When Bad Things Happen to Good People

People often pray for loved ones in the hospital, asking God for their recovery. If God granted all these requests, He would correct each illness or injury, and no one would ever die, except when those who prayed for the recovery got the prayer wrong. Since people do die despite our prayers, perhaps God is either a stuffy bureaucrat who only approves prayers offered in the correct wording, or a cruel and heartless deity who doesn’t care about or approve of those people whose prayers aren’t answered.

In Jewish law, praying for an outcome other than what has already happened is improper. “May God grant that this child be a boy” (128), or a prayer that a fire in the neighborhood is consuming someone else’s house rather than one’s own, are wrong entreaties. Also wrong are prayers that wish harm to another, or prayers that ask God to bring to us things we can get for ourselves. Religion isn’t about getting benefits from God; instead, it’s for bringing the community together through the ritual sharing of good times and bad. When people pray for others, they show their support and express the hope that things will turn out well.