Tzedakah’s unique, an untranslatable virtue
Tucked away in this week’s sedra, almost as an aside in the course of explaining the law of shemittah (the year of “release” in which debts were cancelled), is one of Judaism’s most majestic institutions, the principle of tzedakah:
If there is a poor man among your brothers in any of the towns of the land that the L-rd your G-d is giving you, do not be hard-hearted or tight-fisted towards your poor brother. Rather, be open-handed and freely lend him sufficient for his need in that which he lacks.
Tzedakah lies at the heart Judaism’s understanding of mitzvoth bein adam le-chavero, interpersonal duties. An idea going back 4,000 years, it remains challenging today. To understand it, though, a brief historical note is necessary.
In a key passage in Bereishit — the only passage in which the Torah explains why G-d singled out Abraham to be the founder of a new faith — we read:
Then the L-rd said, “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do? Abraham will surely become a great and powerful nation, and all the nations of the earth will be blessed through him. For I have chosen him so that he will direct his children and his household after him to keep the way of the L-rd by doing what is right and just, so that the L-rd will bring about for Abraham what He has promised him.
The “way of the L-rd” is defined here by two words, tzedakah and mishpat. They are both forms of justice but are quite different in their logic.
Mishpat means retributive justice. It refers to the rule of law, through which disputes are settled by right rather than might. Law distinguishes between innocent and guilty. It establishes a set of rules, binding on all, by means of which the members of a society act in such a way as to pursue their own interests without infringing on the rights and freedoms of others.
But mishpat alone cannot create a good society. To it must be added tzedakah, distributive justice.
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One can imagine a society which fastidiously observes the rule of law and yet contains so much inequality that wealth is concentrated into the hands of the few, and many are left without the most basic requirements of a dignified existence. There must be justice not only in how the law is applied, but also in how the means of existence — wealth as G-d’s blessing — are distributed. That is tzedakah.
Maimonides, in his halachic code the Mishneh Torah, makes a fascinating observation: “We have never seen or heard of a Jewish community without a tzedakah fund.”
Thus far, deliberately, I have left the word tzedakah untranslated. It cannot be translated, and this is not accidental. The word is untranslatable into a system like Judaism that values humility and the kind of dignity that attaches to the person as such, regardless of their income or social position.
Tzedakah cannot be translated because it joins together two concepts that in other languages are opposites, namely charity and justice.
Suppose, for example, that I give someone £100. Either he is entitled to it, or he is not. If he is, then my act is a form of justice. If he is not, it is an act of charity. In English (as with the Latin terms caritas and iustitia) a gesture of charity cannot be an act of justice, nor can an act of justice be described as charity. Tzedakah is therefore an unusual term, because it means both.
It arises from the theology of Judaism, which insists on the difference between possession and ownership. Ultimately, all things are owned by G-d, creator of the world. What we possess, we do not own — we merely hold it in trust for G-d.
If there were absolute ownership, there would be a difference between justice (what we are bound to give others) and charity (what we give others out of generosity). The former would be a legally enforceable duty, the latter, at best, the prompting of benevolence or sympathy. In Judaism, however, because we are not owners of our property but merely guardians on G-d’s behalf, we are bound by the conditions of trusteeship, one of which is that we share part of what we have with others in need. What would be regarded as charity in other legal systems is, in Judaism, a strict requirement of the law and can, if necessary, be enforced by the courts.
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The nearest English equivalent to tzedakah is the phrase that came into existence alongside the idea of a welfare state, namely social justice. Behind both is the idea that no one should be without the basic requirements of existence, and that those who have more than they need must share some of that surplus with those who have less. This is fundamental to the kind of society the Israelites were charged with creating, namely one in which everyone has a basic right to a dignified life and equal worth as citizens in the covenantal community under the sovereignty of G-d.
Tzedakah concerns not just physical needs but psychological ones also. The rabbis gave the following interpretation of the key sentence in this week’s sedra, “Be open-handed and freely lend him sufficient for his need in that which he lacks”:
Sufficient for his need — means that you are commanded to maintain him, but you are not commanded to make him rich. That which he lacks — means even a horse to ride on and a slave to run before him. It is told of Hillel the elder that he bought for a certain poor man of good family a horse to ride on and a slave to run before him. On one occasion he could not find a slave to run before him, so he himself ran before him for three miles.
The first provision (“sufficient for his need”) refers to an absolute subsistence level. In Jewish law this was taken to include food, housing, basic furniture and, if necessary, funds to pay for a wedding.
The second (“that which he lacks”) means relative poverty — relative, however, not to others but to the individual’s own previous standard of living. This is an indication of something which plays an important role in the rabbinic understanding of poverty. Beyond sheer physical needs is a psychological dimension. Poverty humiliates, and a good society will not allow humiliation.
Protecting dignity and avoiding humiliation was a systematic element of rabbinical law. So, for example, the rabbis ruled that even the richest should be buried plainly so as not to shame the poor. On certain festive days girls, especially those from wealthy families, had to wear borrowed clothes, “so as not to shame those who do not have.” The rabbis intervened to lower the prices of religious necessities so that no one would be excluded from communal celebrations. Work conditions had to be such that employees were treated with basic respect. Here, the proof text was G-d’s declaration, “For to Me the children of Israel are servants” — meaning that they were not to be treated as servants of any human being. Freedom presupposes self-respect, and a free society will therefore be one that robs no one of that basic human entitlement.
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One element of self-respect is independence. This explains a remarkable feature of tzedakah legislation. Maimonides lists the various levels of giving-to-others, all except one of which involve philanthropy. The supreme act, however, does not:
The highest degree, exceeded by none, is that of one who assists a poor person by providing him with a gift or a loan or by accepting him into a business partnership or by helping him find employment - in a word by putting him in a situation where he can dispense with other people’s aid. With reference to such aid it is said, “You shall strengthen him, be he a stranger or a settler, he shall live with you” (Leviticus 25:35), which means strengthen him in such a manner that his falling into want is prevented.
This ruling is the result of a profound wrestling, within Judaism, with the fact that aid in the form of charity can itself be humiliating for the recipient. (One of the most powerful expressions of this is to be found in birkat hamazon, the Grace after Meals, when we say, “We beseech You, G-d our L-rd, let us not be in need of the gifts of men or of their loans, but only of Your helping hand … so that we may not be put to shame nor humiliated for ever and ever”).
Aid can also create welfare dependency, reinforcing rather than breaking the cycle of deprivation. The greatest act of tzedakah is therefore one that allows the individual to become self-sufficient. The highest form of aid is one that enables the individual to dispense with aid. Humanitarian relief is essential on the short term, but in the long run, job creation and the promotion of employment are more important.
In this context, one detail of Jewish law is particularly fascinating. It specifies that even a person dependent on tzedakah must himself or herself give tzedakah.
On the face of it, the rule is absurd. Why give X enough money so that he can give to Y? Giving to Y directly is more logical and efficient. What the rabbis understood, however, is that giving is an essential part of human dignity. As an African proverb puts it: the hand that gives is almost uppermost; the hand that receives is always lower. The rabbinic insistence that the community provide the poor with enough money so that they themselves can give is a profound insight into the human condition.
With its combination of charity and justice, its understanding of the psychological as well as material dimensions of poverty, and its aim of restoring dignity and independence, not just meeting needs, tzedakah is a unique institution. It is deeply humanitarian, but it could not exist without the essentially religious concepts of Divine ownership and social covenant.
The prophet Jeremiah says of king Josiah, “He judged the cause of the poor and needy; then it was well. Is this not to know Me? says the L-rd.”
To know G-d is to act with justice and compassion, to recognize His image in other people, and to hear the silent cry of those in need.
