Rabbi Nechemiah made a bold claim: afflictions are beloved by God. Not merely tolerated, not merely permitted — beloved. And he backed this claim with a comparison to sacrificial offerings.
Just as offerings conciliate — they repair the relationship between God and the person who brings them — so too do afflictions conciliate. The parallel is established through matching verses. What is written of offerings? (Leviticus 1:5): "And it shall conciliate for him to atone for him." What is written of afflictions? (Leviticus 26:43): "And they shall conciliate for their sin." The same Hebrew root for conciliation appears in both contexts.
But Rabbi Nechemiah went further. Afflictions, he taught, conciliate even more effectively than offerings. The reasoning is elegantly simple: offerings are made with one's money, while afflictions are borne with one's body. A sacrifice costs something. Suffering costs more. The person who endures affliction has given something that cannot be replaced or replenished the way money can.
This teaching reframes the experience of suffering in Jewish thought. Pain is not meaningless punishment. It is a form of atonement that operates at a deeper level than ritual sacrifice ever could. The person who suffers has offered something more intimate than an animal on an altar — they have offered their own comfort, their own well-being. According to Rabbi Nechemiah, God values this sacrifice of the self above any sacrifice of property.