Divine Comedy

I often marvel at the way people take sides in politics, allying themselves both pragmatically and emotionally with one or another mere mortal, powerless human being. And I wonder: Why take the side of either Tweedledee or Tweedledum when you can opt to look at the world from Hashem’s perspective?

It’s not just that viewing human affairs from G-d’s vantage point comports with reality — it’s also a great deal more fun. After all, as Dovid Hamelech says (Tehillim 2:4), “Yosheiv baShamayim yischak, Hashem yil’ag lamo — He Who sits in Heaven laughs, He mocks them.” The Almighty peers down on His little world to behold all the Important People strutting about as if they actually own the place, plotting and grasping and jockeying pathetically for scraps of power and prestige and possessions.

The last couple weeks gave us an inkling of the Divine comedic sense of humor of which we speak. Two political figures were on a glide path toward the November election: One, a socialist, was seemingly rolling inexorably toward the Democratic presidential nomination. The other, the country’s president, was relishing the opportunity to face off against and likely demolish that socialist in the fall.

For all we know, the two of them may yet meet in November, since we never know what further laughs G-d has in store. But the snapshot at this writing is of a political moment in which both of these figures suddenly had the wind taken out of their sails in ways that leave one agape at Hashem’s mastery of the world.