Hashem Only Ask Us For a Little:
The famed Magid, Rav Yaakov Galinsky zt”l, related that Rav Zalman Sorotzkin zt”l told him that when his father-in-law, Rav Eliezer Gordon zt”l, established the yeshiva in Telshe, he traveled to Kiev, where he met with a very wealthy man. The gevir welcomed Rav Eliezer into his home with much honor and asked why he had come. Rav Eliezer told him, “I would like to ask you to donate 500 rubles to our new yeshiva.”
This was a very large amount of money at the time. Rav Yaakov related that when half of the city of Radin burned down, the Chofetz Chaim organized a campaign to raise funds to rebuild the city. He raised 200 rubles, which was enough to rebuild half the houses of the city. Thus, 500 rubles was truly a fortune of money.
The wealthy man told Rav Eliezer, “Rebbi, you must be exaggerating. Did you really think I would give that much?” Rav Eliezer replied, “I am 100% serious. I am not exaggerating at all.”
The rich man now became angry and said, “They say that you are a ‘gaon’ in Torah. This means that you are able to understand the two sides to every argument. We now have two sides before us. Your side is that you want me to give you a huge amount of money. My side is that you are asking for way too much. Please, explain to me with your ‘gaonus’ why your claim is correct?”
Rav Eliezer answered, “Hashem commanded us to give maaser beheimah. We are told to make a small opening and pass all of our sheep through it. We count: 1, 2, 3...9, and the tenth sheep is struck with a stick that has red dye on it to identify it as maaser.
This leads to a question. Wealthy men have huge flocks of sheep. For example, the Gemara says (Shabbos 54B) that Eliezer ben Azariah gave 12,000 calves for maaser a year! This means that 120,000 sheep had to pass under his stick. It certainly is a huge chore to count so many sheep and that certainly takes a very long time. He knew how many sheep he owned, so why couldn’t he just take out 10% and designate it as maaser? Why can’t every wealthy man do that?
The answer is that if we would just go to a wealthy man and tell him that he must give 12,000 of his sheep to maaser, he would be very upset. He would ask: How can you tell me to give away such a huge amount of sheep? Therefore, the chochomim said that the rich man should bring his entire huge flock to one place and count them all. He should say: This one is for me, this one is also for me...and the tenth is for the kohen...In this way, he will understand that he gets to keep so much of what Hashem gave him, and he only is expected to give a small percentage to the kohen.”
Rav Eliezer concluded, “That is what we are arguing about. I asked you to give me 500 rubles to support Torah, and you said that I was asking for too much. Let’s count all of the money and possessions you own, and see what percentage I am asking for.”
It goes without saying that the wealthy man conceded and gave the 500 rubles.