Benaiah's heart almost stopped beating, and he ran back to the young merchant. Baffled, he watched the man take a plain gold band from his carpet and engrave something on it. But when Benaiah read the words engraved on the ring, his face broke out in a wide smile.

"This is it!" he cried, and he emptied his purse of gold coins into the merchant's hands. Then he ran swiftly through the dark streets to the kings palace, grasping the gold ring tightly in his hand.

That night the entire city welcomed in the holiday of Sukkot with great festivity. In the palace, Solomon presided over a magnificent feast for all his court. Benaiah sat down near the king, concealing the ring in his pocket until the king should ask for it.

"Well, my friend," said Solomon, "have you found what I sent you after?"

All the ministers laughed, and Solomon himself smiled. Poor Benaiah! He had finally failed his king and would feel the sting of shame. But Solomon was prepared to redeem his minister's honor by now revealing to him that he had been sent on a wild goose chase.

But to everyone's surprise, Benaiah held up a small gold ring and declared, "Here it is, your majesty!"

As soon as Solomon read the inscription, the smile vanished from his face. For the jeweler had written three Hebrew letters on the gold band: Gimel, Zayin, Yud, which begin the words Gam Zeh Ya'avor -- "This too shall pass."

At that moment Solomon realized that all his wisdom and fabulous wealth and tremendous power were but fleeting things, for one day he would be nothing but dust. And the amusement he had just felt a moment before now gave way to sorrow.

Solomon beckoned to his minister and said, "I have always known you were faithful, Benaiah, but now I know that you are truly wise."

Then Solomon slipped the ruby signet ring off his finger and replaced it with the gold band that Benaiah had brought him.

"I shall always wear this ring," my friend, he said, "and keep its wisdom close to my heart. And you shall have this ruby ring as my thanks to you."

And until the day he died, Benaiah never once failed to do whatever the king asked of him.

This beautiful story, taken from Ellen Frankel's fantastic compendium of Midrashic tales, has helped me time and time again when I have faced difficulty, anger, and pain.

It helped me put into perspective a difficulty I was having with a neighbor regarding a common fence (don't we all have a fence story or two?) While in the midst of this problem, I wrote the first part of this piece, praying that it would be resolved by the time I wrote the second part of this piece, and sure enough, Gam zeh ya'avor, this problem passed.

God has created an imperfect world, and it is the responsibility of humankind to accept this imperfection, and to do whatever we can, when possible, to help mend its problems and heal the fissures.