The Tithing Process - Rabbi David Kaplan

it's the number 72 now this sounds like a technical mitzvah again that's the beauty of the mitzvos is always where the mitzvah sounds like it has very little to do with us then you find out that it's actually a a fundamental in life so the mitzvah here the technical mitzva is you know that a jew there are a lot of things that have to be tithed when a jew has uh brings in a jew harvest his crop so you have to separate a certain amount and give it to the cohan and then a certain amount to the levy and then a certain amount you leave for the poor people and then the lady kicks up ten percent to the cohen there's a whole technical process of how the tithing was called the tithing process there's all technical a whole technical idea right there there's a there's a whole technical idea a whole technical uh uh uh what do you call it uh of how the tithing process works now the mitzvah itself is to not do anything out of order in the tithing process that means when you separate truma and micer do it the way it's meant to be done don't go out of word now sometimes if you do it out of order say you have to go back and you have to reverse it but in general in general you're not supposed to go you're not supposed to go out of order and the commentaries explain with the torah obviously if the torah says don't do it out of order what do you think why would the story say don't do it out of the prescribed order what do you think is the basic idea given for why not to do that okay that's always true they always do it the way you're told to do it that's certainly true there's some sort of military discipline you know don't you know do it to where you're told but that's true that's true there's a lot of merit to that but what's the most basic idea if i tell you to do something and do it in a certain order why would you think so why would you think anything in life i tell you doing this you recognize like you know you're giving to the kai and you're giving to the lady like you you're doing priorities yeah exactly okay that's certainly true would you say it wouldn't work or not you're close sometimes sometimes things in life just don't work or it it just doesn't work properly if you put in if you you know that's it's just not going to work if you do things out of order that's true hunter hunter said that the the uh you know you know you want to maintain a priority the coin comes first so it's like with alias you got that's certainly true that's certainly true but the commentaries say very basic that when you're when you have to do so if you do it out of order chances are you're going to forget something you're going to mess up if you do it out of order you know if you put on if you put on your your shirt before your undershirt that's not going to work and it just isn't going to work right it is you know you know that's case in point okay or or you'll forget something okay no any similarities to real life purely intentional but the the uh uh what do you call but there are other things in life that i won't forget it but you're going to end up you end up there are certain people there's certain people that i see if they you get the impression if they would have gotten up five minutes earlier their whole day would because they're five minutes late to everything during the day so if they just would have backed up their clock five minutes but we know that doesn't work if they get a five minutes later they'll be five minutes late for everything during the day so so what the torah says is that that order doing things in order prevents mistakes when you do things in order that prevents mistakes that's a very that's a fundamental and and the idea here is you know that in the yeshiva system the learning sessions that they have in a real yeshiva and they have a real yeshiva do you know what the learning sessions are called it's called seder you go to seder there's a learning center you know what the word satyr means it means order what does it mean pesach we have a seder why is it called a seder the seder he has a pursuit he has it he has a a a prescribed set of steps that you go through in the pace of saturday and it's a prescribed set of steps that you go through in the pesach seder it's called a seder because you're going in an order in an order generally means you're trying to accomplish something so the torah says don't do it in a disorganized fashion because if you're doing this organized fashion that's going to lead to mistakes that's the basic idea by the tithing process you leave out the levy because you skipped it the whole tithing process in in in a tourist society in the torah society the the uh that get the 10 that you have to give away you give away of your earnings 10 percent and if you want you can give up to 20 not more than that can't give more than 20 because you have to make sure you don't turn yourself into a poor person on the other hand uh if you are what's called fabulously rich i don't know what that number is when but if a i would like to find out soon b uh uh if you have to ask you probably aren't uh that's usually the rule unless you're fabulous or rich you're limited to twenty percent now the ten percent that you give there's actually a three-way dispute nowadays whether it is a custom whether it is a rabbinic law or a torah law some kind of commentary some of the commentaries say that is actually a torah law to give away ten percent even nowadays others say of your earnings others say it is ten percent of uh it's a min hug now going back to your question uh when to do it doesn't really matter as long as you do it by a certain deadline you you you you have a running many people just have a running record of how much money they are in credit or in debt to the ten percent uh it is after taxes though in other words if you earn twenty thousand dollars a year and you pay five thousand dollars taxes so you only tithe uh fifteen thousand dollars fifty thousand dollars off your net not off your grouse that's for sure but how to how to calculate the net is not always so simple and sometimes a uh uh somebody of a medium means uh is easier for him to fulfill the mitzva than a man of uh than a man of stronger beans because a man of somebody who's got investments all over and he owns buildings and real estate it's not always so clear exactly how much he's earned and when he should tie this so it's not not so simple yeah does this order also apply to like doing mix was yeah like mixed with there is a doing and then one comes before the other there is an order there's an order there's an order how to do mitzvos what if two mitzvahs come your way and what what about what about if if you have a simple mitzvah versus later on there will be a more difficult mitzvah there are all sorts of orders in life let me just let me just let me just go on forward yeah too big now asked why one of your previous comments suggested to being that this is there's a line from a purim spell the only reason i said it's not a really shiva is because this is a balchuva this is a yeshiva that was set up for people who have limited jewish background whereas in in your standard what we call a mainstream yeshiva most of the learning during the course of day is independent learning the boys learn together and they go to shear once a day and they have like ffbs right fractured from birth the the the uh the uh so that was all that was only tongue-in-cheek this is very much a shiva because the shiva doesn't say what level the ship has to be but but the in in your regular mainstreaming shiva and or samantha we don't have when you get to the base measures they'll have a seder a morning seder an afternoon seder an evening seder which is a learning session but in in in most in all mainstream each other's call the cedar because the day is built on an order at seven o'clock in the morning here at minion at eight o'clock you're at breakfast at nine o'clock you are in the basement and you're supposed to know where you are where you are at all times the person is supposed to know is supposed to say you have some idea of where he is where he is at all times so when uh um as a matter of fact if you're on a deeper idea do you know that it says that when the torah was given when the torah was given the world there was a perfect stillness in the world there was no movement in the world no birds chirped nothing there was not a sound when the torah was given other than the torah being given that's what the matter says because when something is in motion when something is moving it means it has not gotten to its destination that's imperfection when something is moving around that shows a lack of perfection if you're bringing a fork towards your mouth that means you have not achieved the goal yet something in motion is a lack of perfection at a deeper level and so the entire world was at a perfect stillness that's what the badger says when the torah was given that means if if if you see and you're in the home at 11 o'clock at night if there's a child in motion at 11 o'clock at night that is not perfection that child is supposed to be horizontal quiet in sleeping so that is out of that is out of motion that's just that now what what what applies to us like you know there's a classic story they say a father once went to a yeshiva he went to yeshiva to see how his son is doing i want to see how his son is learning in yeshiva when they check on his son so the father went straight he went to the shiva he went straight to the kids dormitory room went up to his dorm room came from out of town visited at the isheva went into the kid's dorm room took a look in the dorm room he saw that his bed was well made the pillow was straight the shelves his clothing was folded turned around went right back home and said to his wife he's learning well in yeshiva i heard that story when i was in about fifth grade how do you know why did he know because an organized if if you an organized a a mind is going to be an organized person and if a person is disorganized i means his mind is disorganized the same mind it's the same it's the same character that's coming out one way or another it's very rare that you're going to have a guy who's making it on time to everything he's precise everything and his room in his room is in disarray it doesn't work that way if the room is this i could basically look at a person i could look at a person and basically make a projection not necessarily i'm right i could basically make a projection of what this guy's room probably looks like to make a projection because if you're organized the organization carries over in all areas by the way this is not this is sometimes a a problem in marriage because in marriage you often get one of the couples is is a little less concerned and one is more concerned now usually usually it's the husband usually not always by far from always usually it's the wife is a little more particular about the order in the home than the husband not always by far from always as if i knew a couple i knew a couple that the husband was not only neat he was military neat military neat and his wife was if she would have been average so it would have been just a minor conflict she was an incorrigible slab right and this this was this was a very big issue in their marriage they had they have a very they have they had to work it out because both have to you know just because your military doesn't mean everybody else around you has to be and you could drive people crazy that way there are women who make their entire families neurotic because they're women in extreme cases they follow their kids around the house as soon as he takes off his shoes in the living room to read a magazine get your shoes out you might take out if she's just a nervous rag just a nervous wreck about you know i wasn't even allowed into the living room when i was a kid yeah you know you're not and sometimes so so they just don't want you know they worked in the house they want to keep the house deep that i understand but sometimes in an extreme case extreme case she actually cannot rest she's got she's just waiting to to pounce on anything did you finish up her you know get those dishes off there she got to have it you know she can't she can't she can't be relaxed now it's everything has an upside and a downside because there are other areas in life the point is the torah is telling you that that one of the things in life that you know there was a hasidic rebbe he was very meticulous very meticulous about his time his daily schedule was measured to the minute one day somebody came to him and told him there's a jew who's in trouble so the rebbe took 20 minutes to say to hillam for that jew he said it took him two years to get back on his regular schedule he was off schedule for two years because it was 20 minutes and knocked off his schedule his schedule was behind for 20 minutes for two years until he could get back to regular schedule because that's how meticulous that's how precise he was in his scheduling the rule in life is that it takes time to get organized real life doesn't take time to get organized but the time you take to get organized will eventually save you time if you're organized it'll save you time there's certain people who are always some people are always that you got an appointment they're always at the doctor's office 20 minutes early they leave they take all precautions to be there and then they're other people you know they they live on the edge right they if they if they're going to the airport you know some people are always there three hours ahead of time people are always running they're the ones who are being announced on the thing you know you know mr murphy you know we're a final call for mr murphy he comes staggering in from a bar you know wherever he is now once in a while these people they live on the edge and it usually works out once in a while you missed the plane and when that happens it just gives you so much aggravation that all the other times that you that you save time you just went out the window now because the aggravation you have when you blew it is a lack of organization that's what the torah is telling us talking about organization is or organization is the key if you want to be rebecca moser grozinski was one of the great one of the great uh torah leaders of the previous generation was he was a world renowned genius you know the khafitzhaim was the acknowledged leader of torah jury after the prophet saying uh was passed away so the acknowledged leader of torah drew was rabbi jaime ozer gazinski who was a massive genius who could do three things at once he could talk and write and have phone conversation all the same time rabbi ozer grozinski from vilna from vilnius he became the leader yeah he became the leader after the toughest time said rob hymos are going to say you don't have to to succeed in life you don't have to be brilliant to succeed in life you have to be organized right and and it just you know sometimes you walk into a person's room and you just see a guy's working at a desk and he's he's swimming in a sea of in a sweet sea of paper just everything is all disorganized and in a person it leads eventually catch that's update it actually leads to frustration you