9 Charity and distributive justice
2 Social justice in the Bible
2.1 Biblical laws relating to social justice
2.2 Social justice as a legal issue
2.3 Personal responsibility
2.4 Sustenance and rehabilitation
2.5 The recipient’s responsibility
2.6 Social stratiﬁcation
3 The introduction of charity laws during the Rabbinic period
4 Charity: ‘between man and God’ or ‘between man and his fellow’?
5 Compulsory charity
6 Determining the poverty line
6.1 Three tests for poverty
6.2 The objective test
6.3 The subjective test
7 Amount to be collected
8 Sustenance and rehabilitation revisited
9 Responsibilities of the poor
9.1 Those able to work
9.2 Charitable donations by the poor
10 Individual and community
10.1 Communal charitable institutions
10.2 Dividing the burden between individual and community
i Private charity versus public charity
ii Support for subjective needs––private or public?
iii Support for relatives
Appendix Social justice in the ancient Near East
One of the burning questions in the life of human society is that of social
justice: what would constitute a just society, and how can this vision be
achieved? This chapter will explore the position of Jewish law on the
question of the just distribution of resources within society, or in short,
In his Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle deﬁned distributive justice as
the proper division of goods and wealth among members of a society,
where goods and wealth are deﬁned broadly and include not just material
resources and assets such as capital, land, labor, and so on, but even
44 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
indirect beneﬁts.1 In contemporary societies, such indirect beneﬁts would
include tax exemptions, access to senior public positions, and the like.
The question of distributive justice engaged the thinkers, statesmen,
and ordinary people of ancient times, and is no less vital today. The Cold
War of the latter half of the twentieth century, for instance, can be charac-
terized as a tension between regimes advocating opposed approaches
to distributive justice. The West upheld a free market system, limited gov-
ernmental intervention in economic life, private property, and the right to
unlimited personal and corporate wealth. The underlying premise is that
ultimately, sufﬁcient wealth will be generated to ensure that even the
less productive sectors of society live comfortably. The Soviet bloc was
socialist in orientation, with a planned economy, nationalized means of
production, and limitations on private property so as to achieve an equi-
table distribution of goods. Although the Cold War ended with the repu-
diation of the communist ethos, distributive justice has yet to be achieved,
and it has yet to be demonstrated that capitalism can ensure a satisfactory
standard of living for all. Indeed, globalization has exacerbated the dis-
tributive inequalities both within states and between developed and
That the question of distributive justice engages many of us so
passionately is due, in large part, to its immediacy. In contrast to other
legal dilemmas, whose signiﬁcance and relevance to the non-jurist must be
explained and justiﬁed, the question of distributive justice speaks to
This chapter will explore the approach to social justice put forward in
the sources of Jewish law, from the biblical period through the mishnaic
and talmudic eras, with particular emphasis on the latter. As we will see,
Jewish law with respect to distributive justice went through several impor-
tant transformations, producing biblically-inspired concepts and institu-
tions that became entrenched in the thought and social organization of
cultures the world over, to the point where they are seen as self-evident.
In the last hundred or so years, considerable attention has been directed
to the position of Jewish law on various social issues. Many of those who
debated these issues interpreted the halakhic sources anachronistically,
that is, in terms of the socioeconomic ideas of their own place and time.
Some portrayed Jewish law as a quasi-socialist legal system,2 others, as an
individualistic proto-capitalistic legal system.3 In reaction, some insist that
Jewish law is impervious to the inﬂuence of contingent ideological or
cultural trends.4 In this chapter, sensitive to the Scylla of anachronism and
1 Book V, ch. 2, 1130b30.
2 See Joseph W. Singer, The Edges of the Field (Boston: 2000).
3 See J. Lifshitz, “Foundations of a Jewish economic theory,” Azure 18 (2004), 34–36.
4 See R. Haim David Halevi, “The social approach of the Torah in opposition to capitalism
and socialism” (Hebrew), Kol Sinai 5 (1966), 251–54.
Charity and distributive justice 45
the Charybdis of taking Jewish law to exist in a vacuum, we construe the
talmudic approach to social justice as a distinctive but evolving
socioeconomic orientation. From time to time, however, we will draw on
the insights of contemporary ‘outside’ discourse on distributive justice, to
sharpen our understanding of the solutions suggested in the halakhic
It should be noted that our examination of distributive justice will be
conducted from the jurisprudential perspective: we will not survey the
historical realities of Jewish socioeconomic life during the periods under
discussion, but rather, the principles espoused in the classic sources of
Jewish law—the Bible, Mishnah, and Talmud—and the wider halakhic
Readers might wonder why the problem of distributive justice is being
addressed in the legal context at all: are not the disciplines of philosophy,
economics and political science more appropriate contexts within which
to contemplate the most equitable distribution of a society’s resources? As
we will see, however, the halakhic tradition reﬂects the legalization of the
problem of distributive justice and transfer of the responsibility for actions
intended to beneﬁt the weak from the political realm to the legal. It is thus
apt for the directives and principles pertaining to charity to be studied in
the legal context.
2 Social justice in the Bible
2.1 Biblical laws relating to social justice
Concern for the weaker groups within society—the poor, orphans, widows,
strangers, slaves, and maidservants—is a central biblical theme. Numerous
precepts focus on the material betterment of society and the provision of
support to those in need. Many such laws are related to farming, the
primary economic activity in the biblical period, and pertain to crops,
stewardship of the land, and slaves, who appear to have worked chieﬂy in
the ﬁelds. Before turning to a more detailed consideration of these precepts,
we will ﬁrst explain some of the relevant terms and institutions.
The Jubilee year (yovel)
The biblical precept of the Jubilee year (Lev. 25:8-13) provides that all land
within the territory of the land of Israel is to be redistributed among
members of the community on a set ﬁfty-year cycle. The key to the
redistribution is familial: every man returns to and gains ownership of
his family’s ancestral plot. The redistribution thus presupposes an
initial distribution of the land according to family. In addition, within the
framework of the Jubilee law, all slaves are manumitted, and return to
their homes and ancestral lands as freemen.
46 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
Emancipation of slaves
The Torah provides, in effect, two separate cycles for the freeing of slaves—
one personal, the other communal. The communal cycle, recurring every
ﬁfty years, is described in Leviticus 25, and occurs as part of the Jubilee
year. All Hebrew slaves are to go free that year, regardless of when their
term of slavery began. In addition to the Jubilee cycle, the Torah also sets
down that every Hebrew slave5 has his own personal emancipation time,
six years after his entry into servitude. “When you acquire a Hebrew slave,
he shall serve six years; in the seventh year he shall go free, without
payment” (Exod. 21:2). The Torah adds that the slave should not be set free
empty-handed, but rather, the owner is obligated to give him some of his
yield: “When you set him free, do not let him go empty-handed: Furnish
him out of the ﬂock, threshing ﬂoor, and vat, with which the Lord your
God has blessed you” (Deut. 15:13–14).
In contrast to the situation at the end of the communal cycle, when
remaining with his master is not an option, at the end of the slave’s
personal six-year cycle, he is offered his freedom, but not compelled to
accept it. The Torah allows him to choose to remain with his master
“forever” (leolam): “If the slave declares, ‘I love my master, and my wife
and children: I do not wish to go free,’ his master shall take him before the
judges [lit., God]. He shall be brought to the door or the doorpost, and his
master shall pierce his ear with an awl; and he shall then remain his slave
forever” (Exod. 21:5–6). It is clear from the text that though the Torah
allows the slave to decline to be freed, it disapproves of his doing so. The
Sages, however, do not interpret the word “forever” literally, but take it to
mean ‘until the next Jubilee year.’
This law of emancipation is part of a more general array of precepts
intended to improve the lot of slaves. These include, for example, the
prohibition against working a slave too harshly in Leviticus 25:43.
The commandment to rest on the seventh day—the Sabbath—is not
generally thought of as falling within the Torah’s social legislation. But
upon scrutiny, the social justice element becomes apparent. One of the
rationales the Torah offers for the Sabbath is to grant slaves and
maidservants a rest their masters might otherwise deny them: “But the
seventh day is a Sabbath of the Lord your God; you shall not do any
work—you, your son or your daughter, your male or female slave, your ox
or your ass, or any of your cattle, or the stranger in your settlements, so
that your male and female slave may rest as you do” (Deut. 5:14).
5 The Torah also broadens the rights of Canaanite (i.e., non-Hebrew) slaves, but they
remained less extensive than those of Hebrew slaves.
Charity and distributive justice 47
Sabbatical year release of lands
Another precept that can, on reﬂection, be seen to have a social justice
dimension, is that of the ‘release’ of land every seventh year, which is
referred to as the Sabbatical year. This process, as set down in Leviticus
25:1–7, has two main elements: for the year in question, the land is not
worked; and whatever the ﬁelds produce may be enjoyed by anyone,
regardless of ownership. In effect, private ownership of agricultural
produce is suspended for the year. The primary beneﬁciaries of the
Sabbatical year are the poor, who, during normal years, cannot enjoy
agricultural produce, as they cannot afford to buy it. During the Sabbatical
year, however, they can enjoy fresh produce to the same extent as their
Nevertheless, the release of lands will not be covered in this chapter,
for it does not function as an ongoing mechanism for supporting the
needy. In this, it differs from the other biblical social justice laws, which, as
we will see, are intended to provide effective substantive assistance to
members of the weaker social strata. The precept of the Sabbatical release
of lands makes only a minor contribution to this goal, as distribution of
produce once every seven years has no sustained economic effect during
the other six years. Release of lands seems to have a primarily religious
and educational purpose, namely, to heighten awareness of the transient
nature of material wealth, in contrast to the permanence and immutability
of God’s sovereignty over the world. The Jubilee year, on the other hand—
though it, too, is a cyclical process undergone once in a set number of
years—in enabling the poor to make a fresh start, has the potential to effect
long-term changes in economic well-being.
Gleanings, forgotten produce, corners of the field
In fact, it is not only during the Sabbatical year that the poor are sustained
by ﬁeld produce; the Torah commands property owners to leave a portion
of their crops—grains, fruits, olives, and so on—for the poor every year.
Farmers may not harvest their entire ﬁeld, but must leave a corner
unharvested (Lev. 19:9). Likewise, they are forbidden to go back and gather
produce that fell while being harvested or was forgotten in the ﬁeld. These
must be left for “the poor and the stranger” (Lev. 19:10), for “the stranger,
the fatherless, and the widow” (Deut. 24:19).
In Deuteronomy 15:7–8, the Torah mandates that the poor must be helped
not only by providing them with agricultural produce, but by ensuring
their access to loans. The wealthy are obligated to lend money to the poor:
“If, however, there is a needy person among you, one of your kinsmen . . .
48 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
do not harden your heart and shut your hand against your needy kinsman.
But you shall surely open (patoah tiftah) your hand unto him, and shall
surely lend him (haavet taavitenu) sufﬁcient for his needs, for whatever he
needs” (Deut. 15:7–8).
Later in the chapter, we will examine these verses and delve into the
question of why loans are emphasized, as opposed to outright donations.
The lending mandated by the Bible has a markedly social character:
lending on interest is forbidden. Charging interest is compared
metaphorically to the lender’s taking a bite out of the borrower; one
biblical Hebrew term for interest is neshekh kesef, literally, “a bite of money.”
Loaning money to the poor is mandated for social reasons, not as a
mechanism for advancing the lender’s economic interests.
This is also evident from the laws governing the manner in which loans
are to be collected, laws that protect the debtor and his dignity, for example,
the prohibition against the creditor’s entering the debtor’s home to seize a
pledged object (i.e., collateral), and the creditor’s obligation to return the
debtor’s collateral to him every evening, if the debtor needs it to sustain
himself (Deut. 24:10–13).
Remission of loans
Not only does the Torah prescribe the granting of loans; it also mandates
that loans be forgiven once every seven years, at the time of the Sabbatical
year. All debts are nulliﬁed and debtors can work on their own behalf
rather than for their creditors: “Every seventh year you shall practice
remission of debts. This shall be the nature of the remission: every creditor
shall remit the due that he claims from his fellow; he shall not dun his
fellow or kinsman, for the remission proclaimed is of the Lord” (Deut.
Although the Torah is replete with precepts and mechanisms whose
primary or secondary purpose is to care for the weaker classes within
society, it nowhere considers the underlying socioeconomic philosophy.
Indeed, Jewish law in general, and its biblical stratum in particular, says
little about the theoretical concepts on which its various legal institutions
rest. To reconstruct these concepts, we must analyze the relevant precepts,
laws, and jurisprudential arrangements, and attempt to extract the relevant
principles. In the following sections of this chapter, we will seek to
articulate some of the socioeconomic principles that can be inferred from
the Torah’s social injunctions, in part, by comparing them to parallel
provisions of other ancient Near Eastern legal systems.6
6 This comparison is subject, however, to one important qualification: the Torah, to a certain
extent, represents an ideal legal system, not expressly related to the existence of an actual
government with funds to distribute.
Charity and distributive justice 49
2.2 Social justice as a legal issue
A wide range of actions intended to help the weaker social strata were
known in early antiquity: declaring a remission of debts, freeing prisoners
and slaves, suspending taxes, and more. In some languages and at some
places, measures such as these were referred to with the very rubric used
in the Bible: “to do justice in the land.”7 Ancient Near East scholars have
pointed out that these practices, while intended help the weak, take place
within a political context. They are always effected by decree of the king
and at his initiative. It is the monarch who decides whether, when, and
how the weaker classes should be helped; see Appendix.
Acts intended to generate social reforms were taken when the king saw
ﬁt, or more accurately, when he saw the need or the opportunity to endear
himself to his subjects and ensure the tranquility of his kingdom: on
ascending to the throne, say, or at times of war.8 Bestowing such concessions
allowed the king to advance his own political interests while clothing his
machinations in the rhetoric of social justice.
Another substantial difference between the proclamation of “liberty”
in Egypt and Mesopotamia and in Israel was that the motivation for
this proclamation among the kings of the ancient Near East was the
wish of the monarchs to win over the hearts of the people . . . which
explains why this was usually done when they ascended the throne.
While the kings ameliorated the condition of the poor by establishing
“uprightness” or “freedom,” their motivation for this was the wish to
appear in the eyes of the people as just and upright kings, and not a
genuine concern for improving the lot of the poor among their people.
In ancient Greece, where this practice also took root, the tendency of
the rulers to act in this way was looked upon with suspicion, for which
reason the institution of cancellation of debts was a punishable offense,
and anyone attempting to realize it was cursed.9
The biblical approach differs markedly. While the social measures
legislated in the Torah were for the most part familiar—remission of debts,
emancipation of slaves, restoration of property to its owners, and so on—
the initiative for implementing these steps is no longer the king’s, but a
matter of statutory law. The Bible regularizes acts of social justice. The
steps to be taken, and the timing of these steps, are no longer discretionary,
but ﬁxed and known in advance to all. The ruler cannot take such steps
7 See M. Weinfeld, Social Justice in Ancient Israel and in the Ancient Near East (Minneapolis and
Jerusalem: 1995), 75, 84.
8 Biblical examples include Pharaoh’s freeing prisoners on his birthday (Genesis 40:20), and
Ahasuerus’ proclaiming a tax amnesty in honor of the new queen’s coronation (Esther
9 Weinfeld, n. 7 above, 11.
50 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
whenever he ﬁnds it politically expedient, but is required to abide by the
In bringing actions undertaken for the beneﬁt of the weak under the
umbrella of the law, the biblical approach to social justice was tantamount
to a revolution. It ensured that the measures in question indeed served
their declared purpose, and were not undertaken merely to advance the
interests of the throne. To further enhance provision of social assistance,
the biblical system also set in place other principles, to which we now turn.
2.3 Personal responsibility
Who bears ﬁnancial responsibility for supporting the disadvantaged? On
the biblical model, are those in need to seek out wealthy individuals for
help, or can they seek succor from an anonymous source, such as a charity
Personal responsibility is a central pillar of the Torah’s social legislation.
Responsibility for helping the disadvantaged falls not on public institutions,
but squarely on the shoulders of the individual, who is obligated to help
the poor and needy with whom he comes in personal contact. The Torah
does not mandate establishment of public institutions for collecting money
from the wealthy and distributing it to the poor, but rather, the transfer is
This is evident, for example, in the precepts of gleanings, forgotten
produce, and corners of the ﬁeld. These commandments, as we saw,
obligate the owner of a ﬁeld to set aside a portion of his yield for the poor.
This portion is transferred directly to the poor, with no mediation: “When
you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap all the way to the
edges of your ﬁeld, or gather the gleanings of your harvest. You shall not
pick your vineyard bare, or gather the fallen fruit of your vineyard; you
shall leave them for the poor and the stranger. . .” (Lev. 19:9–10).
This policy of direct contact between helper and beneﬁciary is manifest
in the formulation of the obligation to lend to the poor: “do not harden
your heart and shut your hand against your needy kinsman” (Deut. 15:7).
Maimonides articulates this obligation more explicitly still: “He who,
seeing a poor man begging, turns his eyes away from him and fails to give
him alms, transgresses a negative commandment, as it is said, ‘Do not
harden your heart and shut your hand against your needy kinsman.’”10
Note that the biblical verse Maimonides invokes terms the poor person
“your kinsman,” even though it is not referring literally to a member of the
wealthy person’s family. This device is used often in the Bible, as when
fellow Israelites are referred to as “your brother” or “your friend.” The
family metaphor evokes social solidarity, and sends a message of
interpersonal responsibility. When a needy person approaches his wealthy
10 Code, Laws concerning Gifts to the Poor 7:2.
Charity and distributive justice 51
neighbor for assistance, he need not hope the latter will exhibit good will
and generosity, but can rely on the legal obligation imposed by the Torah.
Only much later do we see the rise of communal institutions such as
charity funds, that serve as intermediaries between rich and poor.
In effect, the Torah broadens the scope of the social assistance that
has up to this point been viewed as the province of the ruler, requiring it
to be extended to the needy by their fellows.11 This policy is not due to a
lack of familiarity with the concept of public funding, which is indeed
invoked in other biblical contexts. The story of Joseph recounted in
Genesis, for instance, features public funding. Joseph, serving in a public
capacity in Egypt, amasses a large quantity of grain during the years of
abundance to ensure the Egyptians’ survival during the coming years of
famine.12 Similarly, the Israelites’ construction of the Tabernacle in the
desert was accomplished through a public fund that solicited valuables
from the Israelites. Thus the concept of a publicly funded institution
was by no means unfamiliar, and could have been harnessed to support
the needy. Yet in all matters related to support for the disadvantaged,
the Bible deliberately chooses to impose responsibility directly on the
This policy creates direct personal contact between the two sides of the
socioeconomic divide. One who has means cannot avoid his disadvantaged
neighbor by telling him to direct his requests to the public authorities, but
must look him in the eye and open his purse to his needs. In section 10
below, where we examine the social institutions established by the Sages,
we will consider the extent to which this ‘personal responsibility’ principle
was preserved in the post-biblical period.
2.4 Sustenance and rehabilitation
Having deﬁned the source of funding for provision of assistance to the
needy, we must consider the purposes for which this aid is provided. In
what respects are the needy to be assisted, and how is the mandated
assistance designed to meet those goals?
The precepts related to social justice can be divided into two groups
with complementary goals. One goal can be termed ‘sustaining the poor,’
that is, ensuring at least a minimal standard of living: a small amount of
food (through the precepts of gleanings, forgotten produce, and corners of
the ﬁeld13) and a weekly day of rest, the Sabbath. The Sabbath ensures that
even someone who engages in arduous physical labor from dawn to dusk
11 Weinfeld, n. 7 above, 17.
12 See Genesis 41. The food was not provided gratis, but this does not detract from the fact
that this was a publicly-run aid operation.
13 As is clear from the account in the biblical Book of Ruth, the amount of food this yields is
meager, sufficient only for day-to-day survival.
52 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
is not entirely consumed by the burden of work, with no respite. Indeed,
the biblical passage ordaining observance of the Sabbath sets out the social
rationale: rest is the right of all, including slaves: “But the seventh day is a
Sabbath of the Lord your God; you shall not do any work . . . so that your
male and female slave may rest as you do” (Deut. 5:14).14
The second goal of the social justice precepts can be termed ‘rehabilitating
the poor.’ The disadvantaged are not to be given goods for immediate use,
but means of production that will enable them, in the long run, to attain
greater ﬁnancial independence. Thus in the Jubilee year, for instance,
land—the primary means of production in an agrarian society—is returned
to those who have lost it, and further, the freedom to work the land on his
own behalf, and not for a master, is restored to the owner, giving him the
opportunity to provide for his family.
Another example is the precept of manumission. As we saw, the Bible
speciﬁes that an emancipated slave must be given goods from among his
master’s assets: “When you set him free, do not let him go empty-handed:
Furnish him out of the ﬂock, threshing ﬂoor, and vat” (Deut. 15:13–14).
This precept seeks to rehabilitate the freed slave, ensuring his short-term
economic security so he can direct his attention to ﬁnding work and getting
established. Were he manumitted empty-handed, he would have to spend
his initial days of freedom gleaning a small amount of food and seeking
shelter; before long, he might be deterred, and return to his former master.
The precept mandating that departing slaves be given provisions to sustain
them transforms their freedom from nominal to genuine.
Another rehabilitative precept is that concerning the seventh-year
remission of loans. This measure enables those trapped in a cycle of debt—
taking one loan to pay off another—to escape and start afresh. It does not
provide them with goods that can be used in the short term, but rather
affords them the opportunity to labor on their own behalf, and not simply
to repay creditors.
A contemporary institution somewhat similar to remission of debt is
that of bankruptcy. An insolvent debtor can be declared a bankrupt by the
court. His debts are forgiven, and he can turn over a new leaf. But there are
important differences between the two institutions. The biblical precept of
loan remission is intended to provide an across-the-board social mechanism
by which the vicious circle of borrowing in order to pay off debt will be
preempted or dramatically reduced. By contrast, bankruptcy is intended
as an ad hoc life preserver, as it were, for individual debtors who have
become insolvent. Remission of loans takes place according to a regular
14 Unlike the rationale given in Deuteronomy, the rationale for Sabbath rest set forth in
Exodus 20:8–10 is emulation of God’s rest following His creation of the world. This is not
a social rationale, and no distinction is drawn between the worker’s rest and that of his
employer—the precept encompasses both. There is, however, no contradiction, as the two
rationales can be seen as complementary, and many so interpret them.
Charity and distributive justice 53
schedule known in advance, whereas bankruptcy comes into play only
when someone can no longer pay his debts, and its occurrence cannot be
The historical context is, of course, pertinent to understanding the
institutions in question. During the biblical period, only the poor borrowed
money, and they did so solely in order to provide themselves with the
necessities of life. Later on, however, loans became an economic engine:
people from every social stratum took out loans, often for the purpose of
generating proﬁt and increasing their earning power.
2.5 The recipient’s responsibility
We have surveyed the various precepts that obligate the wealthy to provide
a safety net for the disadvantaged. Parallel obligations are imposed on the
needy, effectively conditioning assistance on their active cooperation.
Recipients of charity must join in the effort to rehabilitate them, that is,
they must help themselves.
This is manifest in the precepts of gleanings, forgotten produce, and
corners of the ﬁeld. Although these mandate transferring to the poor goods
meant for use in the short term, the manner in which the produce is
provided ensures the beneﬁciary’s participation in the process. Farmers
are obligated to give of their yield to a needy neighbor, but the Torah does
not require them to harvest the grain and bring it to the recipient. Indeed,
they are not even required to harvest it and leave it at the entrance to the
ﬁeld for the poor to come and take. Rather, the precept calls for the farmer
to leave unharvested produce in the ﬁeld, so the needy can actively take
part in the harvesting process. The precept, in other words, commands the
landowner to provide his poor neighbors with work—their wage being
the produce that they gather. One who is indigent yet too lazy to go out to
the ﬁeld and work with the reapers will derive no beneﬁt from the precepts
of gleanings, forgotten produce, and corners of the ﬁeld.
This conclusion is reinforced by the sharp contrast between the manner
in which these gifts are given to the poor, and the manner in which priestly
gifts (terumot [sing., teruma]) and levitical tithes (maasrot [sing., maaser]) are
supplied to their recipients. Unlike the poor, the priests and Levites are
given harvested, ready-to-eat produce; they need not participate in
harvesting the ﬁeld (Num. 18:8, 11–13). Indeed, the Sages went further,
actually prohibiting the priests and Levites from participating in the
harvesting process. Maimonides ruled similarly: “Priests and Levites
are forbidden to serve as helpers at the threshing ﬂoor so that they can
receive the gifts due them [more quickly]. . . . The Israelite too is forbidden
to allow them to help him; rather, he should give them their share with
15 Code, Laws concerning Heave Offerings 12:18.
54 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
What explains the difference between the rule governing gifts of produce
to the needy, who must participate in harvesting the ﬁeld, and that
governing tithes and heave offerings given to the priests and Levites, who
receive their shares of the harvest ready-to-use? The priests and Levites
do sacred work (see Num. 18:21), and the produce given them is com-
pensation for this work. Accordingly, they are not required to perform any
additional labor, such as working in the ﬁeld, to obtain it. The needy,
however, receive the produce as a donation rather than as wages, and must
therefore join in harvesting the ﬁeld, thereby contributing and helping
themselves, so to speak.
Another instance in which the beneﬁciary is required to take on
responsibility with respect to a donation is the precept of loaning money,
an important precept that constitutes the source for the later laws referred
to as the laws of charity. It is not always recognized that there is no biblical
commandment mandating that money be donated—given—to the poor.
The Sages derive this obligation from the passage in Deuteronomy that
sets forth the obligation to loan money (interest-free, of course) to the
If, however, there is a needy person among you, one of your kinsmen
in any of your settlements in the land that the Lord your God is giving
you, do not harden your heart and shut your hand against your needy
But you shall surely open (patoah tiftah) your hand unto him, and
shall surely lend him (haavet taavitenu) sufﬁcient for his needs, for
whatever he needs. Beware lest you harbor the base thought in your
heart, saying, ‘The seventh year, the year of remission, is approaching,’
and are thus mean to your needy kinsman and give him nothing. And
he will cry out to the Lord against you, and you will have transgressed.
But you must surely give him, and your heart should not be grudging
when you do so, for because of this act, the Lord your God will bless
you in all your deeds and in all your undertakings.
These verses mandate that monetary assistance be provided to the poor.
The Torah recognizes that the giver may resist doing so out of concern that,
due to the forthcoming Sabbatical year remission of loans, any money lent
out will be forfeited, and seeks to allay these concerns by promising that
all the giver’s endeavors will be blessed. Clearly, then, the precept in
question refers to assistance in the form of a loan, which is subject to
remission, rather than an outright gift, which is not affected by the law of
Moreover, the Hebrew verb translated as “you shall surely lend him”—
haavet taavitenu—is derived from the root av”t, meaning ‘collateral,’
something given to the lender as a pledge that the loan will be repaid. That
Charity and distributive justice 55
is, the literal meaning of the verse is “you shall take collateral against the
loan you are obligated to grant him.” And indeed, this is how the great
medieval exegete R. Abraham ibn Ezra interpreted it: “you shall give him
[something that is] yours in exchange for his collateral. And [the meaning
of ] “taavitenu” is “accept his collateral.”16
What, then, is the essence of the assistance that is rendered to the needy
by loaning them money? A loan will provide effective aid only if the
borrower is prepared to keep his nose to the grindstone and use the loan
productively, so that he can both repay the loan and beneﬁt from its
potential fruits. If the borrower tries to beneﬁt from the loan immediately,
it is likely that when the time for repayment comes, he will be left with
nothing, or more likely, with a loan he cannot repay. Granted, a borrower
struggling to repay a loan can rely on the fact that it will ultimately be
remitted and thus transformed, in effect, into a donation; but this will not
occur until the Sabbatical year, and does not relieve the borrower of the
responsibility to work hard to pay off the loan in the intervening years.
Loans, like gleanings, forgotten produce, and corners of the ﬁeld, provide
the needy with effective assistance only to the extent that the beneﬁciaries
themselves actively work to reap the beneﬁts in question.
2.6 Social stratification
We have seen that the Pentateuchal teachings on social justice seek to
provide the poor with sustenance and rehabilitation, while imposing on
them the responsibility of taking an active part in this enterprise. Let us
now consider the formula for transferring resources to the poor and
distributing these resources among them.
An important principle of the Torah’s social legislation, a principle
retained in the Rabbinic literature, is that assistance is provided in
accordance with individual needs, which are not necessarily the same in
all cases. Equality between rich and poor is not aspired to or achieved, and
indeed, neither is equality among the poor themselves. In other words, the
biblical outlook seeks to assist the disadvantaged classes while accepting
the socioeconomic stratiﬁcation that occurs naturally in every society.
Can the mechanisms outlined above, such as the Jubilee year, the eman-
cipation of slaves, and donation of corners of the ﬁeld, prevent the con-
centration of wealth within speciﬁc social strata? It seems not. The Jubilee
year makes it impossible to accumulate vast holdings of land and slaves,
and the remission of loans precludes the accumulation of large numbers
of outstanding promissory notes; but the Bible does not rule out the
16 As we will soon see, this construal of the verse diverges from the Sages’ exegetical
interpretation of the verse. The Sages’ reading of the precept is apparent in Rashi’s com-
ment: “You shall surely lend him”—if he does not want to accept it as a gift, give it to him
as a loan.”
56 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
possibility of accumulating other sorts of wealth known in the ancient
world: silver and gold, precious stones, cattle and sheep, chattels. Nowhere
is redistribution of these assets mandated. Hence one who wishes to pro-
tect his wealth, that is, remove it from the purview of the social justice
precepts, can do so by accumulating precious metals, animals, and mov-
able property. The biblical social justice directives seek to preempt the
dominance of a small group over the means of production and other ele-
ments of economic independence, but not to prevent people from becom-
ing wealthy by accumulating other goods. We see, in fact, in the patriarchal
narratives in Genesis, that wealth is characteristic of those who serve God,
and connotes blessedness. Although it seeks to rehabilitate the poor, the
biblical text does not disparage wealth per se.
Moreover, even in the context of the social precepts intended to give
the poor a chance at rehabilitation, the opportunities provided are not
necessarily the same for all. Consider, for example, remission of loans in
the Sabbatical year. This process affords all debtors the possibility of
turning over a new leaf, but even so, it must be kept in mind that not
everyone is on the same footing initially. That is, the playing ﬁeld is not
completely level to begin with. Remitting the debts of one who has
nothing does not have the same force as remitting the debts of one who
owns land or animals. For the latter, debt remission constitutes an
opportunity to utilize the means of production he owns, which he can
now employ for his own rather than his creditors’ beneﬁt. Remission of
debts frees debtors from loans that enslaved them and prevented them
from taking advantage of their own resources. Those who lack such
resources remain relatively disadvantaged even after their debts have
This is also true of the Jubilee year, when all regain the land that was
their ancestral inheritance. The land one is allocated depends entirely on
his family, and the redistribution is not proportionate to the holdings
of one’s neighbors. Thus the precept of the Jubilee year is in no sense
egalitarian. A member of a large family with many heirs will receive a
smaller portion than a member of a smaller family with fewer heirs to
share in the ancestral holding. Clearly, then, the biblical vision of social
justice sanctions socioeconomic inequities, and allows the continuation of
naturally-occurring social stratiﬁcation.
3 The introduction of charity laws during the Rabbinic period
The Bible’s protagonists are often shepherds and farmers, and most of its
social justice precepts are tied to the world of farming. The Mishnah,
compiled in the land of Israel at the end of the second century CE, likewise
makes laws related to agriculture the focus of measures intended to beneﬁt
the disadvantaged. The principal tractates that manifest concern for the
disadvantaged are found in the ‘Order’ Zeraim (Seeds), which deals with
Charity and distributive justice 57
the laws of agricultural produce; this concern is especially pronounced in
tractate Peia (Corner [of the ﬁeld]).
Various developments in Jewish society in the land of Israel during the
second century CE, however, especially increasing poverty—reﬂected in
both the number of the poor and the severity of their situation—set in
motion a shift away from the primarily agrarian economy. This in turn
gave rise to a need for different mechanisms to support the poor, chief
among them being the distribution of money rather than produce. E.E.
Urbach summarizes this transition as follows:
The Jewish community in the land of Israel suffered greatly as a result
of the wars that took place during the second century CE, and certainly
did not enjoy the full beneﬁt of the economic prosperity then prevalent
in the Roman Empire. Its situation became even worse when things
overall took a turn for the worse. . . . The harsh economic conditions
and the pervasive poverty created increasing demand for individual
acts of charity, and for formulation of laws of community and
institutional charity. The destruction of the Temple put an end to the
income the poor had earned from activities related to the sacriﬁcial
service and other Temple rituals. The dispossession of many farmers
increased the rolls of the needy and diminished their income from the
‘gifts for the poor’ [i.e., gleanings, forgotten produce, and corners of
the ﬁeld] that were related to working the land; the urban population
received just a small fraction of these ‘gifts.’ . . . It stands to reason that
the laws of the public welfare funds [tamhui and kupa, explained
below] and the obligations of town dwellers with respect to charity
were reformulated following the destruction [of the Temple].17
To this must be added Hillel the Elder’s famous prozbul enactment. The
Mishnah recounts how Hillel saw that the law of debt remission was doing
borrowers more harm than good—lenders, apprehensive that borrowers’
ﬁnancial obligations would be nulliﬁed by the Sabbatical year, were
unwilling to lend. In response, he devised a legal mechanism, the prozbul,
that made it possible for creditors to continue to enforce their rights
despite the Sabbatical year. The enactment was a broadening of the
Rabbinic rule that promissory notes submitted to the court for collection
were not nulliﬁed by the Sabbatical year. The Mishnah describes the
prozbul as follows:
This was one of the measures enacted by Hillel the Elder; for when he
observed people refraining from lending to one another, and thus
17 E.E. Urbach, “Religious and social tendencies in the Sages’ teachings on charity”
(Hebrew), in E.E. Urbach, World of the Sages: Collected Studies (Hebrew), (Jerusalem: 2002),
58 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
transgressing what is written in the Torah, ‘Beware lest you harbor the
base thought in your heart . . .’ (Deut. 15:9), he instituted the prozbul.
This is the formula of the prozbul: ‘I declare before you, so-and-so,
judges of such-and-such a place, regarding any debt due me, that
I shall collect it whenever I wish.’ And the judges sign below, or the
Of course, in effect, this spelled the end of debt remission, depriving those
most likely to have debts—that is, the needy—of an important protective
mechanism, and it became necessary to create some alternative means of
providing them with assistance.
These processes herald the beginning of the laws of charity. There are a
few instances where the Mishnah, in passing, discusses the obligation to
give alms and provide for other essential needs of the poor. At the end of
tractate Peia, for example, after discussion of the laws related to providing
agricultural produce to the poor, we ﬁnd a Mishnah that speaks of the
obligation to provide food and shelter to the poor. This Mishnah even
attests to the existence of public welfare institutions, referred to by the
Sages as the “communal fund” (kupa) and the “soup kitchen” (tamhui):
One may not give an itinerant poor person less than a loaf worth a
pondion, when four seahs [of wheat cost] one sela. If he stays the night,
one must give him the cost of what he needs for a night. If he stays
over the Sabbath, he is given food for three meals. He who has the
means for two meals, may not take anything from the soup kitchen
(tamhui); and he who has the means for fourteen meals, may not take
anything from the communal fund (kupa). The communal fund is
collected by two people and distributed by three.
Elsewhere, apropos discussion of parents’ ﬁnancial obligations to their
children, the Mishnah addresses the obligation to provide ﬁnancial support
to poor brides:
If a man gave his daughter in marriage without specifying any
conditions, he may give her no less than ﬁfty zuz. If he arranged to
have him [the groom] take her in unprovided-for [lit., naked], the
groom may not say ‘when I have taken her into my house, I shall
clothe her with clothes myself,’ but must provide her with the clothing
while she is still in her father’s house. So too if one gives an orphaned
girl in marriage, he [the treasurer of the charity fund] may give her no
less than ﬁfty zuz. If funds are available, she is to be outﬁtted in
accordance with the dignity of her position.
Charity and distributive justice 59
The term “charity” (tzedaka) and the institution of “charity collectors”
(gabaei tzedaka) are mentioned several other times in the Mishnah, always
in passing and without any comprehensive discussion of the laws of
charity. More extensive references to charity as an institution appear in the
Tosefta, but the matter received no systematic treatment until the Gemara.
It seems, therefore, that charity as an institution emerged slowly within
Jewish society, in response to the waning importance of the agricultural
precepts and the inadequacy of the support they afforded the needy. One
of the questions that will occupy us in the next section is whether the laws
of charity are a continuation of the distributive justice mechanisms
established in the Bible, or should be seen as a new paradigm.
4 Charity: ‘between man and God’ or ‘between
man and his fellow’?
Social actions that are to be undertaken within the framework of a
religious legal system invite consideration of their nature and purpose.
Do they represent a system of norms whose purpose is societal, that is,
to improve the situation of certain classes within society; or is their pur-
pose religious, namely, to bring an individual’s conduct and character
closer to that prescribed by his faith? In halakhic terminology, this ques-
tion can be formulated as follows: is the obligation to donate to the poor to
be understood as a precept that is ‘between man and his fellow,’ that is,
a precept whose purpose is to help one’s fellow man, or is it to be seen as
a precept that is between man and God, that is, intended to foster conform-
ity between the individual and the divine will?18
Though the religious and social objectives of charity need not be
mutually exclusive, how much emphasis is to be placed on each is not
simply a theoretical question, and may have actual legal consequences.
Moreover, differential emphasis may explain why the Jewish legal tradition
stresses the social effects of charity—sustaining and rehabilitating the
poor—whereas the Christian tradition tends to emphasize charity’s inner
effect on the donor’s soul and character.
Indeed, we ﬁnd that the obligation to give charity is understood in many
different ways in the various Rabbinic sources. Some see it as a social
18 Of course, the question can be asked, not just vis-à-vis societal precepts, but about all
religiously-mandated acts: we can ask of what appear to be purely ritual acts, for instance,
eating matza, whether they have a societal purpose, and we can ask of manifestly rational
acts mandated by biblical law, for instance, respecting one’s parents and returning lost
objects, whether they also have a religious role, viz., whether they are intended to bring
us closer to God as are ritual precepts such as observing the Sabbath, waving the lulav,
and eating matza. The degree to which the religious aspects of Jewish law can be sepa-
rated from its more conventionally ‘legal’ aspects is the subject of debate among contem-
porary scholars, see H. Ben-Menahem, “Is talmudic law a religious legal system? A
provisional analysis,” 24 Journal of Law and Religion (2009), 379–402.
60 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
obligation, others, as a religious duty, and others still, as an ethical mandate.
In Rabbinic terminology, the latter is evocatively referred to as a matter
‘between man and himself.’ Let us consider an example.
R. Joshua b. Korha said: How do we know that whoever closes his eyes
to [the need to give] charity is like one who engages in idolatrous
worship? As it is said, “Beware lest you harbor the base (beliyaal)
thought in your heart, saying [‘The seventh year, the year of remission,
is approaching,’ and are thus mean to your needy kinsman and give
him nothing]” (Deut. 15:9); and it is said, “some base fellows (bnei
beliyaal) from among you have gone [and subverted the inhabitants of
their town, saying, ‘Let us go and worship other gods, which you have
not known’]” (Deut. 13:14). Just as “beliyaal” there refers to idolatry, so
too “beliyaal” here refers to idolatry.
tPeia 4:20 (Zuckermandel edition)
It seems that R. Joshua b. Korha emphasizes the religious aspect of the
precept of giving charity: seeking to heighten the importance of charity,
he compares the act of withholding it to idolatry, one of the gravest
transgressions. But note that though he could have compared withholding
charity to committing murder, another such grave offense19—he speciﬁcally
invoked idolatry—repudiation of the Creator.
R. Joshua (to be distinguished from R. Joshua b Korha) notes the beneﬁt
received by the donor himself from the act of giving, thereby emphasizing
the ethical–educational dimension of charity. As he sees it, the charitable
act’s contribution to reﬁning the donor’s character is greater than its
ﬁnancial contribution to the recipient:
R. Joshua taught: More than the master of the house does for the poor
person, the poor person does for the master of the house.
Leviticus Rabbah (Vilna), parasha 34:8
As to the social perspective, below, we will examine laws whose purpose
is to ensure that donated monies reach the proper recipients and neither
remain in the hands of the funds that collected them, nor fall into the hands
of fraudulent claimants. The social quality of these laws is manifest in the
fact that they focus not only on the giving of charity, but also on its receipt
by the needy. Moreover, the Hebrew word customarily translated
as ‘charity’ (tzedaka) itself highlights the social dimension of charitable
giving, as it is derived from the lexical root tz”d”k—to do justice. Clearly, the
act of charity entails doing justice, not merely being kind or merciful.20
19 Such a comparison is indeed drawn by the Talmud in bSanhedrin 35a.
20 The meaning of tzedaka in biblical Hebrew differs from that in Rabbinic Hebrew. The Bible
uses the word primarily to refer to the doing of justice and righteousness; e.g., “Thus said
Charity and distributive justice 61
In some cases, however, as exempliﬁed by the following law from
the Shulhan Arukh, the rationales for the mandated charitable acts are
One who wishes to acquire merit for himself should subjugate his evil
impulse and open his hand wide; and everything done for the sake of
heaven should be done in a good and lovely way. If he builds a
synagogue, it should be nicer than his home. If he feeds the hungry, he
should do so from the best and sweetest foods on his table. If he clothes
the naked, he should clothe him with the most beautiful of his
garments. If he dedicates something [for sacred use], he should
dedicate the choicest of his assets. As it is said: “All fat is the Lord’s”
Shulhan Arukh, YD 248:8
Clearly, this law reﬂects the ethical and religious objectives of the precept
of giving charity. There is no social-welfare justiﬁcation for giving the poor
person the best of the donor’s food or garments; rather, the rationale for
doing so is to train one to overcome his egoism, acknowledge that his sus-
tenance comes from God, and cultivate generosity and selﬂessness.
In determining the primary objective of the laws of charity, it should
also be noted that the Sages took steps to ensure that the funds would
reach the intended recipients, and would not fall into the wrong hands,
that is, would not be diverted to the pockets of the collectors, or wind
up in the hands of scammers feigning poverty. The Sages set in place
a system of checks and balances to preclude such eventualities, even if
this entailed reducing the net amount of money distributed to the needy,
or a delay in its delivery. For example, charitable funds are to be adminis-
tered by committee rather than by individuals, so that the collectors
will exercise oversight over each other and preempt misappropriation
More importantly, the Rabbis also established that the credibility of
those seeking charity must be investigated, to be sure that funds are not
distributed to those who do not meet the appropriate criteria, though an
exception is made for situations in which the urgency of the need does not
allow for such investigation.
R. Huna said: Applicants for food are investigated, but not applicants
for clothing. . . . And Rav Judah said: applicants for clothing are
investigated, but not applicants for food. . . . It has been taught in
the Lord: Do what is just (mishpat) and right (tzedaka); rescue from the defrauder him who
is robbed; do not wrong the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow; commit no lawless
act, and do not shed the blood of the innocent in this place” (Jer. 22:3). The Sages, in con-
trast, appropriated the word to refer to the giving of gifts to the poor.
62 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
accordance with the view of Rav Judah: If someone says, ‘Clothe me,’
he is investigated, [if he says], ‘Feed me,’ he is not investigated.
bBaba Batra 9a
The existence of such checks and balances supports the thesis that the
primary objective of the laws of charity is social, namely, sustenance of
the needy. Charitable donations that fall into the wrong hands make no
contribution to the sustenance of the needy; they have no social value.
Though such donations may indeed foster or attest to the donors’ virtue
and selﬂessness, from a social point of view they constitute an undesirable
transfer of welfare funds to those not entitled to them. The law therefore
seeks to minimize them. Here we can see a concrete legal consequence
of the difference, noted by Urbach, between the approaches to charity
underlying Jewish and Christian legal thinking. Christianity empha-
sized the love and kindness that are manifested in the charitable act,
and therefore assigned less weight to the donation’s reaching its inten-
ded recipient.21 In contrast, the halakha focused on charity as a mech-
anism for social betterment, and hence conditioned discharge of
the precept of giving charity on the donation’s reaching its intended
5 Compulsory charity
If the system for transferring funds from rich to poor is to achieve its social
goals effectively, it cannot rely solely on the good will and charitable
impulses of the wealthy, who may not be responsive when the needy
require assistance. It must, therefore, have recourse to coercion. It might
be thought that the notion of the enforcement of charity is an oxymoron.
And indeed, if the emphasis is placed on charity as a manifestation of
the donor’s character, the laws of charity will likely be based on voluntary
giving. If, on the other hand, the primary goal is support for the disadvan-
taged, the laws of charity may mandate coerced donations. This notion
was heatedly debated in the Rabbinic sources:
As was stated by R. Nahman in the name of Rabbah b. Abuha . . . [the
collectors] can seize [his possessions] as a charitable donation even on
the eve of the Sabbath. Is that so? Is it not written, “I will punish all
that oppress them” (Jer. 30:20), even, said R. Isaac b. Samuel b. Marta
in the name of Rav, charity collectors?! There is no contradiction: the
21 “Charity was not meant to end poverty but to manifest and arouse love. . . . The goal of the
act of charity was not to ensure the welfare of the other and enhance his condition; it was
to ensure the salvation of the donor and the redemption of his soul. . . . The powerful mis-
sionary spirit that drove [the Church] did not allow it to examine the sources of income
of charitable donors or the actions of the recipients. It opened its hands to all who
requested assistance, imposing no conditions” (Urbach, n. 17 above, 113, 118.)
Charity and distributive justice 63
one [R. Nahman] speaks of someone well-to-do, the other of someone
not well-to-do; as, for instance, when Rava compelled R. Nathan
b. Ami to give 400 zuz to charity.
bBaba Batra 8b
In R. Nahman’s view, it is permissible to collateralize a charitable obliga-
tion, that is, to attach money or property that is to be contributed to the
charitable fund. R. Nahman adds that this may be done even on the eve
of the Sabbath—a time of feverish preparation for the approaching
Sabbath, when it is least convenient for the property owner to pay his
charitable obligations, especially by having his assets seized. But the
eve of the Sabbath is precisely when the poor are most in need of assist-
ance. The ruling that charitable contributions may be seized even on the
eve of the Sabbath emphasizes the sweeping extent to which the laws of
charity are enforced, the donor’s convenience being scarcely taken into
R. Isaac, on the other hand, appears to reject coerced charity. Not content
with simply contending that enforcement is inappropriate, he goes further
and compares charity collectors to the worst of Israel’s enemies: those who
devour the people of Israel, ﬁght them, prey upon them, and plunder their
possessions (Jer. 30:16–20). R. Isaac’s exegesis, in invoking these verses
apropos charity collectors, indirectly ascribes to them an odious proﬁle:
vile and reprehensible, they are destined to be punished by God. R. Isaac
is thus expressing great hostility to the institution of charity collectors. On
his view, a completely voluntary system of charity, uncoerced by the
communal leadership, would be preferable.
The Talmud tries to resolve the controversy between R. Nahman and
R. Isaac by distinguishing one who is well-to-do from one who is not.
Charity may be coerced only from the former, who clearly has the
wherewithal to pay. Still, a critical reading suggests that the Talmud
favors R. Nahman’s approach, which upholds enforcement of the laws
of charity as a matter of principle. Exempting those who lack the
wherewithal to contribute is a reasonable qualiﬁcation of the principle that
charitable giving can be coerced, but in no way detracts from its main
This conclusion is underscored by the reference to the case of the Amora
Rava, who used coercion to extract a charitable contribution of 400 zuz
from another Amora, R. Nathan b. Ami. We know from elsewhere in the
Talmud22 that Rava was one of R. Nathan b. Ami’s teachers, thus this is not
merely a case of coercion, but a case of coercion of a student by his teacher;
that is, coercion within the walls of the study hall, as it were. Arguably, the
story recounts a dispute within the study hall over the question of coerced
charity, a dispute resolved by Rava’s treatment of his student.
22 bShabat 103b; bKidushin 30a.
64 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
Although the Talmud decided that charitable donations may be coerced,
the post-talmudic halakhic decisors continued to debate the issue. The
point of departure for their analysis was the incompatibility between the
rule that charity can be coerced, and another talmudic dictum: “It has been
taught, every positive commandment whose reward is explicitly stated in
Scripture does not fall within the jurisdiction of the earthly court” (bHulin
110b). In other words, a precept whose reward is stated in the Torah is not
subject to enforcement by the court, on the premise that the reward set out
in the Torah will sufﬁce as motivation to fulﬁll the precept. But if so, the
decisors asked, how can the precept of charity be enforced, when the Torah
explicitly states, “But you must surely give him, and your heart should not
be grudging when you do so, for because of this act, the Lord your
God will bless you in all your deeds and in all your undertakings” (Deut.
15:10)? The Tosafot suggest several ways to resolve the apparent
One approach argues that charity is indeed enforceable, and the “every
positive commandment” rule from tractate Hulin does not apply to it.
Various reasons are put forward. The Tosaﬁst R. Isaac b. Samuel, known
as Ri the Elder, explains that the precept of charity comprises both a
positive commandment (to give charity) and a negative commandment
(not to disregard the poor), and the negative commandment, at least, can
be enforced. Another Tosaﬁst, R. Isaac b. Abraham, offers a different
explanation: a court is not required to enforce a precept whose reward is
articulated explicitly, but is permitted to do so if it sees ﬁt. Both agree that
it is clearly permissible to compel the afﬂuent to give charity.
Yet another approach is that of Rabbenu Tam, who maintains that,
in principle, compliance with the precept of giving charity is not to be
coerced. He explains the Gemara’s reference to enforcement as follows:
“And this is compulsion by words.”24 The talmudic concept of “compulsion
by words” refers to persuasion and verbal pressure exerted by one who is
in a position of power, as opposed to physical compulsion, coercion via
threatened harm, or the legal compulsion exerted by the court on parties
who refuse to abide by a ruling.
Ultimately, however, the debates came to an end, and the view that
charity is fully enforceable was endorsed as decided law. Maimonides
even details the enforcement measures a court can have recourse to against
one who refuses to pay his assessed charitable contribution:
He who refuses to give alms (tzedaka), or gives less than is appropriate
for him, is compelled to comply by the court, which metes out lashes
for disobedience until he gives as much as the court has assessed he
should give. And the court may go and seize his property in his
23 bBaba Batra 8b s.v. akfei.
Charity and distributive justice 65
presence and take from him that which it is appropriate for him to
give, and they can seize [his possessions] as a charitable donation even
on the eve of the Sabbath.
Code, Laws concerning Gifts to the Poor 7:10
Lashes are meted out as an in personam remedy, whereas seizure of property
is an in rem remedy. The latter ensures that even if one who is afﬂuent
refuses to cooperate with the collector, the poor will not lose out.
It is important to keep in mind that the decided law on the books was
not necessarily implemented in practice. R. Joseph Caro attested that, in
his time, charitable giving was not coerced:
The Mordekhai [R. Mordekhai b. Hillel] wrote . . . no fewer than three
[charity] collectors are to be appointed, and two brothers are not to be
appointed [as collectors], and that is the right thing to do. Still, the
practice in every place is to appoint [only] one collector. So [the
But is appears to me that since today we do not seize possessions in
lieu of a charitable contribution, it is permissible as a matter of law to
appoint [only] one collector.
Beit Yosef, Tur, YD 256
Notwithstanding the unambiguous ruling handed down by
Maimonides that charitable giving can be coerced, and his implicit
endorsement of the idea that the goal of charitable giving is, in effect,
a more equitable distribution of resources, that is, distributive
justice, echoes of the view that the laws of charity are voluntary and un-
enforceable by the communal authorities, continue to be heard. For
instance, R. Joseph Isaac Lifshitz, a present-day scholar, has argued as
The obligation to care for the poor stems from [a] sense of responsibility,
and is expressed through the act of tzedaka, or charity, in which the
individual voluntarily gives away the fruits of his labor out of concern
for his fellow man. The Jewish concept of charitable giving does not
impinge on property rights, but rather expresses the individual’s
moral duty as a responsible person. . . .
Despite the fact that charity relates to one’s money, it does not fall
into the category of civil law governing property, but of religious laws
governing moral and ritual obligations.25
Lifshitz’s view seems inconsistent with the dominant approach in the
halakhic literature, on which giving charity is a mandatory obligation,
25 Lifshitz, “Jewish economic theory,” n. 3 above, 52.
66 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
fulﬁllment of which is enforceable in the full legal sense of the term.
Nevertheless, there has long been a marked gap between the law as written
and the general practice, as it was often impossible for communal leaders
to compel the afﬂuent to give charity.
6 Determining the poverty line
6.1 Three tests for poverty
Thus far, we have considered philosophical questions related to the laws
of charity, speciﬁcally, their essential nature, objectives and enforceability;
we now turn to an examination of their substance. The ﬁrst question is that
of deﬁning ‘the poor,’ that is, those deemed poor enough to be eligible for
To gain a fuller understanding of the Sages’ views, it will be helpful to
ﬁrst present three theoretical possibilities for setting the poverty line.
One possibility is to draw a relative poverty line, as is currently done in
many welfare states, including Israel. The rationale is that poverty is a
social phenomenon and thus inherently relative; a poor person is someone
at the bottom of his community’s socioeconomic ladder. To apply this
approach to determining the poverty line, it is necessary to select
socioeconomic criteria that can be used to classify members of the society
into deciles and percentiles, and then to set the point below which
individuals or families will be considered poor and eligible for assistance.
Such assessments can be made on the basis of income, expenditure,
standard of living, personal wealth, and so on. This approach thus
measures social differences, measuring the distance between those at the
top of the ladder and those at the bottom in order to determine the extent
of poverty within society.
A second possibility is to set an absolute or ‘objective’ poverty line. On
this approach, a non-conditional deﬁnition of what is needed to maintain
a reasonable quality of life must be formulated. Here too, various criteria
can be invoked in formulating the deﬁnition. Those unable to procure the
standard in question will be considered poor and entitled to assistance, but
the size of the gap separating them from others in the community will not
be taken into account.
Naturally, the unconditional criteria will indeed reﬂect accepted, and
non-static, social norms. What were formerly considered luxuries are now
considered part of the minimum required for a reasonable quality of life.
Two centuries ago, indoor plumbing was available only to the very
wealthy; today, its absence is, in many parts of the world, an indication
of dire poverty. Even an objective poverty line, then, will be a function of
time and place. Nevertheless, the relative component of this approach
is almost imperceptible: the criteria are quite stable and do not ﬂuctuate
in accordance with changes in the standard of living of those above the
Charity and distributive justice 67
poverty line. The absolute standard is used in countries with a capitalist
orientation, such as the United States, Australia and Germany.
The third possibility is a subjective poverty line. This approach is theor-
etical, and not used by contemporary societies, but merits consideration.
It does not deﬁne poverty relative to other members of the society, or set
hard and fast objective standards for a minimally reasonable quality of life.
Instead, it takes the deﬁnition of poverty to vary from person to person.
Since every individual’s needs and abilities differ, the deﬁnition of hard-
ship and poverty must be variable, so that it can reﬂect each individual’s
subjective perception of his situation. It is easy to see that even if this
approach has theoretical merit, it would be difﬁcult, if not impossible, to
put it into practice: a society cannot be run on the basis of subjective crite-
ria that vary from person to person within the community.
6.2 The objective test
Let us now examine how the Sages determined the poverty line. A Mishnah
in tractate Peia offers three tests for poverty, each corresponding to charity
of a speciﬁc kind:
He who has food for two meals, may not take anything from the soup
kitchen (tamhui); and he who has food for fourteen meals, may not
take anything from the communal fund (kupa). . . .
He who has 200 zuz may not take gleanings, forgotten produce,
corners of the ﬁeld, or the poor man’s tithe. . . .
If his property is mortgaged to his creditors or to his wife’s ketuba,
he may take [support]. . . . . If he has 50 zuz and he uses it for business,
he may not take [support].
The ‘soup kitchen’ (tamhui) was a charitable institution that distributed
daily meals to the poor. Anyone unable to provide himself with two meals
a day (the norm at the time) was eligible for soup kitchen meals. The ‘com-
munal fund’ (kupa) was a charitable institution that distributed other
necessities to the poor on a weekly basis; accordingly, one was eligible for
such support if he lacked the fourteen meals sufﬁcient for an entire week.
Gleanings, forgotten produce, corners of the ﬁeld and the poor tithe, the
donations from agricultural produce discussed earlier in this chapter, were
distributed annually. Accordingly, the eligibility threshold is 200 zuz,
which the commentators estimated to be the sum needed at the time to live
for a year. R. Ovadiah of Bartenura ad loc. explains that this sum “sufﬁces
for one year’s clothing and food.”
The distinction in the latter part of the Mishnah is somewhat puzzling:
why does possession of 200 zuz that is mortgaged to a creditor or as surety
68 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
for ketuba monetary obligations not preclude eligibility for gifts to the poor,
whereas possession of just 50 zuz used for business dealings does? The
answer appears to be that as the 200 zuz put aside as a surety cannot be
realized until the loan is paid off, it lacks the purchasing power of 200 zuz
that has not been attached. Accordingly, possessing this attached sum does
not raise one above the poverty line. On the other hand, 50 zuz used for
commerce may have the purchasing power of 200 zuz used for ongoing
living expenses, given the potential proceeds to the investor. The
signiﬁcance of these qualiﬁcations is that the 200 zuz test is intended not
merely as a formal condition to be met by applicants, but as a substantive
indicator of an applicant’s actual ability to sustain himself.
Though each of the tests is for provision of a different type of charity, the
tests have a common denominator: they do not assess a person’s situation
relative to the community in which he lives, but only in comparison to
what is deemed to be the minimum cost of a reasonable quality of life. The
Mishnah does not set down, for example, that one who has ‘about what
his neighbors have’ or ‘more than a poor worker’ may not take gleanings,
forgotten produce, and corners of the ﬁeld. The 200-zuz criterion is basically
stable, varying little from community to community; and so too, the two-
meal and fourteen-meal criteria.
Yet as noted, even these objective criteria are ultimately affected by
empirical circumstances. At the time of the Mishnah, two meals a day were
considered sufﬁcient; today, the norm is three. The 200 zuz ﬁxed by the
Sages would thus not sufﬁce for subsistence in an era, such as our own,
when more than two meals were the norm, hence the decisors ruled that
the 200-zuz ﬁgure had to correspond to relevant local conditions, and
was thus subject to periodic adjustment. The Tur, R. Jacob b. Asher,
articulated this view early in the fourteenth century:
Some say that all these measures applied only in those days, when
they had a communal fund (kupa), a soup kitchen (tamhui), they
distributed the poor tithe annually, and the poor took gleanings,
forgotten produce, and corners of the ﬁeld. And therefore they
estimated that one who had 200 zuz could not take [charity] because
that amount would see him through the year, and the following year
he would again be eligible [for the available resources]. But now that
we do not have these [institutions], he can take until he has an amount
sufﬁcient to allow him to support himself . . . and it all depends on the
place and the time.
Tur, YD 253
R. Shlomo Goren suggested a criterion for the present day:
One who has a monthly wage, or even a daily wage, even if he has no
assets, is considered afﬂuent, as long as his work sufﬁces for him to
Charity and distributive justice 69
support himself. This is because the trade he plies is his principal asset,
as it sustains him.26
Of course, if poverty is determined by applying an objective test, then in
determining how charity is to be disbursed, we will be unable to take into
account the feelings of the poor, and will focus solely on meeting their
need for physical sustenance. Imagine a poor person who, though able to
maintain a reasonable standard of living, has neighbors and acquaintances
whose standard of living is much higher. If the disparity causes him
distress, is there an obligation to give him charity so that he too can enjoy
that standard? One contemporary authority ruled as follows:
The precept of charity [is to be observed by donating] in accordance
with what the poor person lacks . . . and not his situation in relation to
that of his neighbors. And even if the poor person is distressed, and
jealous of those who have more than he does, he is not eligible on that
account to receive charity, and any additional assistance he may
receive is given as an act of kindness.27
The objective test comes across as cold and insensitive. It makes no attempt
to address, let alone mollify, feelings of disenfranchisement that arise in the
wake of income disparities and socioeconomic polarization. Where those
at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder have a reasonable minimum
quality of life, but there is a huge chasm between their way of life and that
of the wealthiest classes, the laws of charity do not mandate the transfer of
resources from the advantaged to the disadvantaged. Yet Jewish law rec-
ognizes another test for poverty, rendering this picture more complex.
6.3 The subjective test
Above, we adduced the Mishnah in tractate Ketubot that sets out the
provisions to be made for the weddings of orphaned girls.
So too if one gives an orphaned girl in marriage, he [the treasurer of
the charity fund] may give her no less than ﬁfty zuz. If funds are
available, she is to be outﬁtted in accordance with the dignity of
The Mishnah rules that a ﬁxed minimum must be allocated to a bride who
is an orphan; it sets this sum at the amount it earlier speciﬁed as the
26 R. Shlomo Goren, “Setting the poverty line according to the halakha” (Hebrew), in idem,
Torat Hamedina (Jerusalem: 1996), 358, 363.
27 R. Naftali Bar-Ilan, “Eligibility for charity” (Hebrew), Tehumin 2 (1981), 459–60.
70 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
minimum a father must give his daughter prior to her marriage. But it
adds that when the orphaned bride is from a household in which lavish
wedding parties had been the norm, if adequate charitable resources are
available, the fund’s ofﬁcers must allocate money for her wedding “in
accordance with the dignity of her position.”
This Mishnah sets down a class-related criterion for an orphaned bride’s
entitlement (has she been outﬁtted in a manner beﬁtting her family’s social
status?) to complement the standard allocation (the 50 zuz due a bride).
Beyond the minimum to which every orphaned bride is entitled, each
orphaned bride’s social class is also taken into account (provided funds are
Another such non-universal criterion is found in a law based on exegesis
of Deuteronomy 15:8: “But you shall surely open (patoah tiftah) your hand
unto him, and shall surely lend him (haavet taavitenu) sufﬁcient for his
needs, for whatever he needs”:
Our Rabbis taught: “Sufﬁcient for his needs”—you are commanded
to support him, but you are not commanded to make him rich;
“sufﬁcient . . . for whatever he needs”—even a horse to ride upon
and a slave to run ahead of him [to escort him]. It was related of
Hillel the Elder that he brought to a certain poor man from a distin-
guished family a horse to ride upon and a slave to run ahead of
him. On one occasion he could not ﬁnd a slave to run ahead of him,
so he [himself] ran ahead of him for three miles. Our Rabbis taught:
It happened that the people of the upper Galilee brought to a poor
member of a distinguished family from Sepphoris a pound of meat
According to this exegesis, some needy individuals are entitled to more
substantial charitable allocations, even to the point of “a horse to ride upon
and a slave to run ahead of him.” These poor are from “distinguished
families”—wealthy families that have fallen on hard times. This is, again,
an individualized criterion: circumstances that would be considered
acceptable for an ‘ordinary’ poor person could be such as to constitute
hardship for one of distinguished birth, who would therefore be entitled
to a greater allocation.
The Talmud uses the locution “distinguished family” to describe the
poor person in question to emphasize that his expensive tastes were
instilled in him by his family, and he did not acquire them on his own.
Accordingly, he should not be castigated for pampering himself, and
should be helped out in his present reduced circumstances.28 This implies
a qualiﬁcation of the individualized test: if the said individual developed
28 Maharsha, Hidushei Agadot ad loc.
Charity and distributive justice 71
his expensive tastes on his own, he need not be afforded beneﬁts beyond
those accorded to all needy persons.
The Sages expanded on this principle, applying it to additional situations:
If he was accustomed to clothes of ﬁne wool, he is given clothes of ﬁne
wool; to grain, he is given grain; to porridge—he is given porridge; to
a yeast loaf, he is given a yeast loaf; to being fed, he is fed; as it says,
“sufﬁcient for his needs, for whatever he needs.”
tPeia 4:10 (Zuckermandel edition)
One contemporary legal philosopher who has considered this sort of
support for expensive tastes and extravagant personal ‘needs’ is Ronald
Dworkin. Dworkin argues for the idea of “equality of resources,” that is,
providing all members of society with identical—to the greatest extent
possible—conditions of economic opportunity. He rejects the competing
idea of “equality of welfare,” that is, providing all members of society with
the same—to the extent possible—level of wellbeing. Dworkin contends
that the problem of extravagant ‘needs’ cannot be properly addressed by
“equality of welfare.” As an example, he cites the case of someone who
cannot fall asleep at night without having had a glass of champagne, a
luxury he cannot afford to buy. If society chooses to support someone with
expensive tastes, for the purpose of allowing him to sleep at night like
everyone else, the patently unreasonable result, according to Dworkin,
will be the subsidizing of nightly glasses of champagne for certain people.
If, on the other hand, society chooses not to support expensive tastes,
it will fail to attain the desideratum of ensuring equal welfare for all
Equality of welfare seems to recommend that those with cham-
pagne tastes, who need more income simply to achieve the same
level of welfare as those with less expensive tastes, should have
more income on that account. But this seems counter-intuitive, and
I said that someone generally attracted to the ideal would neverthe-
less wish to limit or qualify it so that his theory did not have that
Dworkin’s approach differs substantially from that expressed in the
Rabbinic passages just examined, which—in speciﬁc circumstances—
recognize expensive tastes as legitimate ‘needs’ that must be supported.
The Sages, apparently, did not regard equality as essential for distributive
justice, much less seek to impose it, but rather accepted socioeconomic
stratiﬁcation as a given.
29 Ronald Dworkin, “What is equality? Part I: Equality of welfare,” Philosophy and Public
Affairs 10 (1981), 185, 228.
72 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
But though the Sages sought to augment the support provided to some-
one well-born who became impoverished, they did not hesitate to criticize
him for his expensive tastes, which burden the community as a whole:
A man once came before Rava [seeking charity]. He said to him, What
do your meals consist of? He said to him, Fattened chicken and old
[i.e., good] wine. He said to him, have you not considered the burden
[this places] on the community? He said to him, Do I eat of theirs? I eat
[the food] of the All-Merciful. For we have learned: “The eyes of all
look to You expectantly, and You give them their food in its30 season”
(Ps. 145:15)—it is not said ‘in their season,’ but “in its season,” teaching
that the Holy One, blessed be He, provides each and every individual
with sustenance in accordance with his habits [lit., his season].
Meanwhile, Rava’s sister, who had not seen him for thirteen years,
arrived, and brought him a fattened chicken and old wine. Rava said
[to himself], What is this before me?! He said to him, I humbly concede
to you, come and eat.
Rashi ad loc.: “Rava said, What is this before me?!”—what is this
event that has just taken place before me, for I am not accustomed to
her coming here with a chicken and old wine in hand.
It is evident that this story expresses criticism, but what it targets is unclear.
Rava can be understood as critical of the poor person whose expensive
tastes are a burden on the public—“have you not considered the burden
[this places] on the community?” Moreover, the story ends on an almost
miraculous note: a coincidence enables Rava to satisfy the poor person’s
rariﬁed tastes. The implication is that without this unexpected development,
the said tastes would not have been accommodated, and Rava’s protest
would have prevailed. On the other hand, the story can also be taken as
critical of Rava. On this reading, the seeming coincidence at the end of the
story is in fact no coincidence, but rather an indication of the divine will,
which desires that the needs of the poor, even if excessive, be satisﬁed.
Another critique, perhaps more penetrating, of those with expensive
tastes, is found in the Jerusalem Talmud:
A member of the Nasi’s household lost his wealth and was provided
food in a clay utensil; when he ate it, he threw up. The physician told
him, doesn’t the food itself originally come out of an [earthenware]
pot? [Imagine that you] are eating directly from the pot.
jPeia 8:7 (21a)
30 The pronoun here is in the third person singular, allowing the exegete to read the verse as
saying “his season.”
Charity and distributive justice 73
Pnei Moshe commentary31 ad loc.: “Of the Nasi’s household”—some-
one from the Nasi’s household who had lost his money and
sold his elegant utensils, and was brought food in clay dishes. When
he ate from them, the food repeated on him and he vomited it out,
because he was of delicate constitution and unaccustomed to eating
off dishes of this sort. The doctor asked him, Wasn’t the food cooked
in an earthenware pot? Imagine yourself to be eating directly from
the pot itself, and then you won’t be disgusted by the food or the
Though these anecdotes indeed express a critical attitude to those who
are impoverished yet retain their expensive tastes, there is no need to
understand them as conﬂicting with the directive that such individuals
are to be supported by public charitable funds. The Sages take a nuanced
approach, both prodding the individual to accommodate his changed
circumstances by changing his habits; and imposing upon the public the
duty to provide him with the costly items to which he is still accustomed
as he adjusts to his new circumstances.
To limit the obligation to support such ‘necessities’ and extravagant
tastes, and keep it within reasonable bounds, some codiﬁers added the
The Geonim, of blessed memory, wrote that all these cases of [the
need to accommodate the expensive tastes of] a poor person from a
distinguished family pertain to a poor person whose impoverish-
ment is not widely known. He is treated with the honor to which he
is accustomed so that [his poverty] does not become widely known.
But a [formerly well-off[ poor person whose impoverishment is known
is treated no differently than any other poor Jew.
Shita Mekubetzet, bKetubot 67b
The rationale here is that the only reason the poor person’s subjective
needs are accommodated is to preserve his self-respect. When his reduced
circumstances have become public knowledge, however, maintaining his
former standard of living no longer achieves this, and is discontinued.
The Sages thus proffer two tests for poverty. There is a universal
threshold for poverty: anyone who cannot provide himself with a
reasonable minimal standard of living is eligible for a ﬁxed amount of
charitable support. To supplement this test, a second, individualized test
is applied to identify cases where those who fall under the ﬁrst criterion
also have additional needs. In light of the latter test, the fact that the
halakha does not invoke a relative means-test to determine eligibility for
support from charitable donations—a test that would assess the needy
31 By eighteenth century Talmudist R. Moses Margalit.
74 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
person’s situation relative to his community’s socioeconomic ladder—is
The signiﬁcance of this absence of a relative means-test may come to
light by considering it against the background of the last of the Ten
Commandments: “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall
not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male or female slave, or his ox or his
ass or anything that is your neighbor’s” (Exod. 20:14). It could be argued
that the relative poverty test, and the critique of socioeconomic polarization
that often goes hand in hand with it, reﬂect little more than a covetous
desire, on the part of some classes, for that which better-off classes have.
We saw earlier that the biblical social support mechanisms combine
help for the needy with preservation of naturally-occurring social stratiﬁ-
cation. The purpose of the mechanisms is to sustain and rehabilitate the
poor, but not necessarily to prevent the formation of centers of wealth
within society. Assistance to the poor is not premised on egalitarian prin-
ciples. This conclusion seems to be consistent with the “for whatever he
needs” directive, which the Sages invoked as the prooftext for helping the
poor meet their individualized needs. Recourse to both standard and indi-
vidualized tests ensures, on the one hand, that concrete assistance is pro-
vided to the disadvantaged, yet on the other, allows for naturally-occurring
7 Amount to be collected
Having explained how the category of ‘the poor’ is to be demarcated, we
must now determine the amount of goods or funds that the well-to-do are
obliged to give. Here too, there is a range of possible methods for assessing
the speciﬁc amounts, each reﬂecting a particular understanding of the
duty to give charity.
The main talmudic source that addresses this question is the Usha
enactment, which will be examined below. This source is relatively late.
The mishnaic sources that preceded it did not address the matter, leaving
it open. For example, the Mishnah from tractate Peia that sets out how
much is to be given to the poor—“One may not give an itinerant poor
person less than a loaf worth a pondion. . . . If he stays over the Sabbath, he
is given food for three meals” (mPeia 8:7)—says nothing about how much
is to be collected from the wealthy. Similarly, the Mishnah from tractate
Ketubot that sets the amount to be provided to an orphaned bride says
nothing about the amount to be collected for that purpose from donors.
How are we to understand this silence? It might be argued that this is
indeed a legal lacuna, which could have been ﬁlled in by specifying a
percentage or a ﬁxed amount that the non-poor are to contribute, but for
some reason was ignored by the Mishnah. But it could also be argued that
the omission is deliberate, and the Mishnah does not deﬁne the amount of
charity to be collected because the only relevant parameter is the needs
Charity and distributive justice 75
of the poor. There is no need to collect charity beyond that amount, so
there is no reason to specify a particular sum of money or percentage of
assets or income as the amount to be donated. On this approach, the
amount to be given is inherently a function of the recipients’ needs.
The decisors appear to have favored the latter explanation, basing their
deﬁnition of the amount of charity to be donated primarily on the needs
of the poor and not the afﬂuence of the donor. Maimonides, for instance,
ruled as follows:
It is a positive commandment to give charity to the poor, according
to what is ﬁtting for the poor, if the giver can afford it. . . . You are
commanded to give to the poor person in accordance with what he
Code, Laws concerning Gifts to the Poor 7:1, 3
The practical signiﬁcance of deﬁning the amount to be given on the basis
of the needs of the poor is that when the needs of the poor are limited—
when, say, an area is generally prosperous, the amount of charity to be
collected will be small. Where the economic situation is not as good,
however, and there is a large impoverished population, people of means
will be obliged to give substantial sums.
From a theoretical perspective, deﬁning the obligation to give charity in
this manner implies that money is to be appropriated from people of
means only to provide direct assistance to the needy. Possession of assets
does not in itself constitute reason to tax the possessor and appropriate a
speciﬁed amount or percentage of the assets. Money may be taken only in
response to a speciﬁc concrete need, and no more than the amount required
to address that need may be collected. This approach differs markedly
from approaches—such as the contemporary institution of progressive
taxation, on which the more one earns, the greater the percentage of that
income she must pay as tax—that are wealth based, and seek to level socio-
economic disparities rather than to simply ameliorate concrete instances
Let us now turn to the aforementioned Usha enactment. Both the
Babylonian Talmud and the Talmud of the land of Israel, the Jerusalem
Talmud, report an enactment introduced in the town of Usha, located in
the north of the land of Israel, apparently in the second half of the second
century CE. This enactment addressed the question of the amount a
wealthy person was obligated to set aside for charity.
In the Babylonian Talmud version, the enactment establishes a maximum
contribution that no donor may exceed: one-ﬁfth.
R. Elai stated: It was enacted at Usha that even one who spends money
extravagantly [on charity] is not to expend more than a ﬁfth.
76 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
The decisors explain that the one-ﬁfth in question pertains to income, not
Why was the Usha enactment needed? According to Urbach, the
enactment attests to a tendency in talmudic-era Jewish circles (and even
more in Christian circles) to dedicate large portions of one’s wealth to
charity, as a means of avoiding the civic responsibilities ensuing from
afﬂuence under the Roman regime.32 The Talmud relates several such
incidents.33 The Sages of Usha, according to this explanation, sought to
ensure that donors did not themselves become needy and a burden to the
community, and therefore ﬁxed a maximum that could be donated.
As presented in the Babylonian Talmud, the Usha enactment does not
fundamentally change how the requisite amount of charity is determined.
The sum continues to be calculated primarily on the basis of the needs of
the poor; the enactment simply imposes a cap. But the Jerusalem Talmud
offers a different version of the enactment:
They voted at Usha that one is to set aside one-ﬁfth of his assets for
[observance of] the precepts.
jPeia 1:1 (15b)
The difference between the two versions of the enactment is striking.
While the Babylonian Talmud speaks of a maximum percentage (“he is not
to expend more than a ﬁfth”), the Jerusalem Talmud speaks of a ﬁxed
percentage that cannot be reduced. Moreover, the Babylonian Talmud
speaks of “spending extravagantly,” whereas the Jerusalem Talmud speaks
of setting aside a portion of one’s income for “[observance of] the
precepts”—a much more positive characterization. On the Jerusalem
Talmud version of the enactment, one is to set aside a ﬁfth of his income,
without any connection to the immediate needs of the poor. This approach
is based on assessing the donor’s means, and not the recipient’s needs. In
other words, on the Jerusalem Talmud’s version of the Usha enactment,
anyone with an income must pay a charity tax, regardless of whether there
are poor people in his locale.
In some respects, the Jerusalem Talmud’s version of the Usha enactment
is akin to progressive taxation, whereas in other respects, it is not. It resem-
bles progressive taxation in that in absolute terms, the greater a person’s
income, the more he gives to charity. But unlike progressive taxation in the
standard sense, the Usha enactment—or rather, the Jerusalem Talmud ver-
sion of it—mandates that all are to pay the same percentage of their income.
The Jerusalem Talmud’s version of the Usha enactment makes more
demands on citizens than does the Babylonian version, but does not take
a progressively higher percentage of their income the more they earn.
32 Urbach, n. 17 above, 111.
33 See bArakhin 28a; bKetubot 50a, 67b.
Charity and distributive justice 77
The two versions of the enactment differ both in principle, and in terms
of their actual legal consequences. The Babylonian version, in effect,
protects those with assets, capping their charitable contributions to ensure
that they themselves are not impoverished, even if the needs of the
populace are immense. The Jerusalem Talmud, on the other hand, protects
the interests of potential recipients of charity, ensuring that a ﬁfth of all
income is earmarked for them, whether or not there is any immediate
Above, we saw that in Maimonides’ view, articulated in the Code’s
Laws concerning Gifts to the Poor 7:1, 3, the needs of the poor are the sole
determinant of the amount to be given. However, in deference to the
enactment at Usha, he introduced an important qualiﬁcation that, in
essence, factors in the donor’s wealth. Maimonides sets a maximum
contribution, not to be exceeded; and this maximum ﬁgure incorporates
the two traditions regarding the Usha enactment:
If a poor man comes and asks for [support] sufﬁcient for what he
lacks—if the giver is unable to afford it, he gives him as much as he can
afford. How much is that? [If he gives] up to one-ﬁfth of his assets, he
is observing the precept in a superior manner; up to one-tenth of his
assets, he is observing the precept in an average manner; less than
this—[he personiﬁes] the evil eye.
Code, Laws concerning Gifts to the Poor 7:5
Maimonides seems to have drawn on elements from both versions. From
the version in the Babylonian Talmud, he adopted the principle that the
basic criterion determining the amount of charity to be collected is the
needs of the poor. The other sums cited are upper limits for contributions,
which come into play only where the contributor lacks sufﬁcient income
to provide for the poor person’s needs. But it seems that the Jerusalem
Talmud is Maimonides’ source for the principle that giving the maximum
allowable is preferable to giving less than the maximum allowable. Clearly,
it could not have come from the Babylonian Talmud, which simply sets the
maximum and says nothing further. Overall, however, it is evident that
Maimonides favored the Babylonian Talmud’s version of the enactment,
for he adopted, as a matter of principle, its premise that the amount to be
given to charity is determined by the needs of the poor.
The practice of setting aside ten percent of one’s income, referred to as a
‘monetary tithe’ (maaser ksaﬁm) for supporting the needy, came to be
accepted in Jewish communities. The decisors debated the legal basis for
this obligation, the prevailing view being that the practice is a custom. For
example, R. Joel Sirkes, the Bah, asserts:
The tithe that one sets aside [for charity] from what he has earned from
business dealings, monies, and other proﬁts . . . may be contributed
78 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
[however one wishes] to charity and the redemption of captives, for he
is not obligated in this regard, not biblically and not Rabbinically.
Bayit Hadash, Tur, YD 331 s.v. veein notnim
The custom of giving a ﬁxed percentage of one’s entire income, regardless
of the how much is needed by the poor, reﬂects the Usha enactment as
reported in the Jerusalem Talmud.
It is instructive to consider this summary of the ‘monetary tithe’ laws,
composed by an eminent present-day halakhic authority, R. Ezra Batzri:
• It is proper to have a special receptacle for the tithe, so that one
will have coins readily available whenever he is asked to give.
• When God, may He be blessed, grants him proﬁt, he should imme-
diately set aside the tithe. And a merchant who sells on a daily
basis should keep a special notebook, and at the end of the day,
week, or month should calculate his proﬁt and set aside [the tithe].
An ofﬁcial or laborer who is paid his wage at the end of a week or
of a month should set aside [the tithe] as soon as he receives his
• All proﬁt is subject to tithing, whether from business, wages,
brokering transactions, dividends on shares, lottery winnings, or
inheritances. Even though his father tithed his assets, the son must
again tithe the inheritance he receives.
• If one purchased two types of merchandise in the same transaction
and proﬁted on one and lost on the other, he deducts the loss from
the proﬁt and tithes the remainder. If he has two types of business
dealings (for instance, if he has a shop and shares), and proﬁted
on one and lost on the other, his calculation of the loss is not
deducted from the proﬁt, but rather, he tithes his total proﬁt, and
absorbs the loss himself.
• One can deduct his business expenses from his [gross] proﬁt, and
set aside [the tithe] from the remainder.
Dinei Mamonot, vol. 1, gate 12
8 Sustenance and rehabilitation revisited
In examining the biblical approach to social justice, we distinguished
between two goals set by the Bible: sustaining the poor, that is, ensuring
their immediate needs are met, and rehabilitating the poor, that is, en-
abling them to be self-supporting. This duality of purpose, we saw, is
reﬂected in the relationship between, on the one hand, gleanings, forgotten
produce, and corners of the ﬁeld—mechanisms for sustaining the poor—
and, on the other, manumission, debt remission, and restoration of
ancestral property in the Jubilee year—mechanisms for rehabilitation.
Are these two distinct concerns preserved in the Rabbinic laws of charity?
Charity and distributive justice 79
Did the transition from a system where charity was collected and distrib-
uted in the form of ﬁeld produce, to a system where charity took the form
of monetary donations, impact which goal was emphasized?
Overall, it appears that the Rabbinic recasting of the precept in terms
of monetary donations led to a reduction in the emphasis placed on
rehabilitation. Giving a donation to one in need provides short-term help,
but does not contribute to the beneﬁciary’s rehabilitation. Indeed, it could
have the opposite effect: those who grow accustomed to living off charitable
donations may lose the motivation to be independent and reintegrate into
the work force. Aware of this paradox, the talmudic Sages tried in various
ways to reinforce the goal of rehabilitation within the framework of the
laws of charity.
As we saw, the Bible itself does not mention a duty to donate to the poor,
and speaks only of lending money. Only later, in the Rabbinic literature,
were the verses in question interpreted as referring to outright donations.
But from the perspective of rehabilitation, this is problematic, since loans
clearly have greater potential than gifts for effecting long-term change.
They require the debtor to use the loan wisely, so that he can repay the
principal while fully utilizing the funds that have been made available
to him. The Sages recognized that donating to the poor might make it
harder for them to break the cycle of poverty into which they had fallen.
Accordingly, they recommended the provision of charitable support in
more productive forms than simple donations.
One recommendation is that the funds be used to prevent poverty in the
ﬁrst place. Invoking the metaphor of stabilizing a load borne by a donkey,
the Midrash calls for donating to those in imminent danger of falling into
“If your brother becomes poor and cannot support himself among you
[then you shall uphold him]” (Lev. 25:35)—do not allow him to decline.
To what may this be compared? To a load on the back of a donkey.
While it is still in place, one person can grab hold of it and stabilize it.
Once it has fallen, ﬁve people cannot put it back in place.
Sifra, Behar 6:5
A second recommendation is that charitable funds be used for granting
loans or creating jobs:
R. Abba also said in the name of R. Shimon b. Lakish: He who lends
[money] is greater than he who bestows charity, and he who forms a
partnership [lit., puts money into a (shared) purse] is greater than all.
The ‘shared purse’ (kis) is a common fund; one who invests money in
it is creating a commercial partnership with the poor person being aided.
80 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
Rashi explained it as a fund into which “he invests coins and goods,
intending to be rewarded with half the earnings.”34
Why is a loan preferable to a donation and the formation of a partnership
better than both? The halakhic authorities offered two explanations.
The ﬁrst pertains to the outcome:
Because usually, the amounts loaned are not substantial, and it is
possible that [the borrower] will earn only enough to eke out a living
with the loan, and once he spends those funds on sustenance, he will
have nothing left to repay it, and will default. . . . But if [the donor]
invests in a common fund, he will certainly give him a substantial
amount, so it will be possible to earn money and make a proﬁt from it
sufﬁcient to live on and still have some of the principal of the loan left
with which to pay [the investor] back.
Maharsha, Hidushei Agadot, ad loc.
Another account explains the ranking of the different modes of assistance
in terms of the embarrassment they spare the beneﬁciary: a loan is less
demeaning than a donation, for the borrower undertakes to return the
principal. Creation of a joint enterprise is even less demeaning, since the
recipient becomes a partner in increasing the investor’s productivity. Rashi
explains it that way: “He who lends [money] is greater—because the poor
person is not humiliated thereby.”
Nevertheless, these endorsements of productive forms of charity are
peripheral to the Sages’ overall discussion of the subject, and the notion
of productive charitable giving does not play a signiﬁcant role in the prin-
cipal talmudic discussions of charity in tractates Peia, Baba Batra, and
Maimonides, however, emphatically supports productive giving.
On the basis of R. Abba’s statement in bShabat 63a, quoted above, and
other Rabbinic dicta, Maimonides set out his widely known eight-tier
pyramid of charitable giving. Productive giving, which seeks to liberate
the recipient from the vicious circle in which he ﬁnds himself, is at the
The highest degree [of charity], higher than which there are none, is he
who steadies the hand of an Israelite who is impoverished, by giving
him a gift or a loan, or entering into a partnership with him, or devising
work for him, in order to strengthen his hand, until he has no need to
seek aid from other people. Of him Scripture says, “You shall uphold
him; as a stranger and a settler shall he live with you” (Lev. 25:35),
meaning, uphold him until he will not fall into need.
Code, Laws concerning Gifts to the Poor 10:7
34 Rashi ad loc. s.v. umatil bakis.
Charity and distributive justice 81
In the wake of Maimonides’ discussion, other codiﬁers also placed
rehabilitative forms of giving at the apex of the pyramid of charitable
Thus far, we have considered rehabilitative charity from the recipient’s
perspective, but we should also consider it from the donor’s point of view.
There is no doubt that charity—at the highest level—seeks to improve the
situation of the needy recipient, who can rehabilitate himself more
effectively over the long run by being given a loan or a job. But we must
also inquire into how charity of this sort, as opposed to a simple donation,
may affect the donor. In fact, the recommended form of charity consumes
less of the donor’s assets, and may even increase them. Donated money is
permanently given away by the donor, but money constituting the
principal of a loan is destined to return to him. It is indeed possible that
the poor debtor may default, but in theory, the lender will not lose the
sums given as a loan. Moreover, in a case of partnership with the needy
beneﬁciary—that is, creation of a job—the donor has an opportunity to
combine charity with expanding his own ﬁnancial enterprises. In this way,
both parties beneﬁt—the now-employed ‘beneﬁciary’ receives wages, and
the ‘donor’ develops his business. Granted, creating ‘make-work’ jobs is
not a sound business strategy for the donor (if it were, charity would not
have to be mandated by the law), but it has more potential to beneﬁt his
business than does a simple donation. In other words, the recommended
form of charity is not simply that which will provide greater long-term
beneﬁt to the recipient; it is also that which minimizes the ﬁnancial damage
to the donor’s assets.
We noted earlier that the Torah seeks to sustain the poor and provide
them with a real opportunity for rehabilitation, but does not seek eco-
nomic leveling; it is not hostile to wealth per se. This philosophy also
seems to be embodied in the fact that the mode of giving at the apex of the
Maimonidean hierarchy of charity is assistance to the poor that minimizes
harm to the donor’s assets. As we saw, the preferred form of charity is that
which has the potential to beneﬁt donor and recipient alike. From this
perspective, there is ideological continuity between the biblical outlook
and Rabbinic law.
Yet though the merit of productive charity was duly recognized by
many halakhic authorities, this recognition remained largely in the realm
of rhetoric. The decisors, Maimonides among them, cite this highest level
of giving at the end of the laws of charity, not the beginning. In practice,
donations have, throughout Jewish history, played a larger role in
charitable activities than did loans or job creation:
Maimonides had written that the highest form of charity was the gift
or loan or partnership designed to make the recipient self-supporting.
These words were often quoted, but, as Goitein has argued, they did
not shape the structure of social services in the Jewish community.
82 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
Perhaps the poor were too numerous, the situation of the community
itself too precarious, for anything more than relief.35
An effort to change this situation was made early in the twentieth century
by R. Israel Meir Kagan of Radin, known as the Chofetz Chaim. His Ahavat
Hesed sought to renew attention to the precept of lending to the poor,
reemphasizing its position atop the hierarchy of charitable measures.
We see, then, that an attempt has been made to uphold the biblical
mandate of rehabilitating the poor, a mandate less-readily implemented in
the non-agrarian societies of the Diaspora than in the land of Israel in
biblical times. As the focus of the social justice precepts shifted to the
provision of monetary assistance, it became increasingly difﬁcult to give
substantial weight to modes of charity that rehabilitate the poor or prevent
poverty in the ﬁrst place. Generally speaking, the goal of rehabilitation
was not actively pursued.
9 Responsibilities of the poor
Having discussed the obligations of the fortunate, let us now turn to the
question of responsibilities borne by the beneﬁciaries of assistance. Should
charity be conditional, to one degree or another, on their cooperation?
Would it be proper to allow the recipient to sit back and let the responsibility
for his support fall entirely on the shoulders of the wealthy or on communal
charitable institutions? We saw earlier that the Torah conditions assistance
to the poor—both sustenance and rehabilitation—on joining in the effort.
The rehabilitative precepts, such as that of the Jubilee year, do not provide
the poor with goods, but rather, with means of production, and their
effectiveness requires that those to whom means of production have
been restored actively cooperate in the rehabilitative process. Even the
sustenance-oriented precepts, such as gleanings, forgotten produce, and
corners of the ﬁeld, require the beneﬁciaries’ cooperation in gathering
the produce. What is the signiﬁcance of the transition to the Rabbinic
donation-based laws of charity vis-à-vis the degree of active cooperation
required of the poor?
Here, too, it appears that the Sages were faced with a problem. A
donation is a one-sided transfer from the donor to a passive recipient; the
process tends to shift responsibility away from the recipient, and place it
entirely on the donor. It is no surprise that this tends to instill in the
beneﬁciaries the conviction that they are chronically dependent and cannot
support themselves. Though leery of this danger, the Sages did not forego
the institution of charity in the form of donations, but sought ways to link
the giving of charity to the beneﬁciary’s active participation in improving
35 M. Walzer, Spheres of Justice (New York: 1983), 73.
Charity and distributive justice 83
Of course, where the charitable support is being given in the form
of a loan, job or partnership, the recipient’s active participation is neces-
sary, as these measures can be effective only if such cooperation is forth-
coming. But as we saw, these measures were not the principal vehicle for
ameliorating poverty in post-biblical society, certainly not in practice.
Hence the Sages sought to impose a genuine element of responsibility on
recipients of charitable donations.
9.1 Those able to work
A basic question not addressed directly by the laws of charity is that of one
who is able to work and thereby support himself, but does not do so. Is he
eligible for support? That is, is he to be classiﬁed as poor, on the basis of
his income, or as ineligible for charitable assistance, in view of his potential
earnings? The silence of the sources is ambiguous: it could mean either
that such a person’s eligibility for charity is considered self-evident, or,
that his ineligibility is so patently obvious that it need not be mentioned.
How are we to know which of these interpretations is correct? We must
work out the answer by drawing analogies.
Tannaitic sources considered a somewhat similar case, that of a wealthy
person who is so miserly in tending to his needs that he becomes a burden
on the community and its charitable institutions. Should such a person be
supported, or should he be left to his self-imposed suffering?
[Regarding the verse “But you shall surely open (patoah tiftah) your
hand unto him, and shall surely lend him (haavet taavitenu)” (Deut.
15:8)] our Rabbis taught: “You shall lend him” (haavet) refers to some-
one who has no means, but does not want to be supported [by chari-
table donations], to whom [an allowance] is given as a loan, and then
turned into a gift; “You shall surely lend him” (taavitenu) refers to
someone who has the means, but does not want to support himself, to
whom [an allowance] is given as a gift, and then repayment is taken
from [his estate] after his death—so said R. Judah. And the Sages said:
[As to] someone who has the means but does not want to support
himself—no one need look after him. If so, how is the dictum “You
shall surely lend him” being upheld? The Torah speaks in human par-
lance [i.e., the Torah speaks about the usual case, where people sup-
port themselves to the extent they are able].
According to the Sages, a person of means who does not tend to his
needs is fully responsible for himself, and the community need not support
him. R. Judah, in contrast, takes a paternalistic stance, contending that
the community must not remain indifferent to his plight and must
support him, albeit ensuring that he (or, more precisely, his estate) later
84 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
bears those costs. On the one hand, he grants the person in question the
right to draw on public charitable funds, on account of his concrete
situation, though he has the potential, the theoretical capacity, to attend to
his own needs. On the other hand, R. Judah instructs the community to
recapture the funds from the beneﬁciary’s estate after his death. In essence,
then, this is more a simulation of charity than with the real thing. In effect,
R. Judah takes the view that the community must lend money to him, but
need not give him an outright donation. However, the law is decided in
accordance with the view of the Sages:
If . . . a wealthy man starves himself because he is so niggardly with his
money that he will not spend it on food and drink, no attention need
be paid him.
Maimonides, Code, Laws concerning Gifts to the Poor 7:9
Can the case of the wealthy person who starves himself be compared to
that of a poor person who is able to work but refuses to do so? Formally
speaking, they differ. The wealthy person who starves himself has assets
that preclude him from being classiﬁed as ‘poor’ (the 200-zuz criterion, for
example); the able-bodied yet idle poor person, however, is indeed
classiﬁed as poor, since he doesn’t have a penny to his name. Substantively,
however, it is fair to ask whether there is any reason to distinguish between
assets in the form of money and assets in the form of capacity to work. Is
there any real difference between a wealthy person who can deploy his
assets to support himself, and one who can deploy his physical strength to
The biblical precept that one must assist someone having difﬁculty
loading or unloading his donkey may be relevant in this context.
When you see the donkey of your enemy lying under its burden,
and would [prefer to] refrain from [helping] to raise it, you must
nevertheless raise it with him.
The precept is invoked in a Mishnah apropos one who asks for help
unloading his donkey, but refuses to participate in the effort himself:
If [the owner of the animal] went and sat down, and said [to the
passer-by], ‘since the obligation falls upon you, if you desire to unload,
unload!’—he [the passer-by] is exempt, because it is said “with him”
mBaba Metzia 2:10
This Mishnah was adduced by R. Solomon Efraim of Lunschitz:
Charity and distributive justice 85
This provides us with a response for some poor folk of our nation, who
foist themselves on the community. They do not wish to do any work
even though they are able to engage in some trade or other activity by
means of which they could put an end to their families’ hunger, yet
complain if we do not provide them with all they need—for God
did not command us to do so, but only to “nevertheless raise it with
him.” . . . For the poor person should do everything he has the strength
to do, and if after all his efforts, he is still unable to [support himself],
every Jew is obligated to feed him, support him and provide him with
all that he needs.
Kli Yakar, Exodus 23:5
Citing this principle, other decisors also limit the obligation to give
charity in cases where the needy person could in fact make a living on his
R. Isaac of Corbeil also discusses the charity seeker who appears to be
capable of working:
[Regarding the precept] not to harden one’s heart against giving
charity to the poor, as it is written (Deut. 15:7), “do not harden your
heart and shut your hand”—This means: “do not harden”—do not
say, ‘why should we support so and so; if he wanted to, he could earn
more than he needs.’ Scripture therefore teaches us, “do not harden”—
even if you give [a donation] to him, if you have that thought, you
violate [the precept] “do not harden.”
Sefer Mitzvot Katan, commandment 20
At ﬁrst glance, R. Isaac of Corbeil appears to uphold a position very
different from that of the Kli Yakar. He seems to require that charity be
given to anyone lacking means, even someone who can support himself.
In his opinion, a donor who gives charity but inwardly resents the fact that
the recipient does not earn a living on his own thereby violates the “do not
harden your heart” prohibition. A closer reading, however, reveals that
R. Isaac is not addressing the question of whether a poor person able to
earn a living should nonetheless be supported, but rather, the question of
whether donors are entitled to suspect applicants of malingering. In other
words, R. Isaac is making the point that potential donors are not to suspect
the innocent without due grounds. But he would concur that where it is
clear that an applicant for aid is able to support himself, he is not eligible
for charitable support.
Nevertheless, in reviewing the rabbinical literature on the subject, the
overall sense is that very little is said about making assistance to the poor
36 See Derisha, EH, beginning of sec. 71; Beit Shmuel, EH 71:3.
86 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
person conditional on his having exhausted his ability to earn a living, and
the little that is said has no signiﬁcant effect. Once the main thrust of social
intervention had shifted from agricultural produce to money, and, de
facto, donating rather than lending money had become the default mode
of assistance, it was difﬁcult to avoid a situation where recipients of charity
ultimately became chronically dependent on public support, making no
effort to work.
The aforementioned pertains to the obligation of individual donors
and the community as a whole to render support to those who seek aid.
But with respect to recipients of charity, the Sages explicitly and unam-
biguously endorsed the view—as an ethical imperative, if not a legal
rule—that work of any kind, however menial, is to be preferred to taking
charity. This stance is manifest in the following talmudic passage, which
addresses a very different issue:
He said to them: I received the following tradition from my
grandfather’s house: One is always to hire himself out to idol-worship
(avoda zara) [lit., alien work] rather than be in need of [assistance from]
his fellow creatures. And he [the speaker] thought this referred to
actual idol worship. But it is not so; rather, [it refers to] work that is
alien to him, as Rav said to R. Kahana: Flay a carcass in the street
and earn a wage, and do not say, ‘I am a great man and the thing is
degrading to me.’
bBaba Batra 110a
9.2 Charitable donations by the poor
Another aspect of empowering the poor person’s sense of responsibility—
for others as well as for himself—is reﬂected in the law requiring even the
poor to engage in charitable giving. The law is ﬁrst found in the Tosefta,
which rules that someone poor is not to be required to make donations to
charity, but if he wishes to make a contribution, his donation may not be
If a poor person gave a penny (pruta) to the communal fund (kupa) or
a slice of bread (prusa) to the soup kitchen (tamhui), it is accepted; if he
did not give, we do not oblige him to give.
tPeia 4:10 (Zuckermandel edition)
A talmudic source takes a stronger stance:
R. Awira gave the following exposition, sometimes in the name of
R. Ami and sometimes in the name of R. Asi . . . If someone sees that
his livelihood is meager, he should give charity from it, and all the
more so if it is abundant. . . .
Charity and distributive justice 87
Mar Zutra said: Even a poor person who himself subsists on charity
should give charity.
The Shulhan Arukh rules similarly:
Everyone is obligated to contribute to charity. Even a poor person who
supports himself from charitable donations must contribute out of
what he is given.
In obligating all members of society, including the poor, to give to
charity, the Sages sought to prevent the creation of a social class that takes
without giving, that is supported without providing any support to others.
As Urbach observed, even if the amounts in question are slight, the poor
person’s obligation to donate to charity helps render him, in the eyes of the
community and in his own eyes, a contributor to society.37
The Arukh Hashulhan takes the view that the rationale for requiring the
poor to contribute to charity is not to maximize the amount raised, but
rather, to beneﬁt the poor donors themselves, either by affording them the
opportunity to observe a precept, or by bolstering their self-image as
givers and not just recipients of charity:
And we have already explained that even a poor Jew who goes
from door to door [asking for alms] and has nothing to contribute
to charity is nonetheless obligated to fulﬁll the precept of charity
once a year, as the Sages, of blessed memory, said [bBaba Batra 9a]:
“One should never hold himself back from [giving] a third of a
shekel [to charity] annually.” And if he gives less than that, he has not
fulﬁlled the precept of charity, and the Torah imposed this positive
commandment on each and every Jew, and they must fulﬁll it at least
once a year.
Arukh Hashulhan, YD 249:11
10 Individual and community
Thus far, we have considered the amounts of money to be set aside to help
the needy, and the circumstances in which charity is to be dispensed. But
we have not yet considered how money for communal charitable
institutions is to be collected. The last topic we will address in this chapter,
therefore, will be that of responsibility for collecting funds for charity, or
as we would say today, fundraising. Is this responsibility to be borne by
individuals, or by public institutions?
37 Urbach, n. 17 above, 114.
88 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
The Bible, we saw, assumes that support for the needy will be provided
by individuals. The relevant precepts—the Jubilee year, the laws governing
produce of the ﬁeld, remission of loans, and so on—all establish a direct
connection between someone who lacks means, and someone who has
sufﬁcient means to support his needy fellow. It does not call for public
funds or agencies to mediate between those with means and those without.
The Rabbinic literature attests to the rise of community institutions—the
communal fund (kupa) and soup kitchen (tamhui)—that provided such
10.1 Communal charitable institutions
Several considerations support the unmediated provision of assistance by
donors to beneﬁciaries:
a. Diminished social alienation—Unmediated personal contact between
donors and recipients helps prevent the formation of rigid classes of
‘givers’ and ‘takers.’
b. Meeting subjective needs—We saw that the laws of charity seek to
address not only the objective needs of the poor, but also subjective
individual needs. The latter goal can be better achieved within the
context of small circles in which each person’s distinctive needs can be
c. Conservation of resources—Another factor worth noting, albeit
one that may be more relevant to life in a modern state, relates to
the likely waste of resources inherent in communal institutions,
which necessarily incur administrative costs. In the case of charitable
institutions, for instance, salaries must be paid to employees who
collect and distribute funds, and run other aspects of the system
(cooks in the soup kitchen, say), and costs may be incurred due to
inefﬁciency or even corruption. Overhead often substantially reduces
the amount reaching the needy themselves. Direct disbursement of
charity by the afﬂuent to the poor ensures that every cent reaches its
On the other hand, a number of considerations support the institution-
alization of charity:
a. Effective fundraising—Reliance on the good will of donors is not
enough to ensure that charitable monies are, in fact, transferred from
the prosperous to the needy; it is necessary to enforce charitable giving.
Such enforcement is difﬁcult when charity is given by one individual
to another directly. Systematic collection of funds by the community
makes it easier to identify those who are evading payment and to
enforce their obligations.
Charity and distributive justice 89
b. Equitable solicitation—Communal charitable institutions can ensure
that the burden of charity is borne equally by all those of means within
the community. If the poor turn directly to those with means, they are
likely to shy away from those who adamantly resist their appeals, and
cluster at the doors of the more compliant. Institutionalized commu-
nal fundraising helps ensure that the kindhearted and generous do not
bear a disproportionate share of the burden.
c. Equitable distribution—Likewise, institutionalized distribution of
charitable funds helps ensure that all the needy receive what they are
entitled to, and preference is not given to those who are particularly
vocal in their demands, or have connections to wealthy households.
It is interesting that none of the latter factors are cited by the Sages
in support of the establishment of communal charity funds. Their concern
is to protect the poor person’s dignity by preserving the anonymity of
both sides, donor and recipient. The Sages refer to this as ‘secret giving’
To understand the Talmud’s position, consider the following episodes
reported in the Talmud:
Mar Ukba had a poor man in his neighborhood into whose door-
socket he used to throw four zuz every day. One day he said, ‘I will go
and see who does me this kindness.’ On that day Mar Ukba stayed late
at the house of study, and his wife was escorting him home. When he
saw them moving the door, he went out after them, but they ﬂed from
him and [hid] in a hearth from which the ﬁre had just been swept. Mar
Ukba’s feet were burning and his wife said to him: Raise your feet and
put them on mine. As he was upset, she said to him, ‘I am usually at
home and can bestow benefactions directly.’ And what was the reason
for all this [i.e., their ﬂeeing and hiding in the oven]? Because Mar
Zutra b. Tobiah said in the name of Rav . . . It is better that one enter a
ﬁery oven than embarrass his neighbor in public. . . . R. Abba used to
bind money in his scarf, sling it on his back, and place himself at the
disposal of the poor. But he cocked his eye [as a precaution] against
Rashi ad loc.:
“I am usually at home”—so the poor people ﬁnd me [and I give to
them]; accordingly, my merit is great; “I can bestow benefactions
directly”—my benefactions are ready to use, for I give them bread and
meat and salt, but you give the poor coins, and they must expend
effort to go buy a meal . . . “he cocked his eye”—he cast his eye behind
him, so that a rogue, pretending to be poor, would not come [and take
90 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
These anecdotes praise Mar Ukba and R. Abba for the manner in which
they contribute to charity. Mar Ukba did all he could, to the point of
endangering his life, so that the poor man to whom he gave charity would
not know who his benefactor was. R. Abba gave his charitable gifts in a
convoluted way (in a scarf over his shoulder) to avoid a face to face
encounter that could embarrass the recipients. Both stories involve
attempts to devise a means by which charity could be transferred without
a direct encounter that might be unpleasant or embarrassing for the
recipient, the donor, or both. Elsewhere, the Talmud declares that despite
the merits of the manner in which Mar Ukba and R. Abba made their
donations, there was an even better way:
It is written: “Treasures of wickedness proﬁt nothing, but righteous-
ness (tzedaka) delivereth from death” (Prov. 10:2). . . . What kind of
charity is that which delivers one from an unnatural death? When
someone gives without knowing to whom he gives, and someone
receives without knowing from whom he receives. ‘Gives without
knowing to whom he gives’—this excludes the practice of Mar Ukba.
‘Receives without knowing from whom he receives’—this excludes
the practice of R. Abba.
If so, how is one to act? He should put his money into the charity
bBaba Batra 10a–b
According to this passage, if charity is contributed directly, the
anonymity of the parties cannot be fully preserved. The recommended
method for ensuring anonymity is the communal fund, which eliminates
any chance of humiliating contact between well-off donor and poor
recipient: the former does not know to whom he is giving, and the latter
does not know from whom he is receiving.
In his ranking of the modes of giving charity, described in sec. 8 above,
Maimonides recognizes the virtue of anonymity. After deﬁning the highest
degree of charity as that which seeks to rehabilitate the poor and prevent
poverty, he sets forth the next three degrees:
8. Below this is he who gives alms to the poor in such a way that
he does not know to whom he has given, nor does the poor person
know from whom he has received. This constitutes fulﬁllment of a
commandment for its own sake, as exempliﬁed by the Chamber of
Conﬁdentiality in the Temple,38 where the righteous would
contribute in conﬁdentiality, and the poor of distinguished family
would draw their sustenance in conﬁdentiality. Close to such a
person is one who contributes directly to the charity fund.
38 See mShekalim 5:6.
Charity and distributive justice 91
One should not, however, contribute to the charity fund unless
he knows that the person in charge of it is trustworthy, learned,
and knows how to manage it properly, like R. Hanania b. Teradion.
9. Below this is he who knows to whom he is giving, while the poor
man does not know from whom he has received, as exempliﬁed by
the great among the Sages who used to set out secretly and throw
coins down at the doors of the poor. This is a ﬁtting way to do it
[i.e., give charity], and a commendable method if those in charge
of the charity fund do not conduct themselves properly.
10. Below this is the case where the poor man knows from whom he is
receiving, but the giver does not know [to whom he gives], as
exempliﬁed by the great among the Sages who used to place coins
in [folds of] sheets which they would hang behind them [i.e., over
their shoulder], so that the poor would come and take without any
risk of humiliation.
Code, Laws concerning Gifts to the Poor 10:8–10
It is instructive to consider why anonymous charity is preferable. If
anonymity is desirable because it discourages donor pride and paternalism,
and fosters donor humility and generosity of spirit, the situation where the
recipient knows who the donor is, but not vice versa, is preferable to the
situation where the recipient does not know who the donor is, but the
donor knows who the recipient is. Maimonides, however, appears to have
a different reason for favoring anonymous charity: to protect the recipient’s
dignity and spare him the humiliation inherent in an encounter with the
donor. It is more important that the poor person feel comfortable than that
the donor’s character be ennobled.
10.2 Dividing the burden between individual and community
Though recognizing the necessity of charity funds and publicly-run
charitable enterprises, the halakha continues to ascribe importance to
charity given directly to the recipients without institutional mediation.
That the afﬂuent contribute to a public charity fund does not relieve them
of their obligation to help the poor directly when the occasion arises.
Maimonides, while setting out at length detailed laws governing public
charity funds, nevertheless upholds a separate and no less important
obligation to give charity directly.
1. In every city in which Jews reside, they have a duty to appoint from
among themselves well-known and trustworthy persons to serve as
alms collectors, to go around collecting from the people on the eve
of the Sabbath every week. They should take from each and every
person whatever it is ﬁtting for him to give and the amount assessed
him. And they are to distribute the coins on the eve of the Sabbath
92 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
every week, and to give each and every poor person sustenance
sufﬁcient for seven days. And this is what is called the ‘charity fund’
2. They must similarly appoint other collectors to gather each and
every day, from each and every courtyard, bread and other
foodstuffs, fruits, or money, from anyone willing to make a free-will
offering at that time. They should distribute what has been collected
among the poor the same evening, and from it give to each poor
person his sustenance for the day. And this is what is called the
‘soup kitchen’ (tamhui).
3. We have never seen nor heard of a Jewish community that does not
have a charity fund, but as to the soup kitchen, there are some
locales where it is customary to have it, and some where it is not.
The custom that is widespread today is for the collector of the
charity fund to go around [collecting] every day, and to distribute
the proceeds on the eve of the Sabbath every week.
Code, Laws concerning Gifts to the Poor 9:1–3
He who, on seeing a poor man begging, averts his eyes from him
and does not give him alms, transgresses a negative commandment,
as it is said, “Do not harden your heart and shut your hand against
your needy kinsman” (Deut. 15:7).
Code, Laws concerning Gifts to the Poor 7:2
Given that the halakha recognizes two distinct paths by which charity
must be provided to the needy—the institutional path and the private,
person-to-person path, how are responsibilities divided between them?
When should someone support his needy neighbor directly, and when is
he to do so through the communal institutions? And to whom is a needy
man to address his plea for assistance—a better-off neighbor, or the
communal charity fund? Is a private individual permitted to turn down
requests for aid on the grounds that he already paid his share to the
communal charity fund? Today we might ask whether payments to social
security and income tax, which support the government’s social welfare
efforts, obviate direct contributions to the needy?
One category of charity-seekers can be eliminated from the discussion
at the outset. The Sages were not sympathetic to beggars who went door-
to-door on a daily basis. They sought to deny, or at least substantially limit,
the right of such shameless ‘professional’ beggars to receive charitable
funds. In the words of the Tosefta, “One who goes around from door to
door—no one need look after him in any respect.”39
This position is softened a bit at the end of the following talmudic
39 tPeia 4:8 (Zuckermandel edition).
Charity and distributive justice 93
A Tanna taught: If he goes begging door to door, no one need look
after him. A certain poor man who used to go begging door to door
came before R. Papa [for money], but he did not look after him. Said
R. Sama the son of R. Yeba to R. Papa: If you do not look after him, no
one else will look after him. Is he, then, to die [of hunger]? But [replied
R. Papa] has it not been taught, If he is a poor man who goes begging
door to door, no one need look after him? He said to him: We do not
look after his request for a large gift, but we look after his request for
a small gift.
bBaba Batra 9a
According to this passage, one may not altogether deny the entreaties of a
poor person who regularly goes begging door to door, but should not give
him more than a token amount.
Why are the Sages impatient with beggars? The Sages see them as seek-
ing to circumvent the communal charitable institutions by approaching
householders on their own. Rashi explains it as follows: “No one need
look after him—there is no need to give him money from the charity
fund. Since he has learned to go begging door to door, that is enough for
him.” The words “that is enough for him” here can be understood in two
ways: as asserting that one who begs door to door can be expected to
receive enough money to cover his needs, but also as asserting that
even should he fail to gather that amount, he will have to be satisﬁed
with whatever he gets. The Shulhan Arukh rules that: “A poor person who
circulates door to door is not given a substantial donation from the
communal fund (kupa), but only a small one”40; the Siftei Kohen ad loc.
adds that individuals, too, are “not obligated to give him a substantial
i Private charity versus public charity
Having excluded the case of the inveterate door to door beggar who
seeks to systematically circumvent publicly-run charitable institutions
(and their assessments and limits) by begging for private donations, what
kind of private assistance-seeking does the Talmud, in inquiring into the
balance between institutionalized and private giving, countenance? The
poor person in question is one who has run into difﬁcult circumstances,
and is trying to ﬁnd a solution to his problem by approaching private
donors. Are they obligated to help him, or does their having already
contributed to communal welfare institutions relieve them of any
responsibility to come to his aid? The question is explored in tractate
Nedarim. The Mishnah there notes that if one has vowed to exclude his
fellow from beneﬁtting from his (the oath-taker’s) property, the following
40 YD 250:3.
94 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
argument may be used to provide an ‘opening’41 through which the vow
may be released:
R. Meir also said: An ‘opening’ for him may be adduced from what is
written in the Torah, and we say to him: ‘Had you known that you
were violating [the injunction] . . . ”that your brother may live with
you” (Lev. 25:36), or that he might become impoverished and you
would not be able to provide for him [would you have made the vow
you in fact vowed]?’ If he replies, ‘Had I known that it is so, I would
not have vowed’—he is released [from the vow].
According to R. Meir, one of the openings, that is, one of the points
that, had they been taken into account by the vower beforehand, might
have kept him from taking the oath, or to put it differently, one of the
considerations that can be adduced to release someone from a vow, is
the obligation to provide monetary assistance to one’s fellow who
becomes impoverished. This Mishnah thus invokes the premise—which,
as we have seen, is indeed the accepted rule—that one has a personal
obligation to provide monetary assistance to a fellow who is in need
of assistance. In its discussion of this Mishnah, however, the Talmud
questions the status of this obligation in a community that has established
a charity fund:
R. Huna the son of R. Katina said to the Rabbis: But [the vow-taker]
can reply, Not all who become poor fall upon me [for support], and as
for my share of the [general] obligations, I provide for him together
with everyone else. They said to him [R. Huna]: It can be said: He who
falls [into poverty] does not fall, ﬁrst, upon the [communal charity]
R. Huna argues that the obligation to pay into the charity fund obviates,
and perhaps cancels, the obligation to directly support a needy person. In
his view, it is not possible to have recourse to R. Meir’s suggested ‘opening’
for the vow-taker, that is, to adduce the argument that the oath-taker is
obligated to support some impoverished person, because this obligation
has already been fulﬁlled by his contribution to the public charity fund.
The Sages respond that the public fund is only a backup solution for one
who becomes impoverished, “who does not fall, ﬁrst, upon the [communal
41 An opening is an argument against making the vow that the oath-taker did not consider
when he undertook the obligation. If such an opening can be found, the oath-taker can be
released from the vow, on the premise that had he been aware of the argument, he would
not have made the vow.
Charity and distributive justice 95
charity] collectors.”According to the Sages, in the ﬁrst instance, the poor
person turns to private individuals, who are obligated to help him.
This discussion, then, does not provide an answer to the question before
us. According to R. Huna, the charitable fund is the primary vehicle for
support of the needy, and they are to apply to it in the ﬁrst instance. Direct
charity exists, on this view, only where, for one reason or another, there is
no communal fund. The Sages take a more nuanced position. They ﬁrst
direct one who ﬁnds himself in difﬁcult circumstances to solicit aid from
private sources. In their view, the charity fund comes into play only where
the needy do not receive an adequate response from the individuals they
have sought help from directly. It provides a safety net for the needy in the
event that they cannot secure what they need by directly soliciting aid
from afﬂuent individuals, but does not take render void the responsibility
each member of the community bears toward his fellow in need.
Assuming that there is ﬁrst—that is, before the public institutions
step in—an obligation on the part of individuals to give assistance to their
fellows who have fallen on hard times, on whom does this obligation
devolve? Is it universal, or does it apply only to the impoverished
person’s family and friends? The Early Authorities (rishonim) are not in
agreement on this point.
Moreover, some decisors have argued that a progressive tax imposed by
the government, whereby the wealthy pay more than others to support the
poor, who do not pay the tax at all, is considered charity. For example, the
twentieth-century decisor R. Isaac Jacob Weiss asserts:
Where it is known for certain that his tax is given to charity, and to
charity that the taxpayer is obligated to give, it is certainly possible to
offset it from the tithe [the obligatory percentage to be donated
Responsa Minhat Yitzhak 5:34
ii Support for subjective needs––private or public?
A secondary debate among the decisors pertains to the obligation to
support the subjective needs of the poor. As noted earlier, the laws of
charity impose an obligation to help meet subjective needs of the poor, that
is, unique personal needs fulﬁllment of which they perceive as essential.
The Talmud illustrates the idea by adducing the case of someone from a
distinguished family who has become impoverished, but needs “a horse
to ride upon and a slave to run before him.” But who should bear the
ﬁnancial burden—private individuals or communal charity funds? Is
someone whose depressed neighbor asks him to help ﬁnance a therapeutic
trip to the Alps, say, obligated to participate directly in funding the trip, or
42 See section 7 above.
96 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
may he refer the petitioner to communal institutions or government
agencies, to which he has already contributed his share, having paid the
relevant taxes and levies?
Strong arguments can be made for the claim that this sort of burden
should be borne by the community, not the individual. The sums of money
involved are substantial, for these are not basic needs; but idiosyncratic
and costly cravings. It is unreasonable to impose such costs, or even a
portion of them, on a private individual rather than the community as a
whole. Yet there are countervailing considerations in favor of funding
by the individual rather than the community. First, it is difﬁcult, if
not impossible, for communal agencies to assess subjective needs—to
distinguish between true needs and mere luxuries, between that without
which life is unbearable, and indulgences that the indolent may seek to
enjoy at the expense of others. This sort of evaluation can be made only
where there is direct, unmediated contact with the person making the
idiosyncratic request. Moreover, even if the community could indeed carry
out credible assessments of such individualized needs, the idea that a
public charity fund could underwrite such diverse and expensive outlays
without provoking outrage and accusations of unfairness from members
of the community, is highly dubious. An individual can offer differential
support to various needy parties, but a public fund would ﬁnd it difﬁcult
to do so, and would invite charges of favoritism and discrimination. From
this perspective, a private donor will likely be better able to look after
Given these opposing considerations, there is no consensus among the
codiﬁers as to this issue. From the language of the Code’s Laws concerning
Gifts to the Poor 7:3, and more importantly, from its juxtaposition to the
“He who, on seeing a poor man begging, averts his eyes from him and
does not give him alms, transgresses a negative commandment” law,
which immediately precedes it, it seems that Maimonides places the
burden of providing for subjective needs squarely on individual donors,
and not the community as a whole.
You are commanded to give the poor man in accordance with what
he lacks. If he has no clothing, he should be clothed. If he has no
household furnishings, they should be bought for him. If he has no
wife, he should be helped to marry. If it is a woman, she should be
given in marriage. Even if it was [formerly] the habit of this poor man
to ride a horse, with a slave running in front of him, and he has become
impoverished and lost his possessions, one must buy him a horse to
ride upon and a slave to run before him.
Code, Laws concerning Gifts to the Poor 7:3
R. Shabtai Rappaport, a present-day halakhic authority, interprets
Maimonides’ approach as mandating private support of subjective needs:
Charity and distributive justice 97
There are entirely different limits for charitable burdens imposed on
individuals and those imposed on the community. The rules governing
individuals’ charitable obligations are explained [by Maimonides,] in
[Code, Laws concerning Gifts to the Poor] chapter 7. Charity of this sort
must provide the poor person with everything he needs, as long as it
does not exceed one-ﬁfth of the donor’s assets. . . . In contrast, charity
imposed on the community, the rules of which are explained in [Code,
Laws concerning Gifts to the Poor] chapter 9, is for the support of three
needs only: food, clothing, and burial.43
In contrast to Maimonides, R. Moses Isserles (Rema) takes the view that
subjective needs are to be supported by public funds. He offers the
following gloss on the pertinent passage in the Shulhan Arukh:
How much is given to the poor person? “Sufﬁcient for whatever he
needs.” How so? If he is hungry—they should feed him. If he needs
clothing—they should clothe him. If he has no household furnishings—
he buys him household furnishings. Even if it was [formerly] the habit
of this man to ride a horse, and he had a slave running in front of him,
when he was rich, and he has become impoverished, one must buy
him a horse and a slave.
Shulhan Arukh, YD 250:1
Rema ad loc: And it appears that all this refers to the charity
collectors, or to [a fund contributed to by] many individuals, but an
individual is not obligated to provide a poor person with whatever he
needs. Rather, he informs the community of [the poor person’s] straits.
But if there is no organized community [fund] there, the individual
must give, if he can afford it.
iii Support for relatives
The fact that there remains an obligation to provide direct charitable
support for the poor even where public communal funds are in place has
a further implication. The halakha tends to favor support for needy
relatives over support for strangers who are needy. The Talmud, for
example, offered the following explanation for the verse requiring loans
to the needy:
R. Joseph stated: “If thou lend money to any of My people, to the poor
among you” (Exod. 22:24): [this teaches, if the choice lies between] My
people and a heathen, “My people” take preference; the poor or the
43 R. Shabtai Rappaport, “Priorities in the allocation of communal resources” (Hebrew), in
M. Halperin (ed.), Sefer Assia 7 (Jerusalem: 1993), 94, 100.
98 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
rich—“the poor” take precedence; your poor [i.e., your relatives] and
the poor of your town—your poor take precedence; the poor of your
town and the poor of another town—the poor of your own town take
bBaba Metzia 71a
Maimonides ruled in the same spirit:
A poor man who is one’s relative takes precedence over all others, the
poor of one’s household take precedence over the other poor of his
town, and the poor of his town take precedence over the poor of
another town, as it is said, “To the poor and needy kinsman in your
land” (Deut. 15:11).
Code, Laws concerning Gifts to the Poor 7:13
It must be kept in mind that preference for family members, if shown
by those administering the public charitable fund, would be considered
unfair bias, if not outright corruption. Moreover, strictly applying the
principle that those who are closest should take precedence with respect
to charitable support can leave many of the needy without sustenance and
support. Only if this preference is operative in the context of direct charity,
funded by private individuals, can it have a positive effect, fostering an
increased sense of responsibility, solidarity and empathy. Hence the need
for two channels for supporting the needy: the personal and the public.
Individuals who have ample resources should indeed help maintain
relatives who fall into penury, so as to enable public charity funds to better
assist those who have no family, or whose relatives are not in a position to
offer them sufﬁcient material support. But it is vital to retain a proper
balance between direct charity and public charity, so as to avoid a situation
of overgenerous support for relatives while those without prosperous
families are left unaided.
This line of thinking is manifest in a responsum by the great twentieth-
century halakhic authority, R. Moses Feinstein:
And even though [the questioners] are permitted and it is even a
religious duty for them to set aside the charity from today on for their
brother, so that he can marry and study Torah after being married—
which is an important thing to do—still, it is not right for one to exempt
himself thereby from all charity [to other people]. . . .
And he should not give all his charity to a relative to the exclusion
of other [needy people].
He should not exempt himself from all charities [to others in need,
on the claim that he is supporting his relatives], because that would
desecrate God’s Name, for people would not say that he gives to his
relative; they would say he is unconcerned about the precept of charity
Charity and distributive justice 99
and the strengthening of the Torah, and it would also cause others not
to give. Accordingly, they should set aside the larger share for their
brother, but contribute a portion to other charities as well . . . thereby
fulﬁlling the precept properly and sanctifying God’s Name.
Responsa Igrot Moshe, YD 1:144
To sum up this section, we can say that the establishment of communal
charitable institutions neither superseded nor diminished the importance
of direct giving. The laws of charity mandate two distinct routes for the
dispersal of charitable assistance: charity given by a donor directly to a
beneﬁciary, and charity mediated by the community or the state. These
routes sometimes overlap—and this redundancy may be the system’s
secret strength—but in any event dovetail neatly. The dual-track system
of charity makes it possible to handle social problems that may elude
publicly-run institutions. Difﬁcult cases that might otherwise fall between
the cracks, involving those in need of help yet not clearly within the
categories of eligibility for public assistance, can be resolved through
support provided by individuals and small circles, whether family, friends,
or caring members of the community.
In this chapter, we have considered various aspects of the laws of charity,
examining ﬁrst the biblical social justice precepts, then the laws of charity
developed by the Sages. We have attempted to identify the concepts and
principles on which they rest, and endeavored to assess the extent to which
the Rabbinic laws of charity reﬂect the distributive values implicit in
The laws of charity did indeed preserve some aspects of the biblical
principles of distributive justice, but not all. Clearly, the revolutionary
quality that characterizes the Torah’s seminal social justice precepts is not
found in the laws of charity. We saw that the Torah mandated radical social
transformations: general remission of loans, emancipation of slaves,
re-distribution of land. These measures were designed to rearrange the
social fabric along more equitable, less polarized lines, though not to pro-
duce a socially egalitarian society. This revolutionary spirit is not main-
tained in the more modest, less ambitious Rabbinic laws of charity. These
laws seek to help the poor in various ways, but not to bring about a deep-
seated transformation of society. This divergence between the transfor-
mative ethos of the Torah legislation and the conservative spirit of
the Rabbinic laws of charity is due to the disparate contexts within which
the two sets of rules were set down. The Pentateuch, which describes the
Israelites’ exodus from Egypt—a revolutionary event in its own right—
and the establishment of an entirely new society in Canaan, has a funda-
mentally foundational quality. The Rabbinic sources, however, relate to an
100 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
entirely different historical context: that of a nation in exile, compelled by
circumstance to deal more with daily survival than with rectifying the
world’s ills (tikun olam), or instituting an ideal society. To put it differently,
a foundational era—an age in which a society and sovereign state are cre-
ated ex nihilo–is altogether different from an era in which most of a nation’s
energies are devoted to preserving something already in existence, and
confronting the pressures of life in exile. The latter era is an age in which
one must rest content with more modest—and realistic—social programs.
Still, even within the chastened framework of the laws of charity,
the Sages retain some important social justice principles set out in the
Maintenance and rehabilitation of the poor
We saw that biblical law imposed two sorts of obligations: those intended
to sustain the poor and the weak through the difﬁcult circumstances in
which they ﬁnd themselves (gleanings, forgotten sheaves, corners of the
ﬁeld; Sabbath rest); and those intended to rehabilitate them and release
them from the cycle of poverty (remission of loans, restoration of lands,
emancipation of slaves, lending money). The Sages recognized the
problematic nature of outright charitable donations, which run the risk of
creating an ongoing state of dependency, and thus perpetuating poverty.
Accordingly, they sought out various ways to direct charitable giving to
more productive uses that rehabilitated the poor (preempting descent into
poverty by lending money, entering into partnerships and creating jobs)
rather than merely sustaining them. In this way, they implemented, to a
degree, the biblical principle that merely sustaining the poor was insuf-
ﬁcient. As we saw, however, in the Rabbinic world charity that sustained
the poor predominated, as a practical matter, over rehabilitative charity.
Preservation of social stratification
The Sages sought to cultivate assistance to the poor within a framework
that recognized the existence of social stratiﬁcation and the need for
its perpetuation. They made no attempt to create equality between the
various social classes, and it may be that they did not even seek to
signiﬁcantly diminish the gaps between them, but only to lend assist-
ance to the needy while preserving the existing social fabric. This
accounts for the striking absence of a relative criterion for poverty in
the talmudic sources, and for the emphasis, in setting the amount of
charity, on the needs of the poor rather than the assets at the disposal of
the rich.44 This orientation is also reﬂected in the fact that the most
commendable forms of charity (loans, partnerships, creating jobs) deplete
44 The Jerusalem Talmud’s version of the enactment at Usha is an exception.
Charity and distributive justice 101
the donor’s wealth less than do outright donations. Here too we see an
interesting continuity with the biblical approach to social justice, which
established mechanisms for helping the weak that were not directed at
achieving social leveling.
Responsibility of the poor
The diminished emphasis on the precept of lending money in relation to
that of giving charity (that is, outright donations) did not induce the Sages
to relieve the poor of all responsibility for their situation. The Sages sought
to divide responsibility between donor and beneﬁciary. They therefore
mandated that charitable funds were not to be distributed to those among
the poor who were capable of taking care of themselves yet chose to be
supported by the public, and further, that the poor themselves were obli-
gated, like everyone else, to contribute to charity, albeit modestly. This rule
can be seen as derived from the responsibility borne by the poor in the
biblical context, where, we saw, they were expected to take an active part
in both the rehabilitative processes—working their returned lands, for
instance—and even the provision of their sustenance, by gleaning and
gathering produce left for them in the ﬁelds, as explained above.
Private and communal responsibility
In developing the laws of charity, the Sages had to establish communal
mechanisms, mainly public charitable funds, that would shoulder the
responsibility of attending to the needy. Such institutions were needed
in order to make charitable measures more effective, but also served
to protect the dignity of the poor by allowing assistance to be obtained
anonymously. At the same time, the Sages were careful not to abandon the
biblical principle that every member of society bears personal responsibility
for easing the plight of the poor. Accordingly, they retained, alongside
these public institutions, a parallel private track for charitable giving,
whereby charity was given directly to the poor, especially those close to
the donor, such as relatives and neighbors.
The Sages, then, devised a complex system of mechanisms for advancing
social justice. It combined effective assistance to the needy with recognition
of society’s multi-dimensional structure, fostered the shared responsibility
of weak and strong; and synergized the effectiveness of public provision
of charity with the warmth and sensitivity of private beneﬁcence.
102 Windows onto Jewish Legal Culture II
Appendix Social justice in the ancient Near East
The following documents illustrate efforts undertaken in ancient Near
Eastern societies to help the needy.
The ﬁrst recounts a remission of loans ordered by King Ammisaduqa,
who reigned in Babylon in the sixteenth century BCE, in an effort to ease
the burden on debtors.
Whoever has given barley or silver to an Akkadian or an Amorite as
an interest-bearing loan. . . and had a document executed–because the
king has invoked the misharum for the land, his document is voided;
he may not collect the barley or silver on the basis of his document.
If an obligation has resulted in foreclosure against a citizen of
Numhia, a citizen of Emutbalum, a citizen of Idamaras, a citizen of
Uruk, a citizen of Isin, a citizen of Kisurra, or a citizen of Malgium, in
consequence of which he placed his own person, his wife or his
children in debt servitude for silver, or as a pledge–because the king
has instituted the misharum in the land, he is released; his freedom is
The second text speaks of Pharaoh Ramses IV (12th c. BCE), who, at the
time of his coronation, announced several measures to be taken to beneﬁt
Heaven and earth rejoice, for thou art the great lord of Egypt. Those
who had ﬂed have returned to their home-towns; those who were in
hiding have come forth. The hungry are sated and rejoice, the thirsty
are drunk. The naked are clothed in ﬁne linen, the ragged wear fair
garments. Those who were in bonds are free again; those who were in
chains rejoice. The rebels in this land are become free men once more.
High Niles are come forth from their caverns and make glad the heart
of the people. The widows’ houses stand open once more; they let the
1 Translated by J.J. Finkelstein in J.B. Pritchard (ed.), The Ancient Near East–Supplementary
Texts and Pictures Relating to the Old Testament (Princeton: 1969), 526.
2 H.S. Smith, “A note on amnesty,” Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 54 (1968), 212.