Imagine that there is one available position in a lucrative business, and two people, A and B, are competing for the position. Person A makes fifteen phone calls to influential businessmen associated with this particular business, requests an interview, works two days on preparing an attractive resume, but does not think even once about God. Person B invests only minimal natural effort, just sufficient to avoid requiring a miracle to attain the position, but spends two weeks in supplication before God, begging Him to grant him the position, and trusting that God will fulfill his request.
Who is more likely to get the position?
It seems that you are asking with the premise that if B had fulfilled his obligation of "hishtadlus" he should supposedly get this job. I think that one could posit that although B may have fulfilled his requirement of "hishtadlus", it could in fact have no affect on the probability of his acceptance for the job, because the only result of his "hishtadlus" is that he will recieve the "parnassah" allocated to him, not that he will neccessarily recieve the particular job that he wants and applied for.
ReplyDeleteI was not assuming such a premise; I was just asking a question.
ReplyDeleteDoes your answer also apply if Person B specifically prays for THIS job? Giving him parnassah some other way would not be answering his prayer.