#21
Treat Others As Yourself
It is easy to view other people's problems and difficulties as "their issue." We like to think that it has nothing to do with us and we would never be in their situation.
But no one ever knows what the future has in store. Scary, isn't it?
Treat each person the way you would have wished to be treated if you were in this person's shoes.
(From Rabbi Pliskin's book Kindness)
2 Adar
One who humiliates another person in public ... even though he may be a scholar and may have done many good deeds, nevertheless loses his portion in the eternal world (Ethics of the Fathers 3:15).
Imagine a situation: you have a fine home, a well-paying job, a comfortable car, and a substantial retirement annuity. If you do a single thoughtless act, you will lose everything you have worked to achieve: home, job, car, and savings. What kind of precautions would you take to avoid even the remotest possibility of incurring such a disaster? Without doubt, you would develop an elaborate system of defenses to assure that this event would never occur.
The Talmud tells us that everything we have worked for during our entire lives can be forfeited in one brief moment of inconsideration: we embarrass another person in public. Perhaps we may say something insulting or make a demeaning gesture. Regardless of how it occurs, the Talmud states that if we cause another person to turn pale because of being humiliated in public, we have committed the equivalent of bloodshed.
Still, we allow our tongues to wag so easily. If we give serious thought to the words of the Talmud, we would exercise the utmost caution in public and be extremely sensitive to other people's feelings, lest an unkind word or degrading gesture deprive us of all our spiritual merits.
Today I shall ...
... try to be alert and sensitive to other people's feelings and take utmost caution not to cause anyone to feel humiliated.
See more books by Rabbi Abraham Twerski at Artscroll.com
It is easy to view other people's problems and difficulties as "their issue." We like to think that it has nothing to do with us and we would never be in their situation.
But no one ever knows what the future has in store. Scary, isn't it?
Treat each person the way you would have wished to be treated if you were in this person's shoes.
(From Rabbi Pliskin's book Kindness)
2 Adar
In
1942, Hitler devised a plan for a Museum of Judaism, to remember the
dead Jewish religion, culture and people. Millions of Jewish treasures
-- Torah scrolls, ritual objects, books and art -- were looted by the
Nazis and taken to warehouses. In Czechoslovakia, the objects were taken
to the Jewish Museum in Prague, where the Jews themselves were forced
to sort, label, and pack the items for use in the Nazi's future museum.
After the war, many of these items were recovered, including thousands
of Torah scrolls and nearly one million books. These were distributed to
Jewish communities worldwide, as a living testimony to the
indestructibility of the Jewish people.
In
1942, Hitler devised a plan for a Museum of Judaism, to remember the
dead Jewish religion, culture and people. Millions of Jewish treasures
-- Torah scrolls, ritual objects, books and art -- were looted by the
Nazis and taken to warehouses. In Czechoslovakia, the objects were taken
to the Jewish Museum in Prague, where the Jews themselves were forced
to sort, label, and pack the items for use in the Nazi's future museum.
After the war, many of these items were recovered, including thousands
of Torah scrolls and nearly one million books. These were distributed to
Jewish communities worldwide, as a living testimony to the
indestructibility of the Jewish people.
2 Adar
One who humiliates another person in public ... even though he may be a scholar and may have done many good deeds, nevertheless loses his portion in the eternal world (Ethics of the Fathers 3:15).
Imagine a situation: you have a fine home, a well-paying job, a comfortable car, and a substantial retirement annuity. If you do a single thoughtless act, you will lose everything you have worked to achieve: home, job, car, and savings. What kind of precautions would you take to avoid even the remotest possibility of incurring such a disaster? Without doubt, you would develop an elaborate system of defenses to assure that this event would never occur.
The Talmud tells us that everything we have worked for during our entire lives can be forfeited in one brief moment of inconsideration: we embarrass another person in public. Perhaps we may say something insulting or make a demeaning gesture. Regardless of how it occurs, the Talmud states that if we cause another person to turn pale because of being humiliated in public, we have committed the equivalent of bloodshed.
Still, we allow our tongues to wag so easily. If we give serious thought to the words of the Talmud, we would exercise the utmost caution in public and be extremely sensitive to other people's feelings, lest an unkind word or degrading gesture deprive us of all our spiritual merits.
Today I shall ...
... try to be alert and sensitive to other people's feelings and take utmost caution not to cause anyone to feel humiliated.
See more books by Rabbi Abraham Twerski at Artscroll.com
