The current weather has brought the following story to my heat-affected mind…
There is a well-known rabbinical story attributed to Rav Chaim Soloveitchik זצ”ל.
Whenever corrupt Russian government officials threatened to close the Yeshivah, community activists resorted to the old method of bribing them in order to prevent the closure.
This time, however, a new Minister of Education had taken office. He had a reputation for refusing bribes. He was known to be completely incorruptible. The Yeshivah administration was in a panic.
“This man will come, see that we are not teaching the required Russian subjects, and he cannot be bribed. What are we going to do?”
Reb Chaim calmly replied,
“Do not worry. I shall take care of this minister.”
In the middle of July, Reb Chaim went to the Minister’s office wearing a heavy fur coat, as though it were the middle of January.
The minister looked at him in amazement and asked,
“Rabbi, why are you dressed like that today?”
Reb Chaim answered,
“My late mother came to me in a dream last night and told me that tomorrow the temperature will fall by forty degrees, and it will be ten degrees below zero.”
The minister smiled and replied,
“With all due respect to your late mother, I can assure you that this will not happen in the middle of July.”
Reb Chaim insisted,
“My mother told me. That is exactly what is going to happen.”
The minister became even more astonished when Reb Chaim continued,
“I am even willing to wager money on it.”
“I am prepared to bet one hundred roubles that tomorrow the temperature will drop by forty degrees and reach ten degrees below zero.”
The minister gladly accepted the wager.
The following day Reb Chaim returned. Outside it was still thirty degrees.
Reb Chaim sighed and said,
“This is the very first time my late mother has ever let me down.”
He then handed the minister the one hundred roubles.
Returning to the Yeshivah, Reb Chaim confidently told the administration,
“The Minister of Education is now in my pocket.”
Reb Chaim understood that once a person accepts money, his judgement is no longer completely objective—precisely as the Torah teaches. Once the Torah tells us that accepting money changes a person’s attitude towards the one from whom he receives it, it becomes an immutable spiritual law that affects even the most honest individual.
Perhaps it really will snow tomorrow.
I, however, shall not bet on it…
Shabbat Shalom and best wishes
Rabbi Chaim Michael Biberfeld