Wednesday, July 08, 2009

Donate to Kupat HaIr, or Hashem may smite your children!

An advertisement in last week's Five Towns Jewish Times.

Typically they prey on the fears and desperation of the childless or seriously ill, telling them that the path to yeshua is a donation. And for a salvation outside the domain of derech hateva, one needs to give more than the teva would dictate.

Here, it seems as if they are raising the spectre of harm or death to Jewish children, if their parents do not donate to this specific charity. I would like to think that apart for this, the Gedolim care for all of klal Yisrael and pray in general that no Jewish children are harmed this summer.

Besides frightening parents and cynically using that fear to collect money for their cause (however deserving that cause may be), they are influencing the practices and beliefs of Judaism. They are turning Gedolim, and the prayers of Gedolim, into commodities. And it makes tzedaka into a segulah and into a mechanism of getting what one wants.

Now, perhaps this is not the end of the world. After all, the gemara states that

האומר סלע זו לצדקה בשביל שיחיו בני ובשביל שאזכה בה לחיי העולם הבא הרי זה צדיק גמור לא קשיא כאן בישראל כאן באומות העולם

But then again, Rashi states that this is because regardless, the Yisrael will intend it leshem shamayim. And perhaps these people will. But it seems that if not for this, the thought-process is one of purchasing favors. (Meanwhile, Daryevesh was considered evil, despite giving gifts to kohanim, with those gifts not being counted as evidence of righteousness because he only gave them such that they would pray for him and his children.)

Regardless, while this answer might exist in the gemara, it seems that tzedaka campaigns featuring Gedolim with this message only serves to increase the thought process of purchasing favors with charity, which the gemara in the end does not seem to consider a positive attitude.

I'll also note that it seems that Iyov took a similar attitude before the deaths of his sons and daughters:

ד וְהָלְכוּ בָנָיו וְעָשׂוּ מִשְׁתֶּה, בֵּית אִישׁ יוֹמוֹ; וְשָׁלְחוּ, וְקָרְאוּ לִשְׁלֹשֶׁת אַחְיֹתֵיהֶם, לֶאֱכֹל וְלִשְׁתּוֹת, עִמָּהֶם.4 And his sons used to go and hold a feast in the house of each one upon his day; and they would send and invite their three sisters to eat and to drink with them.
ה וַיְהִי כִּי הִקִּיפוּ יְמֵי הַמִּשְׁתֶּה וַיִּשְׁלַח אִיּוֹב וַיְקַדְּשֵׁם, וְהִשְׁכִּים בַּבֹּקֶר וְהֶעֱלָה עֹלוֹת מִסְפַּר כֻּלָּם--כִּי אָמַר אִיּוֹב, אוּלַי חָטְאוּ בָנַי וּבֵרְכוּ אֱלֹהִים בִּלְבָבָם: כָּכָה יַעֲשֶׂה אִיּוֹב, כָּל הַיָּמִים. {פ}5 And it was so, when the days of their feasting were gone about, that Job sent and sanctified them, and rose up early in the morning, and offered burnt-offerings according to the number of them all; for Job said: 'It may be that my sons have sinned, and blasphemed God in their hearts.' Thus did Job continually.{P}

13 comments:

Vito said...

Now, I'm just sayin'... but if you want to be sure your store doesn't burn down or nothin' next week, you might want to make a small donation to kupat ha'ir. Oh yeah... unmarked bills only.

Anonymous said...

R'YBS commented that Iyov's sin was that he only cared about his family as evidenced by the pasuk you quoted.
KT
Joel Rich

Anonymous said...

R'YBS commented that Iyov's sin was that he only cared about his family as evidenced by the pasuk you quoted.
KT
Joel Rich

b said...

Actually,i don't see your point at all.They are offering a service for a problem people are already of.And your headline is misleading.

joshwaxman said...

i am sure you don't. the people who wrote this ad copy probably don't see my point either. and my headline is dramatic, not misleading. it brings out the point.

kol tuv,
josh

b said...

What dramatic?! it's false.Nowhere do they remotely suggest that you will be smitten by Hashem if you don't give.It's a given that charity saves from trouble.

b said...

Actually we follow iyov .See the halochos of bahab fasting.

joshwaxman said...

sorry, i don't feel like arguing about you with this.

all the best,
josh

joshwaxman said...

see, though, this post for more of the same, perhaps clearer.

http://dovbear.blogspot.com/2010/11/how-kupat-hair-style-scammers-lie-to.html

kt,
josh

Anonymous said...

I think this whole blog is anti Torah who commands us to give tdaka and by giving tzdaka we can prevent all sorts of "tsures" lo aleinu this perticular tdaka is one that the gedolim have endosed unanamously and the funds raised are distributed properly according to the Halacha.u r ridculing and turning away possibly those who may have otherwise wanted to be zoche in this mitzvah

joshwaxman said...

1) as i write above the comment box, "If you choose to comment anonymously, please choose a pseudonym."

2) please take the time to use punctuation, perhaps capitalization, and full words such as 'you' instead of 'u' and 'are' instead of 'r'. run-on sentences or near run-on sentences are also frowned upon.

3) i disagree with you. the Torah commands us to give tzeddaka. yes, as an act of kindness, as a command of Hashem, as responsibility to our fellow Jews. but not as a magic segulah, and not under implied threat that otherwise your children will die. certain tzedaka organizations trivialize Judaism and shame the gedolim by appropriating their name for lowly gimmicks. and there it at least one big gadol who agrees, by the way.

kol tuv,
josh

joshwaxman said...

see here, by Rabbi Yitzchak Adlerstein:

The report you heard is true, according to multiple, reliable local sources with whom I checked. The Lakewood mashgiah Rav Mattisyahu Solomon, shlit”a, did term some of the solicitation techniques of Kupat Ha’ir as “gezel gamur”/ theft in the true sense of the term. According to one local press report, he decried the fact that single women desperate for a yeshua had contributed all their savings to KH, and turned to him when the choson wasn’t forthcoming.

Not only is the report true, but R. Mattisyahu took his objections straight to R Chaim Kanievsky, shlit”a. The latter argued that he clearly did not offer any guarantees, and that his statements about the efficacy of donating to KH were nothing more than a reiteration of the statements of Chazal about the power of tzedaka – not any special prognostication on his part. Despite this reassuring clarification, R. Mattisyahu apparently did not change his mind about the impression that KH’s advertising aimed for, and clearly succeeded in achieving in many cases.


even with Rav Kanievsky's clarification, ask yourself if the glossy pamphlets give this impression, or if they are misleading people as to what the Gedolim are saying. and then ask yourself if the ones misrepresenting the words of the Gedolim are the ones who are anti-Torah.

kol tuv,
josh

Anonymous said...

I agree 100 percent. Turning our Gedolim into commercial gimmicks cheapens them and the Torah they represent.
I feel terrible when I see the pictures of those Kupat Ha'ir posters stuffed into their hands so the photographer can catch them promoting the cause.
And promising Yeshuos when we are told ein somchin al hanes can't be right.

Uri

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