Why Is There a Need for Tzedakah?
Rabbinic sources, both ancient and modern, suggest that tzedakah plays an important role in the
spiritual life of the donor.
By Rabbi Louis Jacobs
This article explaining some of the purposes
that are served by the need for tzedakah
is reprinted with permission from The Jewish Religion: A Companion, published by Oxford University Press. One
additional view not covered here is a teaching of the medieval philosopher
Maimonides: Tzedakah also develops the virtue of generosity in the donor--not
only earning merit for the giver but also nurturing personality improvement. In
this view, all of Jewish practice can be seen as a means of cultivating virtues
or character traits.
The word “tzedakah”
in the Bible denotes “righteousness” in general, but in post-biblical Judaism
it is used to denote charity, as if to suggest, according to many exponents of
the idea, that there should be no condescension in alms-giving. The poor are
not to be patronized but given the assistance they need because they have a
just claim on the wealthy. The Jerusalem Talmud records that in ancient
Palestine a poor man when asking for help would say to his would-be benefactor:
“Acquire merit for yourself,” as if to say: “I am doing you a favor.”
In a popular
Jewish tale, when a rich man excuses the small size of his donation by
protesting that he is unable to afford to give more generously because he has
been obliged to pay his son’s gambling debts, the poor man retorts: “If your
son wants to gamble let him do so with his own money, not with mine.” In a
revealing midrashic anecdote, the Roman Governor [of second-century CE
Palestine], Turnus Rufus, puts the question to Rabbi Akiba: “If, as you
maintain, your God loves the poor, why does he not make them rich?” to which
Akiba replies: “It is in order to give the rich the means of acquiring merit,”
a quaint way of coping with the theological problem of why a beneficent God has
created a world in which people suffer. A world without poverty would be an
uncaring world; without those to whom compassion must be shown it would be a
world without compassion.
A Hasidic
master, in the same vein, once asked: “Since everything in God’s world must
have a purpose, what purpose is served by the phenomenon of atheism?” God
allows the possibility of unbelief, he concluded, because otherwise the rich
would have so much faith that God will help the poor that they would not themselves
think of trying to alleviate their suffering. Faith is admirable when exercised
on one’s own behalf. Where the needs of others are concerned, it is essential
to act as if there is no God to intervene.
Louis Jacobs, a
prominent British rabbi and theologian and a prolific author of popular and
scholarly works, was born in Manchester in 1920. He served for decades as a
congregational rabbi in London and has held appointments as a professor of
Jewish studies in several British universities.
© Louis Jacobs, 1995.
Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. No part of this
material may be stored, transmitted, retransmitted, lent, or reproduced in any
form or medium without the permission of Oxford University Press
