Wisdom & Wit

Wisdom and Wit

The Chafetz Chayim was being driven by a Jewish wagon driver, who asked him: “Rebbe, I don’t have time to sit and learn. What can I do to earn a place in the World to Come?”
“Why don’t you lend out money to people at no interest?” suggested the Chafetz Chayim. The wagon driver laughed: “Rebbe, I am struggling myself to make ends meet. I don’t have money to lend others.”
“What you should do,” said the Chafetz Chayim, “is to set aside a few pennies each week. Soon this will add up to something significant, and then you will have enough money to extend a loan to a family which needs money to buy food for Shabbos. Gradually, the amount you have available to lend out will increase.”
The wagon driver did as suggested by the Chafetz Chayim, and in the course of time his free loan fund grew into a substantial one, with which he was able to lend to others in need.
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One of the students of the Chevron Yeshiva, an orphan, came to the Rosh Yeshiva, R’ Aharon Cohen, and told him that he had just become engaged.
“And did you give your fiancee a gift?” asked R’ Aharon.
“No, Rebbe,” replied the young man. “I don’t have any money to buy any gift.”
“I want you to go to a certain jewelry store, select a gold watch for your fiancee, and tell the jeweler to bill me for it,” said R’ Aharon.
“It was at that time that I felt that I still had a father,” the student later recalled.

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