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G-d's Anger
By Rabbi Pesach Wolicki

"Rabbi Yochanan said in the name of Rabbi Yose: From where do we know that one is not supposed to appease someone at the moment of his anger? As it states, 'My face will go and I will give you rest.' (Shemot 33:14) G-d said to Moshe, 'Wait for me until My face of anger passes and I will let it go.' But, does G-d actually get angry? Yes, as it is taught, 'G-d is angry every day.' (Tehilim 7:12) And how much is His anger? A moment. .... As it states 'For His anger is for a moment, there is life in His will.' (Tehilim 30:6)" (Berachot 7a)

The above passage from the Gemara in Berachot discusses the fact that G-d gets angry. After the initial mention of G-d's anger at the time of sin of the Golden Calf, the Gemara asks what is, at first glance, the obvious question. "Does G-d get angry?"

The question is problematic. The Gemara seems to be asking the common question of how to understand anthropomorphic references to G-d? Can we say of G-d that He experiences an emotion such as anger? Can G-d experience any emotion at all? Obviously He does not.

In fact this can not be the Gemara's question. On the one hand, if it were, the answer would have to be that G-d does not get angry and that all references to G-d's anger are allegorical. However, if the Gemara is asking the question on the allegorical level, matters are equally problematic. Are the authors of the Gemara unaware of the literally tens of verses in the Torah and Nach that refer to G-d getting angry? Why ask the question at all?

A closer look at the text of the Gemara answers the question. Before asking this question, the Gemara tells us that G-d told Moshe to wait for His anger to pass, for G-d to calm down before He is willing to be appeased. In response to this the Gemara asks, "But, does G-d actually get angry?"

The Aramaic word used here for "anger" is "ritcha". There are other more common words for anger in Aramaic (e.g."rugza"). "Ritcha" also means "boiling." It has the connotation of boiling anger - an anger that will subside if you just wait. It is this characteristic of G-d's anger that the Gemara describes and to which the Gemara responds with the question, "Does this apply to G-d?"

Now the question can be understood. If G-d is angry, this must mean that there is something terribly wrong with human behavior that has elicited this response. Why should G-d's "emotional state" change as a result of the mere passage of time? Does this kind of anger - the kind that is a boiling over of emotion that subsides - apply to G-d?

The answer is that it does. "G-d is angry every day". In other words, the attribute of anger - dissatisfaction with that which is wrong in the world - is part of the system. It is critical that note be made of that which angers G-d.

However, His anger is not permanent. It lasts only "a moment." The Gemara then quotes the verse 'For His anger is for a moment, there is life in His will.' (Tehilim 30:6). In other words, G-d's anger is a natural and necessary step towards the fulfillment of "His will." His anger does subside with the passage of time.

It subsides because G-d's purpose in expressing anger is to move us closer to His will at the end of days.

The full text of the verse is 'For His anger is for a moment, there is life in His will, weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning' (Tehilim 30:6)

This Tisha B'Av, may G-d's momentary anger and our weeping in this dark night of the exile yield to the everlasting life in His will and the joy of the morning of our redemption.