Q. Dear Rabbi. I was very impressed with question 3030 in which HoRav Miller advised a nurse in a major old age retirement home and at risk of becoming infected with Covid, to continue saving lives and doing that heroic work, even after a significant number of the staff quit. He added; ‘Take into account that there is no greater mitzva than saving a life and Hashem protects those who do so and rewards them accordingly.’
A close friend of mine is a frum physician working in a large hospital with a significant number of Jewish patients. They are also experiencing an incredible and most unusual overflow of patients being rushed into the hospital with different Covid and other related diseases and a diminished staff to help. He tells me that he is elated to have the opportunity to save many victims of the pandemic.
Yet, I see him very depressed, because at the same time, he is forced to make many fast and difficult decisions that, as he has disclosed to me, he knows they have likely cost the life of patients or at least contributed to their demise. He confided to me that although, he fills elated and with great simcha when BE’H, he can save someone’s life and these cases far exceed the ones where he and others could not. Yet it bothers him tremendously that unwittingly and out of simple lack of help and time, he was likely part and parcel of their untimely decease.
In a way, he revealed to me, he thinks of himself as being liable to multiple ‘golus’ (exile) penalties, as one who accidentally kills another person, and requires great kaparah, redemption and expiation for all those failed recent experiences. This detrimental situation is causing him great emotional concern and depression, that only aggravates his potential for saving lives.
What can one tell to him and was does Horav Miller recommend?
A. Horav Shlomo Miller's Shlit'a opinion is that since he was and is very seriously engaged and dedicated to the greatest Mitzva of saving people's lives, he has to have trust and certainty that Hashem will help him to avoid mistakes. The Rov emphasized that he should begin his day with a tefila to Hashem from the depths of his heart, that He should be with him and help him to save lives and avoid errors.
The Rov added that if one is engaged in the mitzva of Hatzolas Nefoshos (saving lives) and mistakenly, without any irresponsible oversight, remiss or negligence, and due to reasons beyond one's control causes or is a factor of the demise of the patient one is trying to save, he/she is not held responsible and liable to golus as a rotzeach beshogeg (unwitting causer of death) is. He has to remove from his mind those negative and harmful thoughts and feelings and concentrate in the greatest mitzva of saving others.
Rabbi A. Bartfeld as advised by Horav Shlomo Miller and Horav Aharon Miller Shlit'a
Important Numbers
