שפת תמים- פרק ד

This פרק talks about the עונש in עוה''ב for שקר. We already mentioned some עונשים in עוה''ז, for example death, בזיונות…, but this פרק discusses עוה''ב.

If one doesn’t fix up his חטא in his lifetime (by returning or compensating the money and getting מחילה), there is no כפרה for this, not even יו''כ or יום המיתה because it is באל''ח. What happens to this person?

After three “days” in עוה''ב, the stomach of the person splits open and give its contents to the mouth and tells it “here are all the stolen things you wanted to give to me”. The person will be fed sand and his teeth will end up cracking. He’ll say, “I don’t want it”. ה' will answer him, “Well why did you say you wanted גזל, it’s also disgusting?”. This person will get no תקון, so he’ll have to come back as a גלגל to be מתקן for his חטא. Some people will even have to come back as animals, like the story of the man who came back as a horse and had to work for his master until he paid back everything he owed him. Even if you don’t come back as an animal, you will still have to be recreated and this is very scary.

It says in קהלת, "ישמח בחור בילדותך ויטבך לבך... ודע כי על כל אלה יביאך ה' למשפט". There is a משל- man running away from the קוסטינר. The קוסטינר told him that he’s a fool because he is going to have to come back. So the further he runs, the further he’ll have to come back. נמשל- the further you try to run away from being accountable for the bad you did, the further ה' will have to take you to justice and so you will have to come back for longer. Why should you have to worry about coming back? Why don’t you just be מתקן now?

You might think that it’s not so bad if you have to come back. משל- someone lost his פרנסה, so sadly he had to leave his wife and children and go to a far away island in order to make money. There he had a hard time making money. He was only able to make enough for his daily means, and he complained about his lot. Finally, he started to make money. He immediately informed his family that he would come home in seven months. He had to cross seven oceans and each would take one month to cross. His family was so happy and he gathered his things and left immediately. As he was about to embark on his trip home, his friend advised him to think if he owed anyone money so that he wouldn’t have גזל on his hands. He didn’t take his friend’s advice seriously and he left. He sent a message to his family that he’s on his way home and he will arrive on an appointed day. When the day came, his family went to the place in the city that lead to the ocean (there was a wall surrounding it, but there here there was an opening). They waited anxiously and saw that his ship was coming, but to their dismay the wall opening closed. From behind the wall they could hear their father’s voice begging the שר to let him in. The שר said that he couldn’t because he had a debt from ten years earlier that was written into the ספר זכרונות and never paid back and he must personally go and pay it back. (He couldn’t mail it back because the faraway place didn’t get mail.) He begged them to let him in, but they refused. He even offered to pay them even more, but they said that that won’t help the person he owes the money to. They told him that they know he was previously warned to pay back his debts, but he didn’t listen, so it’s his fault. He asked if he could go to his family, but they didn’t let. They only allowed him to see them from afar, through the gate. Then they made him return to the faraway land with him not knowing if once again he’ll owe someone money and repeat this scenario.

נמשל- our home is really עוה''ב, but we are here to do business- מצוות. We often don’t get too serious about doing מצוות until we are older, like the man who didn’t make money until right before he left. Right before we leave, our רבים, teachers and ספרים tell us to make sure that we don’t have גזל on our hands. Then we go through seven ימים, seven דינים a person must go through before he gets to his final resting place, he must go through them even before גיהנום. These seven דינים make a person cry waterfalls. And the person can’t wait to finally reach עוה''ב and reap the benefits of his מצוות. But after he goes through all that, the מלאכים standing at the gate of גן עדן don’t let him through. If he has enough of a זכות, they will let him catch a glimpse of גן עדן, but he will have to go back down to repay the money he owes. And when he finally returns, who knows if he will be זוכה not to have to go back to עוה''ז again?

There are stories about people who came to others in dreams and asked them to repay the money they owed so that they wouldn’t have to come back to this world again. But this is only if you have a very big זכות.