35. Find Favor and a Good Mind
“Find favor and a good mind in the eyes of God and man” (Proverbs 3).
We should understand what it means to be favored by the Creator, meaning to do things by which man’s actions are approvable in the eyes of the Creator. How can man, who is deficient, perform complete actions? For this reason, we asked to be found in favor.
Being favored is as our sages said, “How does one dance before the bride? The House of Hillel say… no blue paint and no rouge and no braiding, and still a graceful gazelle” (Ketubot 16b), or as our sages said about Ester, “Esther was greenish” (Megillah 15a), “And Esther found favor in the eyes of all who saw her.”
It follows that when we want to be favored, it is because in terms of actions, we cannot say that we can perform complete actions; this is why we want to be favored.