Daily Chidush: Does it Pay to be Cheap?

0:42There are 11 reasons. Chazal tell us there are 11 reasons why someone gets this horrendous disease. The commonly known one is when someone says Lashon Hara. Someone says something about somebody else, even if it's true, and it's negative about them. It's considered Lashon Hara. That's the foundation. It's the most common reason why people would get it. And those people who got Tzara'at would be thrown out of the camp, just like they tried. to make someone look unfavorable in the eyes of the public. Hashem makes them unfavorable in the eyes of the public as well by throwing them out of the camp. But that's Lashon Hara (slander), a topic I want to discuss another time. there's another reason, another one of the 11 reasons why someone gets this disease, and that's someone who's a kamtzan, someone who's stingy or cheap. Being cheap is really a disease, and such a disease that Hashem detests it. Now, Pesach is coming up, and there is a minhag of Yisrael that became halacha,

1:55that's called Kimcha D'Pischa, which literally means flour for Pesach, which is a minhag that the Chazal, the sages of Am Yisrael, kept, and eventually reached a point where it became halacha. This should not be confused with other minhagim that people think are halachot. Most minhagim are not halachot. They're not rules or laws in the Torah. But there's a few that became Very, very significant, and it became an actual law in Judaism. And this is one of them. This law is to give tzedakah to the ger, the yasom, the almanah, and the poor — to people who are underprivileged, whether they're converts, or someone who lost their parents. or someone who lost their spouse, or just in general poor people, but specifically those three during the time right before Pesach, because Pesach has an extraordinary amount of expenses, and it's very, very important to give them tzedakah. Now,

3:00What kind of tzedakah? How much tzedakah? To give you an understanding of how significant this is, there's an amazing story by Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, where he recounts an event. There was a time when a wealthy Orthodox Jewish man was approached. Sins are not exclusively committed by secular individuals; unfortunately, they can also occur among religious people who perform religious actions but may lack in areas such as emunah (faith) and yirat shamayim (fear of Heaven). So Rabbi Ovadia goes to his home and asks him to fulfill this mitzvah of Kimcha DePischa. We tell him, listen, we need money to give to the gerim, yetomim, and almanot. And the guy says, no, listen, I worked really hard for my money; let them go work. Yeah, but you have to understand that Hashem mentions these gerim, these yetomim, these almanot, many times in the Torah. I believe in regards to the gerim, it's 48 times in the Torah it's mentioned about the special protection that they have from Hashem, where Hashem says, I am both their father and their mother. And as a matter of fact, each time it's usually mentioned with the one that's yetomim ve-almanah, the one that lost their parents, or the one that is a widow.

4:21stuck to his decision. A day after Pesach, he comes to the Rabbi's office crying hysterically. He said, Kvod HaRav, you're never going to believe it. Kvod HaRav, you're never going to believe it. Kvod HaRav, you're never going to believe it. And eventually, when he got his sense back to himself, the Rabbi says, what? What happened? He says, that I said there was... A day after Pesach, he comes to the Rabbi's office crying hysterically. He said, "Kvod HaRav, you're never going to believe it. Kvod HaRav, you're never going to believe it. Kvod HaRav, you're never going to believe it." And eventually, when he got his senses back to himself, the Rabbi says, "What? What happened?" He says, "That I said there was..." amazingly prepared. We bought fish, we bought meat, we bought wine, we bought all types of wine, we bought everything. Best Seder ever. We didn't spare a penny to make sure the Seder is ready. Before the Seder, my two sons, who weren't exactly as strong in their commitment as they should be, were playing cards with each other. I came to them and said, "Okay, it's time for the Seder." They replied, "Abba, wait."

5:41Okay, a little while passed and, you know, I didn't want to get into an argument at the beginning of a holiday. I said, okay, you know what? They're just playing, let them play. A little while later, I said, how about we wait? The third time, I was already waiting here for over an hour. I got so upset, I just went there and took the cards from them. Unfortunately, to my surprise, my two sons took me physically and... threw me out of the house and locked me out. I spent the rest of the night outside, crying my eyes out, begging to be let inside to do the seder. But I did not do the seder, and all I did was just cry. You were right; for the love, when you don't watch Hashem's children, Hashem punishes you, and the love tells them. Actually, what you're saying is... is exactly one of the 98 curses in Parashat Ki Tavo, which is in the Torah section that discusses the curses for those who do not follow Hashem's will, Hashem's commandments. Parashat Ki Tavo in Deuteronomy 28:31 describes a situation where everything is prepared for someone, but they will never enjoy even a second of it; they will only look from afar.

7:05Being cheap is a disease. My father always says that sometimes if someone has such a bad disease of cheapness, of stinginess, that they're scared to go to the bathroom so they don't have to buy food again. It's mamash a disease, and you have to feel bad for people like this. If we are one of those people, then obviously, we have to work on ourselves because Hashem hates it. There's another amazing story from the Maggid of Dubna. The Maggid of Dubna also came to give a derasha, a lecture about Kimcha dePischa, explaining how it's time for people to start donating specifically for this cause. It's not your ma'aser, it's not your traditional tzedakah, it's outside of it. And he gave a serious derasha, telling people what needs to happen. After he finished, he came home and his wife asked him, "Oh, so how did it go? How did it go?" He replied, "Huh? I succeeded 50%." She said, "Succeeded 50%? What kind of success is 50%? You got 50% of the money you were looking for?" He said, "No, no, not exactly." She asked, "So what's 50%?" He answered, "Well, 50% of the people were poor, and I convinced all of them to commit and donate. The other 50% were rich, and none of them committed. It's only 50% of the people."

8:16And this is actually one of the things that we see, unfortunately, many times. It's not all the time, but many times we see people that are, the better off they are financially, the less likely they are to donate. Whereas the people that are less fortunate, have less, are giving charity. Sometimes they take food out of their own mouth just to give it to somebody else. This is mamash a disease. And the reason why this comes, there's a reason why someone has this disease of being cheap and being stingy. is not because they have less; it's not even necessarily because they have more. It's because of a defective level of connection between them and Hashem, first and foremost. They have such a high desire for money that, just like the Gemara says, you give him a hundred, he wants two hundred; you give him two hundred, he wants four hundred. Meaning, the more somebody has, the more they desire. This is already present in all people who do not have Torah, and sometimes even in those who do have Torah. However, the bigger disaster is not that. This is almost, in essence, an instinct in everyone. The bigger disaster is a lack of emunah (faith). When someone...

9:26believe in a God, but not the same God of Israel. Not the God of the Torah. They might claim it's the same God as in the Torah; they might even call Him by the same name, but it is not the same God. Why isn't it the same God? Because they believe that Hashem created the heavens and the earth and everything else except parnasah, except for financial sustenance. When it comes to money, their mindset is to say, no, I have to help Hashem. This is complete nonsense. So what happens to those people? They... Restrict Hashem. They say that Hashem can't give them enough, so they have to help Hashem, almost to the point where they're scared to spend their money because they don't think that Hashem will give them again. They don't think that Hashem has enough to give them even more, and this is mamash a very, very big problem. Not only is it a lack of emunah, where they obviously don't have faith in Hashem, but it's mamash not believing in the same Hashem, because as we talked about in the previous chiddushim... God of Israel is unlimited. The God of Israel actually already wrote and told us at Mount Sinai that the money that He gives you as far as parnassah is a hundred percent from Him. And the money that you're going to spend on tzedakah and mitzvot is not part of the parnassah He is going to give you. Meaning that if Hashem is saying that you're going to get, let's say, $50,000 for the year...

10:44$50,000 is just for your regular maaser. If you end up giving more than maaser, and you end up giving charity beyond that, whatever your expenses are, they are not included as part of that $50,000. Meaning that if you give five or ten thousand dollars in tzedakah, Hashem is going to give you that on top of the $50,000 that He gave you. So obviously anyone that has yiras shamayim and emunah is going to give as much as they can. Obviously, you're not allowed to give more than a certain amount, because there's a maximum. of what you're allowed to give. But Judaism is the only religion that has such a thing. You know, other religions may tell you to go homeless and just give everything you have. Judaism, however, has a maximum... For standard people, you have to give the regular traditional tzedakah, and then you have a ma'aser, which is 10%. But for someone that's rich, someone that's, let's say, a multi-millionaire, there's no limit to how much they give. As a matter of fact, they're obligated to give much more. Meaning that if someone has $100 million, they made $100 million in a year, if they give $10 million ma'aser, they have not fulfilled the mitzvah.

11:51Why have they not fulfilled the mitzvah? It says ma'aser, it says 10%, give a tithe. Why is someone that made a hundred million dollars did not fulfill the mitzvah? because he still has $90 million. No one needs $90 million to live, especially while you have homeless people and people that are poor, and yeshivot that are barely surviving. There are all of these major organizations that are trying to publicize Torah, and they're barely surviving on a non-existent budget, while you have $90 million. What do you need your $90 million for? To buy more shares of Apple? The source for that is the story of Nakdimon Ben-Gurion. Nakadimon Ben-Gurion in Masechet Ta'anit: The Gemara in Masechet Ta'anit mentions Nakadimon Ben-Gurion as one of three people who fulfilled the mitzvah of tzedakah on such a significant level that he was one of three individuals who financed the entire nation. He literally financed the entire nation when they were in need. So much so that when the... There was a pilgrimage every year, during which time the king and many others would come to us. In one year, he had to make sure that there was enough water, so he went to a goy and told him, "Listen, I need to make sure there's enough water. You have 12 wells of water. Give me the 12 wells of water, and I'll make sure to give them back to you full after this event is done." If the wells were not full of water by the agreed time...

13:16a time we're finished. By the time this specific day came, I'll fill the entire wells with gold, so instead of water, you'll have gold. So the guy said, "Okay, sure, no problem." So the time came—it was time to come back—and the guy sees his wells, and they're pretty much empty. He sees this is the morning already of the day they're supposed to give the money back. He comes to Nicodemus ben Gurion. ...says, "Okay, you owe me, uh, it's 12 wells full of gold." He says, "No, no, no, I have until the end of the day. I have until sundown." Just see the level of emuna he had. He says, "Okay, you have until sundown." He's laughing, and you know, the guy is laughing at him, but he's okay with it. Later on in the afternoon, as he is praying to Hashem, he gets another message. The guy says, "Okay, it's already the afternoon..." Don't worry, I still have until sundown. He goes back into praying to Hashem, beseeching Hashem. He’s saying to Hashem, “Hashem, You said no one in history ever loses from doing a mitzvah. Look at the mitzvah that I did; I made sure that all of Your talmidim, all of Your tzaddikim, have the water they need. Why do I have to pay for it? You have to pay for it, Your children. I was just a vessel." Hashem made such a rain at that very second to the point where all 12 wells were full.

14:41Something that was unbelievable, a true miracle. So then he comes to the guy and says, "I'll see, they're all full." But the guy says to him, "Yes, but they were full because the sun had already set. You were about 10 minutes late, and honestly, I have a complaint against your God because yes, He made a miracle, but it was not a perfect miracle." Then, Nakdimon ben Gurion went back and said, "Hold on a second..." He went back and prayed to Hashem. He said, "Hashem, this could be a Chilul Hashem, a desecration of Your name." Hashem actually turned back the sun and put it back in the sky. This is the level of how much of a tzaddik Nagdimon ben Gurion was. Why do I tell you this story? Because later on in the Gemara, we see a story about Nagdimon ben Gurion's daughter, and she... was one day seen by one of the tzaddikim looking through the waste, the dung of the horses, looking for grain. He asked him, What are you doing? He said, I'm looking for grain, I'm looking for food. Aren't you Nakdimon ben Gurion's daughter? He's so rich. He goes, No, not anymore. He lost everything. How is this possible? He gave so much tzedakah, so much good. How could it be?

16:03And the Gemara says it's because he didn't give enough. Based on his level, he did not give enough. So this is something we need to understand. There's tzedakah, and there's what we are obligated to do. We have to make sure that we fulfill our obligation. In the Torah, the word for stingy or cheap is "kamtsan." "Kamtsan" has a numerical value of 280. Also, there's a... a place where the place of judgment for Hashem in Torah is called "par dinim," which is essentially the head or the source of all judgment. "Par dinim," the word "par," also has a numerical value of 280. "Kamtsan" has 280, and "par" has 280. What does this mean? Chazal teaches us from here that when Hashem is stingy in judgment, When a person is cheap and is a kamtsan, Hashem responds by being restrictive with him in essence. Instead of judging him favorably and with mercy, Hashem judges him with strict judgment.

17:15With the parnasah, so when a person is a kamtzan, he's mamash bringing judgment on himself. Not only is he not fulfilling a mitzvah of giving tzedakah, but on top of that, he's bringing judgment to himself. So, be'ezrat Hashem, these chiddushim will get us closer and closer to Hashem by realizing that all of parnasah, all of money, all of everything that we have, is from Hashem. And the more confidence and emunah that we have in Hashem, the easier it is to fulfill what He says. Shabbat Shalom Tzaddikim. Be'ezrat Hashem. We'll talk after Shabbat. the easier it is to fulfill what he says. Shabbat Shalom, Tzaddikim. B'ezrat Hashem, we'll talk after Shabbat.