Friday, January 2, 2015

The Value of a Dollar

Day 2: "Let Your Fellow's Money Be as Precious to You as Your Own"

I'm beginning to see that there will be many values in this book that I personally will not or don't currently have the chance to act on. Being honest in business dealings would be one of those values.

Rabbi Telushkin tells us to handle our fellows’ money as if their money was ours; to act honestly in business dealings always. This value stems from Vayikra 19:18: ואהבת לרעך כמוך, Love your neighbor as yourself.

The Talmud tells us that the first question we will be asked in heaven will not be about our religiosity or our observance of Judaism. The first question we will be asked will about how honest we were in our business transactions. This is both marvelous and confounding to me, and I hope that by the time I am ready to answer this question, I will have had the opportunity to be honest in my business.

Since part of this project is about finding ways that these values relate to my life, the closest I can think of is the summer internship and job applications I have been and will be filling out. I wouldn’t want to lie on my resume and I haven’t so far. I know this seems like a childish comparison, but I’ll take any opportunity I have to be honest in a business capacity.

"Only he who is reliable in money matters may be considered pious."-Rabbi Tzvi Hirsch Koidonover

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