This week we read about the blessings that Hashem will bestow upon us. The blessings include peace and sovereignty over our enemies, but are largely blessings of wealth and prosperity; “I will provide your rains in their time, and the land will give its produce and the tree of the field will give its fruit. Your threshing will last until the vintage, and the vintage will last until the sowing ….” How apt that this Parshah always falls within a week (or two) around the time of the publishing of the ‘Rich List’, where the public get to read about the richest people in England.
Rabeinu Bachay (13th century) classically brings a verse from Proverbs that encapsulates the central theme and message of the Parshah. What he sees as the central theme that revolves around the blessings and conversely [G-d Forbid] the curses, is that of wealth and poverty. When things are good we have capital, when things go bad we are poverty stricken.
Obviously this concept needs to be explained – is there not more to this world than money in the pocket to buy what you want? Do we not see rich people who are tremendously unhappy with what they have? Does being poor mean that life is all doom and gloom; are there not many happy people living on a very basic lifestyle? It sounds almost childish to say that money is the answer to all our problems. Does a thinking person not reflect on the fact that quite the contrary, money can be the beginning of all our problems, as we read in Ethics of the Fathers, “more possessions, more worry”.
In order to portray the Torah’s view on this, Rabeinu Bachay brings the verse from Proverbs, “The crown of the wise is their riches; but the foolishness of fools is but foolishness”. Riches in the hand of a wise man are his crown, because the riches are immensely useful tools to propagate his knowledge. On a practical level he can pay for his lectures to be broadcast. But also because of his wealth the general public will have an ear to what he has to say. His money can be used to depose those who thwart his plans to spread his wisdom to the world. Furthermore, his wealth can be used for helping society, doing chessed, setting up soup kitchens, supporting the needy and the like. Without the worry of making a living he can even further the wisdom he already has accumulated. His wealth is really the crown, the icing on the cake to all his wisdom.
Conversely, this same wealth in the hands of someone who doesn’t understand what the purpose of money is, money will be his downfall. His money may be squandered on useless things, or he may just sit on it and do nothing of purpose with it. When interviewed, one of the people on the ‘Rich List’ was asked about his aspirations. “To have 600 million pounds!” he replied. Just to have it! Not to do anything with it, to buy another yacht or villa – just to have it for a rainy day – how ridiculous!
R’ Meir of Premishlan (1703-1773) used to say, that if you were to squeeze and condense the prayers of the all the Jews to get just the heartfelt and sincere prayers you would be left with just the prayers that Jews had cried out for their businesses! But if you would take these prayers and squeeze them further you would get prayers to do chessed and support Torah, because at the depths of every Jew is the need for a higher purpose with which to use his money!
Good Shabbos, Yaakov