It happens every day in shul. We see it, we witness it, and we just carry on with our davening and with our day. In most major centers of Yiddishkeit, one of the ubiquitous scenes during the Shacharis davening is people going around collecting money for tzedakah.
The average Shacharis tefillah in most shuls features at least 5-10 collectors and sometimes as many as 20. Those who are collecting tzedakah come in all shapes and sizes, all ages and backgrounds. There are distinguished-looking elderly men with long white beards shuffling along, one hand holding bills and the other holding a credit card machine. There are bochurim who are still in their teens. Some of the men are dressed in rabbinic garb, while others are walking around in sneakers and mismatched clothing, with a hat that looks like they took it out of a box of hefker old garments.
Now, a person shouldn’t admit his own faults in public, and certainly not in a public forum read by thousands of people, but for the sake of truth, I will have to admit that one of my great chesronos is that I am cynical. Some people, when they see a poor man or a man collecting tzedakah, are automatically engulfed by a sense of rachmanus and actually feel a deep inner need to give and try to alleviate the suffering of the Yid. My default button – and I am not proud of it – is to think: Okay, is this guy really legit?
This morning, when I looked around, I was simply amazed. There was a whole parade of Yidden coming around for tzedakah, and the vast majority of the Yidden in the bais medrash just gave, and gave, and gave. Most gave a minimum of a dollar to each person collecting.
Switching Focus
I decided right then and there to stop focusing on the takers and focus on the givers instead. Do we even realize how wonderful the collective body of Klal Yisroel is? Yidden come to shul every day, and most just want to daven in peace, but day after day, they benevolently give, and give, and give over and over again, with relatively good cheer. Often, the same person comes on Monday, then again on Wednesday, and then again on Friday. But these Yidden still give and give. As Chazal teach us, “nason titein,” you should give and then give again. That is exactly what Yidden in Lakewood, Brooklyn, Monsey, Monroe, and so many other places do every day, of every month, of every year.
These people are not what we call heroes. They are just regular Yidden who come to daven every day. Some are kollel yungeleit. Some are people who work long and hard every day, but they give and give and give.
When Giving is Really Taking
I was thinking about this, and it hit me that perhaps the givers aren’t really giving but taking.
Yes, sometimes we feel that we are constantly giving, but, in reality, we are not giving, but taking. There is a posuk in this week’s parsha that says, “Im kessef talveh es ami es ha’ani imoch – When you will lend money to My people, to the poor person who is with you…” (Mishpotim 22:24). The posuk goes on to tell us that when you lend money to the poor among you, do not take ribbis, interest.
The Kotzker Rebbe, however, teaches that this posuk is hinting to something else as well. There is a well-known Mishnah in Pirkei Avos (6:9) that states, “When man departs from this world, neither silver nor gold, nor precious stones and pearls, accompany him, but only [his] Torah learning and maasim tovim.”
The Kotzker Rebbe explains that it is this very important lesson that the Torah is telling us here as well. The simple meaning of the words “Im kessef talveh” is “When you lend money,” but the word “talveh” can also mean “accompany,” such as the word “levayah.” The Kotzker Rebbe continues, “If a person wants his money to accompany him to the next world after his petirah, there is only one way to achieve that. Generally, a person’s money does not go with him. Rather, he leaves it behind in Olam Hazeh and goes to Olam Haba with nothing. How can a person’s money accompany him? The answer to that is found in the very next words in our posuk: “es ha’ani imoch.” Whatever money you gave “es ha’ani,” to the poor, “imoch,” remains with you, even in Olam Haba after you leave this world.
That is how giving can be taking.
When is Your Money Really Yours?
Most people think that the money they have is theirs and the money they give to the poor or otherwise spent on worthy causes is gone. The opposite is true.
The money that you give to others remains with you in Olam Haba. That money is yours for eternity. The money that you earned but did not give to others, the money that you thought is yours here in Olam Hazeh, will not do anything for you in the next world.
I once saw that the Bais Yisroel of Ger adds that this idea doesn’t only apply to actual money that one gives to tzedakah. It also applies, and perhaps even more so, to the chesed one does with others in ruchniyus, even at the expense of his own personal aliyah. He would direct bochurim and yungeleit to give up from their own learning time or other ruchniyusdige pursuits to imbue others with ruchniyus.
The Bais Yisroel would explain that we can learn this from this very same posuk by translating the words a bit differently. “Im kessef talveh,” you should lend someone else from your bounty, even when “ha’ani imoch,” even when you yourself are suffering from being an ani and feel like you are spiritually impoverished.
A person will never lose by helping another. If this is said about helping others with money, which is gashmiyus, how much more so when it comes to giving away from oneself, even from one’s own ruchniyus, to help another.
We Are Amazing
The bottom line is that our generation is a phenomenal one. I am not a historian and certainly cannot say this with definitiveness, but I wonder if there was any generation in the last many centuries of golus when there was so much giving, so much chesed, and so much goodness being spread.
People really, really, want to help. They want to be meitiv. They want to give of themselves, their money, their time, and their intellect to help others.
Yes, we know that there are a lot of things that we need to improve, and we are not perfect by any means, and we write about those things in these pages as well. Nevertheless, it is also important to put things in perspective and realize that achsher dara, our generation is truly a worthy one. We are not just people who perform chesed. Our collective communities can be described as rodfei chesed, people who truly pursue chesed.
We are amazing givers, and we must remember that we are not just giving. We are, in essence, taking, because when it is all over, it is that chesed of giving that we will take with us. Remember that.
