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Rabbi Moshe Haber Path of the Just-The Compassionate Giver: Financial Empathy and Support 9.8.25 · Rabbi Moshe Haber - Daily Mussar/Weekly Perasha

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  Being a Hassid, on page 341 we said you think a Hassid is an
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  external appearance to a certain mindset or even extreme service
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  or that that's if he lies extreme and it's full of
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  coaching and energy and spending a lot of time.
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  That's what you think of a Hassid is a Hassid when it comes
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  to 1 friend to another, one Jew to another.
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  So it means basically going over the top and above and beyond,
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  and this example is about to bring is when it comes to
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  financial help being generous. This is a major item and a
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  major, in my opinion, very important indicator of what kind
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  of Jew a person is regarding how generous he is when it comes to
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  specific money. But even other areas as well,
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  there's certain type that's tight, by the way.
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  Obviously we're talking about it.
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  The person has the means. There's a burnt type, it's
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  tight, which means they make calculate everything and
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  sometimes over calculate and they find ways some of the taxes
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  to, you know, OK, according to this angle, according to this
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  calculation, I did my duty, I gave enough.
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  I'm good. I don't know.
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  I, I can't, you know, give to that one and that one, it
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  doesn't fit into my number. I know someone randomly sees me.
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  It wasn't part of my plan. I'm not going to give them
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  another $20. And they're very limited, very
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  exact, reorganized often, but at the same time not so free and
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  loose and generosity. That's the words inside.
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  I'm talking about mamon. The mamon when it comes to being
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  a hassid of money, they say you're cashier bashet.
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  A sigador would be generous and help a person with the means
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  that you have and to financially assisted person and to help him
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  avoid financial damage as well. In other words, you you're with
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  another person worrying about his finances 'cause who call me
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  in azakin. In a similar vein, my concern
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  for other people having money makes me not interested in
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  harming another guy financially. Makes me feel bad if I'm not
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  paying him properly. Makes me, you know, think about
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  does he have enough money to live?
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  It's all part of my concern and my hasidut toward other people
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  financially. Either it means I give or I mean
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  at least I don't take away, at least I'm happy for them to
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  have. It's all part of the same mental
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  approach toward caring about other people and specifically in
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  this area, being a haseeb with someone's finances.
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  I give you an example of a guy is struggling and he comes to
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  talk to you. If you care, and you're sure
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  that you care, that means you have a certain sense of feeling
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  toward other people's financial state.
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  You not only worry about the physical well-being or stuff
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  like that, you worry about the whole picture.
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  And we all know a person's financial well-being is really
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  part of the part of their functionality and it makes a big
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  difference toward how much they can live in this world.
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  And if you care, that means you care about people.
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  And if you don't care, it means you care a drop less about
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  people. So being a CASI toward others
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  also means not only specifically caring about the physical
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  well-being, also being conscious and worrying about the mental.
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  Well, Ben Lee Ahid, Ben Lee Rabin, whether it be for an
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  individual or for the community, you have a guy who's trying to
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  help out the community financially.
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  That guy cares. And the about about now it's
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  eight months ago or so, someone can come approach me and said he
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  had a very tough background going up as a kid.
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  Thank God right now I shall bless them.
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  And he approached me and said, I want to give people food for
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  Shabbat, figure out a way that I can help them to give people
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  food for Shabbat. I said, you know, it's a
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  generous thing. I said, why?
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  He said, because I know how it feels.
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  You know, it feels we will not be able to live, have a normal
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  Shabbat table. And I want to give them, Can you
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  please find people who need food for Shabbat?
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  They gave me a task and a job. Until today.
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  I'm finding people who need food, money for food Shabbat.
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  And it's coming mainly from this guy and his family.
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  And where'd it come from? A person who feels other people
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  is there's no fanfare. No one has a clue who this guy
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  is. No one knows the name of the
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  organization. Even the people who get the
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  money don't know where it's coming from.
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  They don't even know anyone who's related to it.
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  But he, he went through it, correct?
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  He went through it. He said I'm only through it
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  sometimes gives you that, that, that the ability to say I want
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  to help sometimes, most times, most people who are the idea of
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  this concept of being a Hasid told others means you feel that
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  pain. The only way you really can
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  recognize and fully care of other people is you feel that
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  pain. And usually the best way to feel
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  the pain is having felt that pain once before.
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  Either you're just an extremely sensitive person or you're a
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  person who went through. And we know that there's no
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  question about it. When it comes to every area of
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  being involved with people, there's no better education,
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  There's no better sense than experience.
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  Experience can be spending time talking to people, but even
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  better than that is living in one way or another.
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  Experience is the number one educator.
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  When it comes to other people, you are a lot of life
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  experience. There's nothing better.
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  And when it comes to people's financial struggles, you know,
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  it's it's very hard to really appreciate or sense the
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  challenge is to be financially under pressure unless the person
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  dealt with it because it's not something so tangible.
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  OK, he needs money to live. I got it.
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  But he made it along. If he figured it out so far, OK,
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  you know, money is fuel. I understand being financially
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  well off is help, but it's not life itself is what we think.
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  Until you experience it. And then you have a bill you
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  have to pay. And you imagine the minds of
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  having a bill to pay, I'm being unable to pay it.
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  It's the most pressurizing feeling.
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  You can't sleep, you can't sleep, you can't function.
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  I know you and I thank God personally, it's different.
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  But when it came to the shul at a certain point in time when it
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  became my responsibility and I wasn't really used to it at all.
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  And I had the thought, look at the number, there's X amount of
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  the account and there's unbelievable amount of bills
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  coming in and it's the end of the month and I have no plan.
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  It was pressure that I could not even, I couldn't believe.
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  And now people do this. I again, I had a whole newfound
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  appreciation for my father because he never showed this
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  pressure even though he had it. But it's a certain sense that if
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  people have this certain unbelievable, literally lack of
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  living, being able to live like an old person when you have this
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  stress and for another person to know that and to really display
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  the right sensitivity, it requires some degree of
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  experience or a real sense of sensitivity.
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  And that makes you a hussy. When you get that, you know, you
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  look at people who give charity who are loose.
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  There's two types of my opinion. Either they have an unbelievable
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  education from their parents and their parents told them you want
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  to be blessed, give charity and they lose because of that.
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  Or they have a great experience. In other words, a great
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  knowledge of experience in this topic.
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  Either one creates a loose level of a guy, no education or never
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  experienced it. He understands a mitzvah called
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  charity, but suave charity is not going to do for you.
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  It's not going to get you to be generous.
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  You need more than just a mitzvah check in the box.
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  You need the sense of charity. You need the feeling, you need
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  the emotion, you need the reason to give.
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  You need to see the the fruit of giving.
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  You need to have mindset. That mindset.
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  It's a whole different world. It's true when it comes to money
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  and it's also true it comes to other areas, but specifically
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  financially for now. And a guy, let's say he
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  dedicates himself to build a community organization to help
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  people out. What's what's in it for that
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  guy? If people know his name and he
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  has fanfare, I hear, but no one knows his name.
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  No fanfare or the adjective outweighs the fanfare.
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  So what's in it? What's in it is he's a sense of
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  worrying about the community at large as a beautiful person.
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  He's not. He's not doing anything else.
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  He's based on Hassidut, A Fuchata Miyat, and has a kind of
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  Matsuri. A guy who thinks to himself,
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  right now people are able to make ends meet.
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  They're not going to be damaged right now, but I want them to
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  have more Kevin jehola volla de cah E sedan via BDM.
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  I don't want them to even face a challenge.
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  I want them to be sore, protective financially, to not
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  have to deal with what's going to come down down the road.
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  A guy looks at a young couple who just got married, who
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  probably can afford the basics, but he knows a young couple
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  getting married again on their feet.
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  If you make them pay all their bills within a few months and
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  you'll be underwater. Let me make, let me leave the
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  pressure from the beginning. Let me give that something a
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  little bonus, a little extra. Leave the pressure of financial
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  restraints on a young couple. He's not really saving a poor
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  person, but he's avoiding a challenge.
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  Again, that takes even more sensitivity and more
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  understanding and more, you know, ability to be a person who
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  can see into the future, to really recognize needs.
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  And that is a hasique, right? To think, my friends, money is
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  as valuable to me as my own. Imagine that mindset.
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  I really worry about the people and their financial state,
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  right? This is not so easy to attain.
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  First of all, we face the issue of jealousy, all right #2 we
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  face the challenge of wanting to be up there that doesn't feel
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  about these points #3 it's hard for me to deal with other
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  people's pain all the time. But you know what?
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  If you open yourself up to this mindset, you recognize how
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  financial stress can be equal. I know people and I'll be honest
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  with you, I know people who dealt with medical stress and
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  financial stress, medical stress to be able to handle financial
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  one. They weren't.
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  I looked at them and they said I don't get it.
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  One is life, other one is not life.
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  It's a fuel to function properly but it's not life.
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  My my comment is wrong because it's true.
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  One is life, one is physically living on, one is not.
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  But the reality is to be on the water financially, it's such a
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  hard thing to function. It's an impossible stress to
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  deal with. And we don't have training and
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  we don't have a method out. We don't have a way to live.
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  And other people need to see that for those who are in need.
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  And they need to see that and display that mindset in a few
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  ways. One, to pitch in in any way they
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  can 2 to give advice in any way they can. 3 to give them a word
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  of gesuch when the underwater financially in a way that they
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  can. And four, give them a job 1000%
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  an additional. Don't make them feel so bad.
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  Don't allow them to feel bad when they're struggling
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  financially. Part of the challenge is not
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  just the inability to make ends meet.
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  Maybe equal to that is the bushah and the challenge that it
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  feels for me, my, myself, if I cannot put it up food on the
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  table properly. Khalid Shalom.
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  It's a very difficult feeling. Your entire ego and and and self
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  esteem goes out the window. It's hard to be a husband.
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  It's hard to be a father. It's hard to be a friend.
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  It's hard to be a member of a shul.
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  It's not to be a member of this community.
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  It's a very person. So you have to figure out how to
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  make people feel that money is not a thing.
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  It's a challenge because everyone thinks money leads to
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  something is a challenge. But if you work at it, I need to
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  work or develop your character and you open yourself up to be
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  worried about other people's financial well-being.
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  You can change your relationship to other people and you can
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  change literally how other people live.
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  Because there are people out there who are struggling
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  sometimes for months, sometimes for years, and they cannot
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  function. And the only way they're able to
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  function is if they go to a location or have friends or
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  family who are comfortable around them, with them, who make
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  them comfortable even while these people are going through a
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  tough time. So you're literally providing
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  for them life. That's the mindset and that's
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  the need. So you want to be a Hasee told
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  other people, worry about the financial state and display all
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  this in the process. That's the idea, right?