A Tzadik

The reading of the (autobiographical?) novel The Chosen by Chaim Potok has introduced me to the term tzadik.  In Jewish life, a tzadik is a spiritual leader who is revered by his followers as a particularly holy man.  He functions as one who represents God to his people, and who pleads the cause of his people before God.  In Potok's book, he portrays a tzadik as having another function--to carry the sorrows of his own people.

I considered the portrayal of a tzadik in The Chosen as an overdrawn picture created in the writer's mind--not something that makes much sense now.  Why would anyone set out to cultivate a martyr's complex,  to make of one's son such a person or to admire such a person?

Having thought of the matter over the past few weeks, my thinking is changing a bit.  The story of Jeremiah, the weeping prophet, is instructive.  Jeremiah wept over the sins of his people.  The hardships he experienced no doubt caused him sorrow also.  His own family rejected him.  He was beaten and imprisoned more than once.  The nation he was preaching to never repented in his lifetime.  Tradition says that he died by stoning.

Jeremiah sounds like a tzadik to me.  He was such because of the the call of God on his life, and his obedience to that call.  I doubt that Jeremiah liked his life very much sometimes.  He said things people didn't want to hear.  He said negative things often--the things his discerning eyes "witnessed" before they happened.  He  couldn't marry as most other men did.  He was resisted and attacked and hurt.  He stayed faithful though.

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Very recently, Mark Driscoll resigned from his ministry at Mars Hill--yet another in the chain of once-acclaimed Christian leaders who has been recently discredited.  I know very few details, and am relieved that apparently no dishonesty or immorality was involved.  The problems were in the areas of relationships with his coworkers and in his leadership style, according to the reports I read.

I wonder if Driscoll was a prophet who  never became a tzadik.  Maybe he knew and proclaimed  truth, but never carried a weight of care for those he served.

Maybe being a tzadik is simply being called of God and serving while refusing or being denied a cloak of honor and acclaim--one who serves, even if it must be in sorrow and suffering.

Seen in that light, tzadiks are clearly needed in our time.

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A prophecy of Jesus says that he was a "Man of Sorrows, and acquainted with grief."

Jesus is the tzadik Who is needed in Jewish life and in the life of every one who seeks to follow God.
I'm still not sure if it's possible to become a tzadik by desiring to be one.  I do know, however, that aspiring to serve as a tzadik is likely to result in effective service--far more so than desiring to serve, but rejecting the suffering and sorrow that such serving sometimes entails.