Parshas Behar contains the Torah’s prohibition against cheating: “When you make a sale to your fellow or when you buy from the hand of your fellow, do not victimize one another (Al tonu ish es achiv).” [Vayikra 25:14] Rashi explains that “Al To’nu” refers to deception regarding monetary matters.
It is not a coincidence that this prohibition against cheating immediately follows the section of the Sabbatical year requirements. If there is one lesson that emerges from the parsha of Shemitah, it is that the Ribono shel Olam provides man with his livelihood needs. In the seventh year, farmers (and in Biblical times the economy was almost totally agrarian) were asked to stop working for an entire year, and they were somehow supposed to survive. How can they do that?
The answer is that the Ribono shel Olam promises that He will take care of them. The takeaway lesson of the parsha of Shmittah is that the Almighty provides our parnassa, and in the seventh year a person can in fact not work, not plant, not harvest, and yet survive – and according to the Torah he will do even more than survive!
If we believed that with all our hearts and souls, we would never be tempted to cheat. Why do we cheat? We cheat so that we can make a couple of extra dollars. However, if we fully internalized the idea that a person’s income is determined by the Almighty each Rosh HaShannah, and whatever we are destined to get will come our way and not a penny more, we would have no reason to cheat and try to deceitfully make those couple of extra dollars! This idea is sometimes very hard for people to accept in practice.
I read a very interesting story about Rav Yaakov Kamenetsky, zt”l. As we have mentioned countless times, Rav Yaakov Kamenetsky exemplified and personified what it means to be an honest person. It is no coincidence that he named his seferon Chumash Emes L’Yaakov. This is what he preached, and this is what he practiced.
One of Rav Yaakov’s sons was Rav Noson Kamenetsky. Rav Noson wanted to trace his family’s roots and went to visit the little Litvishe European town in which Rav Yaakov Kamenetsky had been the Rav. While he was there, he discovered a very interesting historical fact: Even though much of Lithuanian Jewry was wiped out during the Shoah, to a large extent, the Jews of that particular city survived the war and escaped the Nazi Holocaust.
Rav Noson Kamenetsky went to the mayor of the town and asked him if he could explain how the Jews of this town were successful in saving their lives. The mayor said, “I can tell you exactly why the Jews escaped.” He said that before the war, the fellow who eventually became the mayor was the postmaster of the town. He would have a test for the clergy members of that town – both Jews and non-Jews. The test was that when they would come in to buy postage, he would purposely give them more change than they deserved, and he would see whether they would return the money or not. That was his acid test of what type of people he was dealing with.
He did this three times with Rav Yaakov Kamenetsky. Each time he gave Rav Yaakov more money than he was entitled to in change, Rav Yaakov would always return the money. This postmaster was so impressed with Rav Yaakov, who was the head of the Jewish community, that when years later he was mayor of the town – any time he became aware of a German action which would have wiped out the Jews, he would notify the Jews and they would go hide in the forest or wherever, and that is how the Jews of the city were saved.
When Rav Noson Kamenetsky returned to America from his trip to Europe, he asked his father if he had any recollection of the post office, if he remembered the postmaster, and if he recalled these incidents. Rav Yaakov said that he did not remember the particular story about being tested, but all he remembered was that the postmaster in town did not know how to count.
