Now You Know Just before a person is born, an angel makes him swear to “be a tzaddik (righteous person) and not a rasha (an evil person.)” What constitutes being a tzaddik and how do we fulfill this solemn oath? One might think being a tzaddik means to just learn Torah and do mitzvos, yet there are many great people in history who did this but did not receive that moniker. Yosef was one person who was called Yosef HaTzaddik. Noach was called a tzaddik, and in the Gemara in Bava Basra (11a) we find a man named Binyamin HaTzaddik, who distributed charity funds and supported a widow and her orphans from his own pocket. What these three all have in common is that they cared for others. Noach spent years building an ark solely so he could make people think of repenting. He spent a year inside it caring for the animals twenty-four hours a day. He is a tzaddik. Yosef provided sustenance for the entire world during a famine. He ensured that people had food and also worried about how his family would be viewed. He is a tzaddik. As we said, Binyamin HaTzaddik took care of the needs of others, and this common thread is the essence of being a tzaddik. A Rasha is one who says, “Let the poor fend for themselves,” or chooses not to get involved when someone is in need. As we read about Yosef HaTzaddik and all that he did for his brothers, their families, and the entire land of Egypt, remember a promise you made long ago – that you will be a tzaddik, caring for others, and not a rasha, merely concerned with yourself.
Posted on: Wed, 24 Dec 2014 17:00:01 +0000
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