is one of the Thirteen Attributes which are ascribed to the Creator, may He be Blessed.

The Wise Man said, "He who has his anger in thought only, but restrains it, you can see dignity and glory on his countenance, but he whose anger is not only in his thought, expresses his folly in his features and in his manner.

And this too, said the Wise Man, "He whose anger and wrath are mighty is not too far away from the madness of insane ones, and he who is habitually angry, his life is no life at all" (Pesahim 113b), and he is never happy — and inasmuch as he is never happy, he does not receive the various happenings that come to man with love and with joy, and he does not declare the Justice of God, whether the happenings be good or bad, and therefore, he is not able to joyously serve God, may He be Blessed.

Now when a man is in the midst of a fast, or in some trouble, then anger dwells strongly in his heart. Therefore at such times he must be particularly careful not to grow angry. Silence nullifies anger and a soft voice nullifies anger, therefore, a man, when he sees his anger growing strong within him, should be silent, or should speak quietly, and should not lift his voice in his anger, for the one who does lift his voice in his anger, will only arouse and stir up that anger, but a quiet voice and silence soothe anger. Another thing he should bear in mind is not to look in the face of a man that is angry with him, but should drop his eyes and speak with him without staring into his face — and thus he will cause anger to flee from his heart.

And you should know that the final sum of the intelligence of a man is his ability to govern his anger. As it is said : "It is the discretion of a man to be slow to anger" (Proverbs 19:11). Anger is very close to arrogance and no angry man can escape arrogance. You already know the evils of arrogance. It is proper for a man to be distant from anger, even on a matter where anger is proper he should hold back his impulse and not be angry. A man who is subject to anger should do this right at the outset. When he resolves in his mind that he must not get angry, he must also determine and resolve that he should not feel any humiliation or any insult. Even though he be rebuked or cursed, he should not feel anything and should not concern himself about it.

This is clear, that he who is very impulsive, it would be better for him that he should not feel any insult or offense whatever, and that he should be silent and restrain himself completely rather than be even a little bit angry. For it is impossible for a man who is angry by nature to be angry "just a little", for he will find in the end that he is unrestrained in his anger. And he who wants to refrain from anger and cast a reasonable awe upon his children and upon his household, or if he is the leader of the community and wants to display anger towards the community in order that they should improve their conduct, what should he do? He must, in order to rebuke them, appear before them as though he were angry, but his mind must be calm just as a man does when he pretends to be angry but really is not angry. And when he does show anger, he should be very careful not to do so when there are poor guests present for they, being very sensitive, will think that he is angry with them. Therefore, he must show himself happy in their presence.

The wise men commanded that one must always remove himself so far from anger as to accustom himself not to feel any humiliation or hurt whatever, even at things which usually cause anger to any man until he completely roots out anger from his heart; This is the best path, and the way of the righteous : "They are shamed, but they do not shame; they hear people speak words of disgrace against them, but they do not retort, they do their deeds of goodness with love and rejoice in God's chastisements." And concerning them the Scripture says, "And those that love Him are like the sun when he goes forth in his strength" (Judges 5:31).