Stingy on the Matzos
Now, with that introduction we can begin to understand what the Gemara in Nedarim is saying, that these four individuals are chashuvim k’meis, considered dead. It means that these four people have lost some of their bechirah, some of their free will to accomplish in their lives.
Number one, the poor man. The poor man is, of course, not actually dead. But because of his poverty he’s not able to utilize his free will in ways that he could if he was wealthy, and that, to a certain extent, is a loss of life.
Here’s a man; it’s almost Pesach and he’s thinking that he wants to serve Hashem by buying matzah with all the hiddurim, all the chumros. Very good! He wants kosher matzah. Excellent idea! But he can’t; he doesn’t have enough money and so he can’t activate his free will. He’s in shackles. It means he wants to choose righteousness but he can’t. As far as matzah is concerned he’s a meis.
Or maybe he would like to sit and learn Torah on Sundays. That’s a choice that he’ll never regret. But he can’t; he has to take an extra job to pay the rent. Sometimes he has to work overtime and he has no spare time for himself to learn Torah at night. He can’t say no to his boss and so his bechirah is limited because of his poverty.
A Wealth of Possibilities
A rich man however is alive! He can do a great many things if he is interested in doing them. He can retire and sit in the kollel all day long. And then he can take off lunch hour to write checks for good causes. He can build a world of Torah! He can spread the knowledge of Hakadosh Baruch Hu!
With money you can buy better matzah. With money you can buy seforim. With money you can get good sons-in-law for your daughters. With money you can even bribe goyim that they should do favors for Jews. The wealthy man is absolutely a bigger baal bechirah than the one shackled in poverty, and that means he’s more alive than the poor man.
Great Paupers
Of course the poor man is not actually dead because there are a lot of things he can do. He can still daven a good minchah and maariv. He can still learn on Shabbos and do many many mitzvos. Absolutely the poor man can make choices.
And he can choose greatness too. We have great men who succeeded in becoming great ovdei Hashem in the midst of poverty. Do we need a better illustration than Rabbi Yehoshua ben Chananya? Rabbi Yehoshua ben Chananya was poor all his life. He toiled in his little hut – probably it was one little room where he worked by day and slept at night and he toiled there over a charcoal fire making needles (Yerushalmi Berachos 4:1). That was his parnassah.
And yet this man who all his life endured poverty became a very great Sage and the Av Beis Din. To this day he shines from the pages of the Talmud; he’s everywhere in the Mishnah and in the Gemara and we live by many of his statements. He is but one example of an untold number of people who were poor and yet achieved greatness beyond measure.
Pray for Wealth
And so poverty is never an excuse because whatever life you’re given, that’s your test. You’ll be rewarded for achieving whatever you can with the lot that you were given. The Jewish nation has hundreds of thousands of examples, millions, of poor people who became great in the eyes of Hashem. And yet there’s no question that in this one area of ‘life’ – the bechirah you can accomplish with money – the poor man is not able to activate his free will as much as he would like and so he’s chashuv k’meis.
That, by the way, is why you have to pray always to Hashem not to be poor (Shabbos 151b): “Please Hashem, I should never sink into the abyss of poverty.” Not because of the affliction of poverty; not because you’ll be lacking the ability to enjoy life more, to buy a nicer car or more expensive drapes. It’s because the poor person lacks the ability to utilize life to its fullest. He’s frozen into inactivity.
The Blind
Now, number two in the braisa’s list is the metzora but we’ll come back to him soon; we’ll talk first about the blind man: A person who can’t see is considered dead.
Now, that sounds insensitive at first. It’s a tragedy, a rachmanus, no question about it; but he’s considered dead? He’s alive as anyone else. The answer is the same thing that we’re talking about: he’s alive, absolutely. But life is for choosing, for choosing to make something of ourselves while we’re still in this world; and the blind man is lacking one of the most important implements that we use for choosing.
Because ‘seeing is believing’, after all. Seeing is for emunah! The purpose of creation is so that you should see Hakadosh Baruch Hu; you should see the wonders of nature and become aware of the Creator.
Of course, if people don’t want to see, they want to be blind all their lives, that’s their loss; but anybody who wishes to see can believe in Hashem. And it’s sight that makes that possible. That’s the primary purpose of your eyes – for acquiring daas Hashem, awareness of Hashem. Everything else you do with your eyes is secondary to that.
Sight is Life
And therefore if a person has two functioning eyes he can live life to its fullest because he can choose to see the maasei yedei Hashem. The natural objects in the world that make us aware of Hakadosh Baruch Hu make life worth living.
And because a suma has lost that opportunity therefore he’s choshuv k’meis. Of course, he has compensation. He can listen to what others tell him. He learns from those who are sighted, but listening is no comparison to seeing. It’s not his fault of course; he didn’t ask for such a disability. But in that one area – a very important area – he’s choshuv k’meis.
Now, there’s still plenty of room for achievement. Some of our greatest men were blind. Rav Sheishes was blind. Rav Yosef was blind. The truth is that many people who can’t see have become much greater than others who can. Only that in order to emphasize to us that life is for choosing achievement and what it means to lose out on any detail of life, our Sages told us this axiom; that the blind person, to some extent, has lost part of his life.
Children Destroy Enemies
The next one is one who doesn’t have any children. He’s also, in one way, not living. In Tehillim (127:5) it says, like arrows in the hand of a warrior, so are the youth. If you have children, it’s like being well-armed; you have lots of arrows to shoot. Happy is the man who filled his quiver with arrows; it means he has a lot of children. Such a man will never be put to shame; he will trample the enemies at the gate.
Imagine now the picture. It’s the olden days, and outside of a small Jewish village in Eretz Yisroel the Arabs are working in fields. They see an old man walking around and they think, ‘An old man, all by himself. We can attack him.’
And so the Arabs start running towards the town. The old man though, he has a shofar – that was the ancient siren-call for help – and he gives a blast on the shofar and his family starts running out of the houses; sons and grandsons. Not a few sons; a lot of sons! And each son has an army of his own sons at his heels. The Arabs didn’t expect that! The family pours out and they trample on the Arabs at the gate; they make short shrift of them. Ahh, that’s a good ending to the story. Absolutely it’s good to have a lot of children.
Children Destroy the Yetzer Hara
But children are more important than even that – killing marauders is the smallest of accomplishments; with children you kill the yetzer hara. From the mouth of little children you establish the strength of the Jewish people, to destroy the enemy and the one who wants to take revenge upon us (Tehillim 8:3). Who is that? The seforim say it’s talking about the yetzer hara! (Ramchal, Derech Eitz Chaim, 23). With a lot of little children studying Torah, we combat all forces of evil! With yeshivas, with Beis Yaakovs, with frum children growing up all around us, that’s our army! That’s our army against the satan!
And therefore, when a father has many children who are studying Torah, sons and sons-in-law and many grandchildren and they’re all frum, an army of Torah, so how happy is such a man. He and his wife, they’re rich!
The childless person on the other hand, that part of life was taken away from him; the opportunity to raise children as ovdei Hashem. And so in a certain sense, he’s choshuv k’meis.
The Childless Righteous
Of course he’s not a meis; it’s k’meis. He has compensations and he should make use of his time. Instead of spending his time on children now he can spend more time on shleimus. The Chovos Halevovos says that; he says that if you are one of those who have no children, you should be grateful that He absolved you from the obligation of children. Children are a big responsibility too. As the children come, the obligations come raining down upon you. You’re going crazy from them. It’s not easy, that obligation of bechirah.
And so suppose Hakadosh Baruch Hu didn’t give you that opportunity. It’s silly for a person to waste his life in sadness. On the contrary, breathe a sigh of relief, like the Chovos Halevovos says, and be grateful; now you can go ahead and accomplish the other great things in life.
A man can become great. The Chazon Ish, zichrono livrachah, had no children; he was able to learn more and more. Reb Chaim Ozer zichrono livrachah had only one child, a daughter who died young; but he learned more and more. There were a lot of gedolim who had no children and that helped them to become greater. You’ll use your life for other great achievements.
