Maghen Abraham - Thoughts From Mayer Sasson

How should we act towards the wicked?

"Then they shall eat the meat in that night… with unleavened bread and bitter herbs are they to eat it." (12, 8)

It happened once that a Jew came to the Grand Rabbi, the Sar Shalom of Belz zy'o with a complaint: "For many years I leased a tavern from the poritz and recently another Jew came and convinced the landowner to lease the tavern to him, and now I am left without a livelihood!" The Grand Rabbi immediately called the man and asked him, "Why did you do that? You know, that is? The Jew answered, "I did a big mitzvah thereby because the previous tenant was wicked and used to open the tavern on Shabbat!"

"Is it a mitzvah to cause bad to the wicked?" Maran asked him – "Look and see that the Torah teaches us the opposite: In the Parsha of Bo when our forefathers in Egypt were in the 49^th level of impurity and the time came for them to be redeemed, G-d did not let them fall down to the 50^th level and when He saw that the Children of Israel did not have mitzvahs in whose merits they could be redeemed – He gave them two mitzvahs – the mitzvah of Pesach and the mitzvah of circumcision."

"Seemingly they previously already had one mitzvah – the mitzvah of buried the dead- for evil Jews had died during the three days of Darkness and the Children of Israel buried them so that the Egyptians would not see and be pleased with their sorrow. This is a great, important mitzvah in the Eyes of G-d for this is a true kindness where one does not receive a favor in return. If so, why wasn't this mitzvah sufficient? Because the Children of Israel should have spoken to the wicked Jews that they leave their bad ways and repent – and then G-d would not have had to kill them."

"The same applies to you," the Grand Rabbi continued, "you did not have to take your friend's livelihood; you should have spoken to him that he repents and return to his Father in Heaven and not open the tavern on Shabbat."

SHABBAT SHALOM!!

Mayer Sasson