Friday, July 24, 2009

Laundering may kasher table-cloths but not money II

When I posted the piece last night I knew that their was a piece in the Shefa Chaim I had read more recently that dealt with this topic, I was just looking in the wrong year and a parsha too early. In the Chumash Rashi Shiur for 5743 on Parshas Devarim we read:

"A hint to this is said in Chazal (Shabbos 31a) that at the time when a person enters for [heavenly] judgment, they say to him, "Did you engage in commerce faithfully?" etc. Of all the Taryag mitzvos of the Torah, they first ask him specifically about faithful commerce, without theft or deception, since if he is not careful over this he will automatically be unable to be particular on the rest. With this we answer the difficulty presented by the Gemara (Sanhedrin 7a), "A persons judgement only starts with words of Torah" since we infer that a person's judgement doesn't begin with faithful commerce but rather words of Torah. But according to our understanding this makes sense, since as a prerequisite for asking if a person engaged in Torah, it is necessary to initionaly aske if he engaged in commerce faithfully, since if he is a robber and thief soiled(?) with money which isn't his, it is not possible that he fixed time for learning Torah. And the matter is simple and obvious, that his mind was contaminated with stolen money so his learing will not be effective." Page 452.

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