Sweeten the Waters

In this weeks's Torah portion, we have an unusual incident, where shortly after the Splitting of the Sea, the people saw that they were without water. The grumbled against Moses, whereupon G-d showed Moses a tree, which, when thrown into the bitter lake before them, turned the waters sweet. The question is asked, why does the Torah criticize the people their grumbling? Isn't thirst in the middle of a desert a good reason to grumble? Rabbi Isaac Meir of Gur suggests as follows: The Torah first says (Exodus 17:1-2) that they had no water to drink and they fought with Moses. The next verse says that they were thirsty, and they complained bitterly. The sequence was that FIRST they SAW the lack of water, and began to doubt G-d and Moses. THEN they became thirsty, and all the stops were out. They were angry and argumentative before the problem began! . When the problem actually began, they were angry and rebellious beyond any proportion! What should they have done? When the problem was only apparent, they should have taken counsel with Moses. and proceeded to pray. Long before they had become thirsty, the problem would have been solved. Instead, the problem became an emergency even before they were faced with the problem. Once in the midst of it, they felt hopelessly trapped.
When I lived in Israel, I taught sofrim (scribes). Each letter must be perfect. Some imperfections render the writing invalid, others are still passable. I always told my students, when they saw a problem, to put a pencil mark next to it, and come back to it in half an hour. The more one looks at the problem, it will undoubtedly get worse by the minute. Concentrate on what MAY be wrong, and it WILL become horribly wrong. We need to think, pray, trust, and see things in proper proportion. The waters WILL become sweet