The Weekly Sedra – Parshas Mishpatim

The Rebbe says:

1. A big part of this week’s Torah portion discusses judgments/laws that Hashem laid down for us. One of the laws is about lending a poor person interest-free money:

The Torah says “Eem Kesef Talveh Es Ami, Es Heh’ani Ee’mach, Lo See’he’yey loy K’no’sheh, Lo S’see’moon Alav Neshech – If you will lend money to My people, to the poor person who is with you, do not act towards him as a creditor, do not place interest upon him” (Chapter 22, Verse 24).

Rashi (an acronym for Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki) tells us right away that even though the word “Eem” usually means “If”, here there is an exception. In our verse the word “Eem” means “When”. So Hashem is not saying that we have permission to lend money to a poor person (“If…”), rather He is telling us that we must lend money to a poor person (“When…”).

2. The Rebbe now explains that Hashem also abides by this law:

It says in Tehillim (Psalms) “He relates His word to Jacob, His statutes and His judgments to Israel” (Psalm 147, Verse 19). The Midrash Rabah (a major collection of homilies and commentaries on the Torah written by Rabbi Oshiah Rabah) explains that whatever Hashem tells us to do- He does Himself. This is why the verse in Psalms says “His statutes and His judgments”, because the statutes and judgments for us are for Him as well.

Therefore when Hashem tells us to lend out interest-free money with all its pertinent laws, He also abides by this law.

3. The Rebbe begins to systematically go through the verse and explain each of the laws and how it translates into Hashem keeping the laws:

“Eem Kesef Talveh – When you will lend money”:

1) The idea of lending money is that you give someone money now and you get paid back later.

This works the same with Hashem and us: He gives us life and everything we need to live and we must pay him back by keeping His commandments and learning His Torah.

2) There are two ways that one can give someone something to get back later; one way is to borrow and one way is to lend. When someone borrows something he must give back to the owner exactly what he borrowed. However when someone lends money out he is lending it to be spent by the other person, therefore the lender does not get back the exact same dollar bills that he lent out.

The same goes for Hashem’s lending to us: He gives us all the tools needed to live and we are able to use them for whatever we want, whenever we want.

Practically this means that whatever level we are at in our observance of Judaism we should know that we are still fit to learn Torah and learn Chassidus in particular. There are those who think to themselves “How can I learn Chassidus if I do not keep all the Commandments of the Torah? Chassidus is very lofty and spiritual and I don’t even keep all the Commandments yet!” But this is wrong because all the tools Hashem gives us are to be used by us no matter what (just like a loan). We should make sure to never miss a day’s learning of Chassidus even if we transgressed on a Torah commandment that very same day!

“Es Ami – to My people”:

The reason why Hashem gives us life and sustenance is because we are His people. Meaning:

Our Sages learn out from the words “Es Ami – to My people” that if there is a Jew and a non-Jew who need to borrow money, you should lend to the Jew (Tractate Bava Metzia, Page 71, Side 1). Now from the fact that our Sages had to tell us that you should lend to the Jew and not to the non-Jew, we see that there was a possibility that you would think to lend to the non-Jew (and therefore the verse tells us that the Jew comes first).

Since all the laws in the Torah must also apply to Hashem (as we said before) we must say that this also applies to Hashem. How?: Hashem did not know if He should give life and sustenance to Jews or non-Jews. Meaning: There is a level in Hashem that the actions of people do not reach or affect and therefore at this level Jews and non-Jews are the same, so Hashem did not know who to give his Blessings to. But Hashem says that he choose the Jews because “they are My people”, for no reason.

This is like it says in the Torah “Was Esau not Jacob’s brother? says Hashem, yet I loved Jacob and I hated Esau” (Malachi, Chapter 1, Verses 2 and 3). We see from this verse that Jacob the righteous one and Esau the wicked one are equal to Hashem at a certain level (“Was Esau not Jacob’s brother?”) but Hashem loved Jacob because He chose to (“yet I loved Jacob and I hated Esau”).

“Es Heh’ani Ee’mach – to the poor person who is with you”:

Since Hashem is giving us life and sustenance from a place where the actions of people do not reach or affect, every single Jew receives Blessings from Hashem. Since Hashem gives us life and sustenance only because He loves us, even a Jew that is “poor” in his observance receives nourishment from Hashem.

“Lo See’he’yey loy K’no’sheh – do not act towards him as a creditor”:

The law is that if the borrower does not have money to pay back the loan you cannot ask him for the money just to upset him. Not only can you not ask him for the money, you cannot even pass by him in the street if it will make him feel embarrassed (Tractate Bava Metzia, Page 75, Side 2).

Since all the laws in the Torah must also apply to Hashem (as we said before) we must say that this also applies to Hashem. How?: When Hashem sees that demanding of us to keep His Commandments through suffering does not help, He acts towards us again with kindness and mercy in a revealed good way.

Translated and adapted by Shalom Goldberg. Taken from Likutei Sichos Chelek Aleph, 2nd Sicha.