The Three Most Important Questions to Live a Good Life

Judaism, as the late Rabbi Jonathan Sacks put it, “is a religion of questions.” Arguably, the Jewish people’s history began when Abraham asked a simple, yet profound question: “Is it possible that the universe lacks a person to care for it?” Upon which, God answered him: “I am the Master of the universe.”

I once heard a Buddhist monk tell a story of three of the “most important questions” that one needs to find happiness in life. The story was memorable for me not only for its depth and profundity, but because of its surprising source: a book of Yiddish short stories, published in 1903!

According to the story, there was once a King who desperately sought to live a good life, and discovered that he only needed to answer three questions in order to do so: when is the most important time; who is the most important person; and, what is the most important thing to do?

After searching far and wide, the King arrived at the answers that settled his heart and pleased his mind when he found Elijah the Prophet, dressed as a beggar, living underneath a bridge. Do not judge a book by its cover!

Before reading ahead to the answers, go back to the King’s three most important questions and ask yourself what you think the answers are. You may be in for a surprise.

1. “When is the most important time?”

Elijah’s answer, of course, is now. The present moment is the only time we truly ever have, the only time in which we can connect to God with intention, express our affection to loved ones or offer forgiveness.

In spite of this, many of us spend most of our lives caught up in regrets of the past or worries for the future. We may physically be present at the dinner table, in the synagogue or at a board meeting, but mentally we are elsewhere.

2. “Who is the most important person?

When I ask students this question they usually answer, “I am the most important person.” While there is no doubt of our own importance - as Hillel said, “if I am not for myself, who will be for me?” – Elijah’s surprising answer was that the most important person is whomever we are with at the present moment.

Many times a day we are by ourselves and thus we become the most important person in the world. But when we leave our private domain, the secret to a happy life is to treat others around us as the most important people in the world. How much of a difference does it make to listen deeply to our friends and loved ones, treating them with this importance?

How many of us can relate to not being fully heard or seen in interactions with other human beings, even loved ones? What a gift we can offer the people around us, treating them this way. And what a blessing it is for us to give in this way, attaining what the our sages refer to as the “saintly level” of generosity in which "what is mine is yours and what is yours is yours."

3. “What is the most important thing to do?”

Elijah’s short answer: care. In this way, we emulate God who is our ultimate caregiver. As the Rabbis teach:

Just as God clothed the naked (Bereshit 3:21), so we should clothe the naked. Just as He visited the sick (Bereshit 18:1), we should visit the sick. Just as He comforted those in mourning (Bereshit 25:11), we should comfort those in mourning. Just as He buried the dead (Devarim 34:6), we should bury the dead.

Judaism is a religion of questions, and the power of a good question can change your life and bring much happiness to yourself, your loved ones, and the world as a whole.