Translated from Hebrew by S. NAthan

l'ilui nishmat Esther bat mordechai

      The Test of Wealth and the Test of Poverty: Free Choice in the Subjective Human Being

      See the Gemara in Yuma (35b): “Our Sages taught: A poor person, a rich person, and a wicked person come to [the heavenly] trial. To the poor person, they say: ‘You certainly could not have been poorer than Hillel.’ To the rich person they say: ‘Why did you not occupy yourself with Torah study?’ If he says, I was rich, and preoccupied with my properties, they say to him: ‘You certainly could not have been richer than Rabi Elazar.’ They said of Rabi Elazar son of Charsom, that his father left him one thousand villages on land, and corresponding to them, one thousand ships in the sea. Yet every day, he would take a measure of flower upon his shoulder, and walk from city to city, and from state to state to learn Torah, etc. We find that Hillel causes the poor to be found guilty, while Rabi Elazar, son of Charson, causes the wealthy to be found guilty. Yosef causes the wicked to be found guilty [because the wife of Potiphar attempted to seduce him and he withstood her blandishments].”

      “If you will walk in My statues…” “If” – a conditional… It is not a command. Chazal say in Avodah Zara (5b): “Rather, it is a request.” Indeed? Are not the blessings and the curses positive and negative forms of pressure that cancel out any free choice? When the blessings and curses are breathing down your neck, are you capable of deciding out of your own free will?

      Here is the place to distinguish between inner pressure that flows from the source of the self, and outer pressure, caused by the conditions of the environment. Some attempt to view the study and labor of Torah as a pressure that is initiated from the source of the self, as it activates its own will. Will is a Godly power that man possesses, and it has the power to control and to dominate the conditions of the environment, and even to bring about new conditions that yield to the human will, and that serve it for a Godly purpose, as was the case with Rabi Chanina ben Dosa. However, from the phrasing of the scripture, it does not appear that man determines things, but rather that it is Divine providence that activates blessings and curses in accordance with the worship of God, or, God forbid, the worship of idols. If so, then whither has free choice disappeared? There are those who view our parasha as the source for the discussion in the Gemara (quoted above) regarding the differences, as it were, between the trial of poverty and the trial of wealth, with Hillel as poverty, and Rabi Elazar ben Charsom as wealth. Yosef the righteous represents the trial that flows from temptation (external temptation, according to the to have narrative of events.) Yet according to this view, the environment seems produced the trials rather than their being the result of human behavior. A deeper examination proves that the matter is not so simple.

      From the very fact that the Gemara attaches different trials to different tsadikim, we can see that every man has his own trial. Thus one might be compatible with the trial of poverty, as he strengthens himself like a lion to overcome temptation and to overpower circumstances by his own righteousness. (Russian Jewry preserved its quality specifically thanks to persecution and distress, whereas the forefathers of those Jews who immigrated to the United States, though they were highly qualitative individuals, yet their descendants lost their quality and their excellence due to overindulgence under living conditions that were characterized by wealth and abundance.) Others might not be able to withstand the temptations of poverty, and would reject everything out of the bitterness of distress, whereas when abundance would enable them, they would excel in generosity. All things go according to how one is as a human being.

      Certain moralists decree that the trial of wealth is the most difficult one, yet this is not necessarily and obviously true, despite the fact that the statistics are in their favor. Everything in this Gemara intends to describe the fact of the spiritual quality of the self as being what truly determines matters, as being what really holds the key to free choice, and as being in no danger of being influenced by external factors.

      From here we may understand the individual differences that separate the trial of wealth and the trial of poverty. Inner quality, which is the root of every individual’s uniquely original being, is what enables free choice. According to this perception, choice does not have an objective weight, but only a relative weight. Choice thus does not exist as an independent power, separate from the individual himself. It does not stand alone, and whomever wishes may come and take a pinch of it, or partake of it as much as his heart desires. Rather, according to our perception, the world of free choice is understood as the measure by which one relates personally to the conditions of one’s environment, and this is an entirely relative affair. It is the individual human being who activates and creates a personal relationship to his environment, within his innermost self, whenever he finds himself in any sort of environmental situation, which to one person might constitute a temptation from the halls of the trial of wealth, while to another, that same situation might constitute a trial of poverty, though both are relating to exactly the same conditions of the environment.

      Now we may understand the emphasis on the “if,” meaning that the blessings are contingent on “that you shall be toiling in Torah,” for the toil of Torah is the prime expression of free will, which as we have said is the power that expresses the quality of the self.

      If we further examine wealth and poverty, we find that their influence is not necessarily felt upon one’s individual freedom; it can be rather on one’s tendency toward belonging and attachment. The one who is sensitive to the trial of poverty is the one in need of a sheltering framework to which he can attach and belong, such as the framework of a community of God-fearing Jews, which is steeped in Torah and mitzvahs – and poverty distances people from this, and therefore makes it difficult to create the attachments that they require. Whereas wealth makes it easy to create attachments and to belong to frameworks. Those who are sensitive to the trial of wealth might be people whose dominant need is the elemental need for freedom. Environmental wealth is an irritant to them because it compels them to belong to it (to property: “Whoever increases property, increases anxiety.”) while it is precisely poverty that liberates them from the compulsions of belonging. Such people can withstand the trial of poverty, as Hillel did.

      This approach is the polar opposite of the perception that views wealth as a tool that leads to independence, in that the wealthy man does not need to depend on others when formulating an opinion or a personal approach to things. As far as we are concerned, the opposite is the case, because poverty liberates from the enslavement to possessions.

      However, the truth of the matter is that all of this is relative, according to how one is as a human being. Each person has his own needs, which he requires of the environment, in order to express his quality, whether abundantly or minimally. Poverty would be a lack of the conditions that one personally requires, while wealth would be excess, a superfluity of environmental conditions. To one person, something is superfluous, while to another person, it is sorely lacking. This parallels the idea of different learning styles. Just as an individualist does not require a study partner, but only a paper and pen, a social extrovert cannot concentrate on his study if he cannot express his thought process directly to his friend.