Don’t Give Charity Where It’s Not Needed
Question: An incident occurred in Tel Aviv where a woman saw a homeless man and decided not just to give him money, but to help him for real. She found him a job and took care of him, and then he killed her….
Answer: She took away a life of freedom from the vagabond. He sat on the street to his heart’s content, not worrying about what time of day it is, whether it’s morning, afternoon, or night, and not thinking about what was and what will be. He was above time and space, above all worries.
People will always throw some coins into his purse or give him something to eat…. The homeless are a special breed – they do not want to depend on anyone or anything. This is a wonderful feeling: I don’t care about anything.
“Where do you live?”
“On earth.”
“Do you have to get somewhere or get something done in time?”
“I don’t even have a watch. I don’t care what time it is.”
“But maybe you owe something to someone? Or someone owes you something?”
“Nothing of the sort.”
And now take a look at yourself: You have a million things to get done at the office and thousands of circumstances. People are calling you, expecting things from you, and your family is also demanding its share…. You simply have no idea what it’s like to be homeless. “Without a home” means without boundaries. I wish you could experience this careless sensation at least once in your life.
This is not a weekend or a vacation when you are also burdened with cares as well. A homeless person has everything tidy, he has no cares in his head and no boundaries, as if he is already floating in the clouds of the world to come.
And now someone comes and brings him down to earth, closes him up within four walls and forces him to live by schedule: wake up, wash up, shave, brush your teeth ,get dressed…. What kind of life is that?
We don’t understand these people, yet they live in a sensation that raises them above matter.
Question: How can we help these people?
Answer: To help someone does not mean to indulge yourself like the way people in Israel are who are trying to house Bedouins in apartments. The Bedouins don’t want to live within four walls and end up setting up their tents again right across the newly built neighborhood. Even if you give them a ten room apartment, they still won’t want it since they have their own ideas about what a household is.
When helping someone, you have to follow their desire rather than yours.
Question: So we should’t help people living in these conditions?
Answer: No. A person has everything he needs and he does not need anything more. If he needed housing, he would arrange it. But he does not want it. For him, setting up “his own corner” is already a restriction. It puts pressure on him. He likes sleeping any place that turns up and not worrying about the next moment.
Compared to him, we do not understand what freedom is. We are slaves while he is a master.
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/27/11, “The Love for the Creator and Love for the Created Beings”
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A true sign that one has reached an egoistical desire, in depth, within, meaning he has brought some good to him, consist in the hatred that is returned back at him . When hatred starts oozing out, then back draft, it is the sign that one did good.
As far as one ignores the form of the good that spread within the egoist, the hatred in return is the only external sign to measure the state.
This lady should have red the parable of the host and the guest. She forcefully cornered the poor dude into the being of a shameful receiver, which was probably the first cause for he to be alone and in the street.
Now he somehow imagined he could have it all, but without her. Illusion.
Being able to return good when one receive good is a real challenge.
HaKol tuv rav
eli
. Not every homeless person is where he/she desires to be. I met a man displaced by Hurricane Katrina and cannot work because of his age and poor health. He is terrified of thunderstorms and has panic attacks when he is forced to be outside during them. People need help, some are just too stubborn to admit when they do.