Day #295–Rambam DAILY Sefer HaMitzvos

today's day number 295 of our daily study of RA mitz and in the three chapters today study track of M we're starting a new section of in the book of judgments it is called Mal it's all about borrowing money loans not like borrowing objects like we were speaking about before in but borrowing money okay we have two Mitzvah today a positive commandment and a negative commandment positive commandment 197 the Mitzvah 2 give alone it's not just a nice thing to do if you feel like it it's actually a Mitzvah to do so and this is distinct from the Mitzvah of Charity of giving Saka and in fact in some ways the Mitzvah of giving alone is considered a superior Mitzvah to giving charity one reason is because giving alone restores the dignity or maintains the Dignity of the borrower as opposed to giving him a free handout there are other reasons as well like for instance um giving charity really is only somebody who qualifies to be a recipient of Charity meaning somebody who's poor but a loan could be for somebody who isn't poor they're just not liquid right now they need to make a business deal right now or they're going to lose the opportunity so you're giving them a loan so they can have the the funds to make a deal and you're helping them out and it's not even not even a poor person in other words when the mitz of Charity is going on it's kind of a sad thing because it means there must be poor people but when loans are going on it doesn't mean that anyone's poor it just means not everybody has the same liquidity at all moments okay at any rate that's positive of 197 okayga - 234 is a Prohibition that goes along with this positive commandment and that is uh not to act like a creditor what does it mean don't act like a creditor you know what it means act like a creditor debt collection it means to Hound somebody who can't pay of course you're allowed to collect payment that's what a loan is it's supposed to be paid back but if you know that the person doesn't have the funds you're not allowed to go and put pressure on them to pay when they don't have it and in fact this Mitzvah even makes it prohibited for the Creditor to walk in front of the borrower if he knows that the borrower doesn't have the money right now and that by walking in front of the borrower it's going to cause him distress he's going to be anxious cuz he's going to feel guilty he doesn't have what to pay okay those are our mitzvah for today we'll see you for more tomorrow God willing