The Torah says “You shall not have in your house a measure and a measure – a large one and a small one. A perfect and honest weight shall you have...” (Devorim 25:14-15). It is prohibited to possess dishonest weights and measures. A person must have the same set of measuring utensils for himself and for his customers; the same set for his “good customers” and for his “bad customers”. No cheating is permitted!
Rabbi Dr. Abraham Twerski, quotes a very meaningful insight from Rav Menachem Mendel of Kotzk. The Kotzker says that when the Torah insists that a person may only possess one set of measures, the Torah is not only talking about commercial scales and tape measures. A person needs to have one set of standards. It is forbidden to have one set of standards for yourself and another set of standards for someone else.
Rabbi Twerski writes: Take the very common statement: I am a very strong person when it comes to my convictions. A person is proud of that when he says it about himself. However, the same convictions, when found in someone else, may elicit the evaluation, “This person is obstinate and obstructive.” When I am doing it, it is because I am a person of principle. When the other person does it, he is stubborn!
Similarly, when someone says about himself, “I can be flexible and tolerant”, he thinks that this is an admirable character trait. And yet when he sees the same behavior in someone else, he comments: This person is spineless and drifts with the wind. So too: “I am frugal” but “He is a miser.”
This is what it means to have two sets of standards. What I do is always right, and I admire that in myself. Yet the very same type of practice in a different person elicits the harshest of evaluations: Despicable!
It is very easy to fall into this trap. I can look at someone and instantly react, “That is not the proper way to behave”. But then I catch myself and ask, “But how do I act?” This is what the pasuk is saying: You should not have in your house two sets of measures – one for yourself and one for somebody else. A person needs to be consistent – one set of measures for both yourself and for everyone else.
