The Torah needs no “proof” from psychology or any other academic discipline. Yet we should not be surprised when psychological research offers support for the idea that a Torah life is uniquely beneficial. Since Torah is the blueprint from which HaKadosh Baruch Hu created man we would expect to find evidence that man experiences the greatest feelings of wellbeing when he is living in sync with the dictates of the Torah the Divine instruction manual.
A recent article in the Atlantic by Emily Esfahani Smith entitled “Meaning Is Healthier Than Happiness” offers such evidence. The subject of happiness is all the rage. Esfahani Smith notes that Amazon listed 1000 new titles on happiness in the preceding three months alone.
And among the claims made by celebrants of happiness is that it pays off all kinds of health benefits. A recent study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences however suggests that all depends upon what you mean by happiness.
Steven Cole a professor of medicine and psychiatry at UCLA has researched the impact of chronic adversity — loneliness financial stress grief over the loss of a loved one — on a particular gene expression pattern. Such chronic adversity produces a stress-related pattern marked by an increase in activity of pro-inflammatory genes and a decrease in activity of genes involved in antiviral responses.
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