Where Should A Jew Invest His Tzedaka & MaAser Money?

0:49that will give them the idea that they have to evaluate things and not just do things randomly. They don't just take all of their money and put it on black; they think about things. A person needs to treat his master as an investment, to think about it: where is my investment going to do the best? Now, if he gives it to, let's say, for example, to a Talmid Chacham... If he gives it to a Talmid Chacham who learns, then he becomes a partner with that Talmid Chacham based on how much he gave. If he covers all of the Talmid Chacham's expenses, then he's an equal partner in all of the Torah that the person learns. Some say he has to give them half of his money, meaning even if he's a multimillionaire, he gives them half of his money, but that's the real way. However, others say that it's sufficient if he just pays all of his expenses.

2:12If he pays part of his expenses, then he gets part of his Torah. A Talmid Chacham learns Torah. He's making no less than 60,000 mitzvot per hour. Every word of the Torah that he reads is a mitzvah, every letter. Enormous and enormous. So already you see that a Talmid Chacham is a much better investment than the Chanukah party and the shul light fixture and so on. But then you see someone that invests in Kiruv, but not just any Kiruv, but Kiruv that actually works, Kiruv that actually makes people do teshuva. Now, HaKadosh Baruch Hu tells the prophet Jeremiah, if you bring someone that used to be a sinner and make him into a precious person, into a ba'al teshuva, you'll be like My mouth. So, that means that a person that helps another person do teshuva, either by giving money to a kiruv organization that actually gets people to do teshuva, or sponsoring CDs that help people do teshuva, or publicizing a video, and so on. And he helps even one person do teshuva. Let's say for every thousand CDs, only one person does teshuva. That means that every single mitzvah that the person who did teshuva will do also goes to the account of the person who donated that money.

3:36Not every letter in the Torah that he learns, if he becomes a mitzvah chacham, is even more so. But the point is that every mitzvah he does, and every mitzvah his kids are going to do, and his grandkids are going to do, continues forever. This not only shows that the investment is much greater, but there's an added benefit to it. The prophet Yechezkel tells us, don't let the sins of your past be the stumbling block of your future. The problem is that all of us have sins, especially before we did teshuva. When a person does teshuva, let's say he starts keeping Shabbat at the age of 30, it means that he violated Shabbat for 17 years when he was obligated to keep it. So, although he's going to keep Shabbat for the next 70 years, which is fantastic and great, when he goes to Shamayim, he will still be missing those 17 years of Shabbat. There's a deficit, and there's a count. You know, what are you going to do with that deficit? It doesn't disappear. So, the Prophet Yechezkel says, don't let the sins of your past be the stumbling block of your future. Don't let those 17 years ruin what the future could be. Because, yes, you'll have good olam haba, but you still have a deficit. Don't let that happen; don't show up to Shamayim with a deficit. When you invest into kiruv, that means that his mitzvah of Shabbat, the person that does teshuva and keeps Shabbat from now on...

5:02Every time he keeps Shabbat, that Shabbat goes to your account. So that means that you keep Shabbat, he keeps Shabbat. Every Shabbat, you get two Shabbatot. He's got three, four, five kids. Every one of your Shabbatot now is seven Shabbatot. You made a few people do Teshuva. You've got yourself hundreds of Shabbatot every week that you're keeping. And before you know it, you've not only made up for 17 years worth of Chilul Shabbat, Or many, many other sins that a person can do. Gemara berit, Hashem yishmor ve'yatzil, an average teenager can do it once or twice a day. By the time he realizes that he has to watch our shiurim and do teshuva, he's already in his 20s, and he has blemished the brit countless times. How is he going to fix all of this? Okay, he stopped now, but what about the future? when he gives people the CDs to stop wasting seed, it means that every time they would have otherwise wasted seed, the merit goes to his account. He's repairing the spiritual damage. Every single day, he's accumulating another 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 100, a thousand instances that are rectifying the times he actually committed the transgression. And he not only shows up to Shamayim without a deficit, but he now arrives with a surplus of merits. This is why many people who engage in such endeavors of helping others rectify their deeds are held in high esteem.

6:15that are great in Torah tell people to, you know, when you pray and you, you know, you want to mention a tzaddik, pray in the merit of the tzaddik, not to the tzaddik. What do you mean by the merit of the tzaddik? Convince the tzaddik to share some of his merits with you. Why share his merits with you? Because he has shown up to Shamayim with so much surplus so much extra mitzvot, so much extra stuff, that he has enough to go around to help you out and get out of your situation. You can show up to Shamaim with the surplus. Imagine showing up to Shamaim with a surplus of gemilut chasadim, a surplus of limud Torah, and so on. You have a surplus; you have a surplus of good. You, you stop people from violating Shabbat; you stop people from being... There is no one in the world richer than you. And what's the proof? HaKadosh Baruch Hu says, you make people do teshuvah ke pita-yeh. Your mouth will be like My mouth. Meaning, just as I created the world with a word, because I said it, when you say something, I fulfill it. That's what HaKadosh Baruch Hu says. And even more so, when a person truly understands what it means to show up to Shamayim,

7:36with a surplus who understand why Rabbi HaKadosh was jealous of his Talmid, Rabbi Chiya, when he found out what's going on with Rabbi Chiya in Shamayim. While all the tzaddikim are able to visit each other in Shamayim, only Rabbi Chiya is allowed to go wherever he wants without anyone taking him there. All the tzaddikim need angels to take them to different places, but Rabbi Chiya is able to go anywhere he wants. as if he owns the place. What's the difference between Rabbi Chiya, the Talmid of Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi, and everyone else? Rabbi Chiya did kiruv. Rabbi Chiya helped people do teshuva. And Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi was so impressed by his Talmid that he was motivated to go into the streets, running into the streets, looking for people to help them do teshuva. That's the significance of somebody that understands that when he's investing his tzedakah, when he's investing his ma'aser, he has to invest in the place that's going to get him the most amount of reward, the most amount of schar, but even more so, the most amount of protection for the mistakes that he made. Most amount of protection from the mistakes that he made, whether he knew it or he didn't know it, the bottom line is he made them. How are you going to fix it any other way? The reality is,

8:57This is the way. It's the easiest way. It's the cheapest way. Most importantly, it's the most profitable way. B'ezrat Hashem, this influences people to understand the significance of helping Am Yisrael do teshuva, assisting the rabbis who actually succeed in helping people return to their roots. Supporting them aids Am Yisrael and, by extension, ourselves. Baruch Adonai l'olam. Amen. mirvis

10:10In Rabbi Moshe Feinstein's teshuvot, the Igrot Moshe, he addresses various halachic questions. For example, he discusses the permissibility of using an electric shaver and the intricacies of observing halachot for modern dilemmas. Remember the rulings of the Chofetz Chaim on matters of lashon hara and in Hilchot Lashon Hara, where he provides guidance on speech and communal relationships.