21 May PARSHAS BEHAR: CHEATING IS FORBIDDEN — HONESTY IS THE BEST POLICY AS WELL

Parshas Behar contains
the Torah’s prohibition
against cheating:
“When you make a sale
to your fellow or when
you buy from the hand
of your fellow, do not
victimize one another (Al tonu ish es achiv).”
[Vayikra 25:14] Rashi explains that “Al
To’nu” refers to deception regarding monetary
matters.
It is not a coincidence that this prohibition
against cheating immediately follows the
section of the Sabbatical year requirements. If
there is one lesson that emerges from the
parsha of Shemitah, it is that the Ribono shel
Olam provides man with his livelihood needs.
In the seventh year, farmers (and in Biblical
times the economy was almost totally agrarian)
were asked to stop working for an entire year,
and they were somehow supposed to survive.
How can they do that?
The answer is that the Ribono shel Olam
promises that He will take care of them. The
takeaway lesson of the parsha of Shmittah is
that the Almighty provides our parnassa, and
in the seventh year a person can in fact not
work, not plant, not harvest, and yet survive –
and according to the Torah he will do even
more than survive!

If we believed that with all our hearts and
souls, we would never be tempted to cheat.
Why do we cheat? We cheat so that we can
make a couple of extra dollars. However, if we
fully internalized the idea that a person’s
income is determined by the Almighty each
Rosh HaShannah, and whatever we are
destined to get will come our way and not a
penny more, we would have no reason to cheat
and try to deceitfully make those couple of
extra dollars! This idea is sometimes very hard
for people to accept in practice.
I read a very interesting story about Rav
Yaakov Kamenetsky, zt”l. Rav Yaakov
Kamenetsky exemplified and personified what
it means to be an honest person. It is no
coincidence that he named his sefer on
Chumash Emes L’Yaakov. This is what he
preached, and this is what he practiced.
One of Rav Yaakov’s sons was Rav Noson
Kamenetsky, zt”l. Rav Noson wanted to trace
his family’s roots and went to visit the little
Litvishe European town in which Rav Yaakov
Kamenetsky had been the Rav. While he was
there, he discovered a very interesting
historical fact: Even though much of
Lithuanian Jewry was wiped out during the
Shoah, to a large extent, the Jews of that
particular city survived the war and escaped
the Nazi Holocaust.

Rav Noson Kamenetsky
went to the mayor of the
town and asked him if he
could explain how the
Jews of this town were
successful in saving their
lives. The mayor said, “I
can tell you exactly why
the Jews escaped.” He
said that before the war,
the fellow who eventually
became the mayor was the
postmaster of the town.
He would have a test for
the clergy members of that

town – both Jews and non-
Jews. The test was that when they would come

in to buy postage, he would purposely give
them more change than they deserved, and he
would see whether they would return the
money or not. That was his acid test of what
type of people he was dealing with.
He did this three times with Rav Yaakov
Kamenetsky. Each time he gave Rav Yaakov
more money than he was entitled to in change,
Rav Yaakov would always return the money.
This postmaster was so impressed with Rav
Yaakov, who was the head of the Jewish
community, that when years later he was
mayor of the town – any time he became

aware of a German action which would have
wiped out the Jews, he would notify the Jews
and they would go hide in the forest or
wherever, and that is how the Jews of the city
were saved.
When Rav Noson Kamenetsky returned to
America from his trip to Europe, he asked his
father if he had any recollection of the post
office, if he remembered the postmaster, and if
he recalled these incidents. Rav Yaakov said
that he did not remember the particular story
about being tested, but all he remembered was
that the postmaster in town did not know how
to count.