Exodus 34:6

"And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, The Lord, The Lord God, merciful and gracious, long suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth," Ex 34:6

This verse from the Bible is repeated many times in the prayer service of Yom Kippur. It's one of my favorite verses but it has puzzled me for a long time. 

On the one hand I'm comforted when I think that God is merciful. He will forgive my sins and will take away my aches and pains. 

On the other hand I still have aches and pains even after I've prayed and fasted all Yom Kippur.

This raised the question in my mind, "if God doesn't take away my suffering then how does He express His mercy?"

The answer is that God's mercy, graciousness, long suffering, abundant goodness and truth applies not to me as an individual but to all the universe, in its widest sense. It applies to the universe as a whole, in its entirety. 

God's mercy, and other qualities, isn't like man's mercy. God is merciful. to everybody and everything all the time and for all time. 

In Man these qualities, mercy and grace etc, are in addition to himself. He may or may not have these qualities. Some men have these qualities while others don't.

In God these qualities are Him. They are an imperative of His nature. It's not a question of choice. He doesn't choose to have them or not to have them. (this idea has been explained by Maimonides in Guide to the Perplexed part 1) 

The creation of the universe, for example, is an expression of God's mercy. God didn't choose to create the world. He created it because it's his nature to create and it's His nature to be merciful. 

The crucial question that people have always asked is whether the universe is infinite. Will it last forever?

In order to last forever the universe must be perpetual. If the universe isn't perpetual then it's going to stop existing one day. 

In other words it must continue without intervention. The question is important:

If the universe is permanent and perpetual then there can't be any intervention. Intervention negates perpetuity. If God intervenes in the natural sequence of events there wouldn't be perpetuity. There would be an end.

In an infinite and perpetual world it's natural that God's mercy is His non intervention.

In an infinite and perpetual world the only kind of intervention can be man's intervention in his own situation, not God's intervention in the actions and situation of Man.

Man's mercy and not God's applies to healing suffering and maintaining life. It's natural that man should seek better ways to relieve suffering and promote his well being. Not to expect God to intervene to relieve suffering and prolong life..

In an infinite and perpetual world God's mercy applies to His non intervention.

In an infinite and perpetual world individual birth is as necessary as death for the survival of the universe. Birth and death and life without God's intervention is perpetual.

Birth, life and death continue all the time in an infinite world, with no intervention of God.

Man mistakenly thinks that he's praying for God's intervention in healing his aches and pains when actually he's praying for God's non intervention. 

Because God's non intervention is His mercy.

God's intervention would bring an end to perpetuity and an end to the universe. So God does not intervene. 

It may be very comforting for us to think that in His mercy God relieves our aches and pains, but it's much more comforting for us to think that the world is forever because God is merciful and doesn't intervene.

Our aches and pains are necessary for the survival of the universe. Instead of looking for God's intervention to take away our suffering let us rather take comfort that we suffer while at the same time looking for rational, human ways to relieve suffering.