Matot Money Matters
Delivered Friday, July 29, 2005
BY: Rabbi Scott Hausman-Weiss

I want to share with you this story about an American businessman who visits a coastal village in Mexico. He is sitting at the pier when a fisherman in a small boat docks. Inside the boat are two yellow fin tuna. The American compliments the fisherman on the quality of his fish and asks how long it took to catch them.
“Only a little while,” the fisherman replies. The American asks why he didn’t stay out longer and catch more fish. The Mexican says he had all he needed for his family. The American then asks, “But what do you do with the rest of your time?”
The fisherman says, “I sleep late, fish a little, play with my children, take siesta with my wife, and stroll into the village each evening where I sip wine and play guitar with my amigos. I have a full and busy life, senor.
The American says, “I am a Harvard M.B.A., and I can help you. You should spend more time fishing and buy a bigger boat with the proceeds. With the profits from the bigger boat, you could buy several boats. Eventually you will have a fleet of fishing boats. Instead of selling your catch to a middleman, you could sell directly to the processor and open your own cannery. Once you control the product, processing, and distribution, you would need to leave this coastal fishing village and move to Mexico City, then to Los Angeles or New York, where you will run your enterprise.
The fisherman listened politely. “But senor, how long will all this take?”
The businessman replied, “Fifteen to twenty years.”
“But what then, senor?”
“That’s the best part,” the American says, “When the time is right, you announce an IPO and sell your company stock to the public and make millions.”
“Millions, senor?” Then what?
“You retire to a small coastal fishing village where you sleep late, fish a little, play with your kids, take siesta with your wife and stroll to the village in the evenings where you could sip wine and play your guitar with your amigos.”

The irony of this story makes us laugh. But it should also make us pause. Here we are on Shabbat, Sabbath evening, ostensibly the day of rest. The day of relaxation. The day whose definition is employed regularly as the messages of some of the most popular advertising campaigns: Have a coke and a smile. The Olive Garden, we’re family here. You deserve a break today at McDonalds. Even the Army, Be all that you can be. But when it comes to us, to truly giving ourselves the break from the mad rush of life that seems to be the most difficult thing of all. The fisherman is truly the wisest one not because he is some noble savage who doesn’t know better. But because he indeed does have everything: a livelihood, love, companionship, rest and time. These days, time appears to be the scarcest commodity of all. The pace of our lives is at times maddening and the things we miss when moving so fast are so sacred. The story is told of a man hurrying along the street. A Rabbi asked him, “Why are you rushing so much?” “I’m rushing after my livelihood,” the man answered. “How do you know,” asked the Rabbi, “that your livelihood is running on before you so that you have to rush after it. Perhaps all you need to do is to stand still and let it catch up.”

As the Israelites approach the land of Canaan, in this week’s Torah portion, there is much discussion over the way in which the Israelites will enter and take possession of the land that God has promised them. At one point in this parshah, the Torah states, “Now the children of Reuben and the children of Gad had a very great multitude of cattle; And when they saw the land of Jazeer and the land of Gilead, that behold, this place was a place for cattle.” This east side of the Jordan River appeared to the Israelites of these two tribes to be perfect for them and all their needs. They then spoke up to Moses and said, “If we have found grace in your sight, let this land be given to your servants for a possession and do not bring us over the Jordan.” Moses was shocked, “Shall your brothers go to war and you shall stay here?” Realizing that this was probably not something they were going to get away with, they adjusted their proposal to include that while the women and children would stay, the men would first join their brothers in battle and then return to this land. That was a good start but it wasn’t enough. For following their first request, they had added these words: “We will build pens for our cattle and cities for our little ones.” Not only were they willing to allow their brothers to go into battle without them but they had placed their livelihoods ahead of their families. And subtly, Moses teaches them with his response: “Build your cities for your little ones and folds for your sheep and do that which has proceeded from your mouths.”

So many things are so important, it seems. So many tasks are so crucial, we believe. So many opportunities are knocking on the opposite side of the door often so much more loudly than those opportunities lying on this side of the door right before our feet. As a parent, I think one of the hardest lessons to impart to my children is the appreciation and gratitude for what we have had and do have right here at this very moment. The Rabbis taught, “Who is rich? He who is satisfied with what he has.” While this aphorism is to teach us that wealth is a matter of perspective, it doesn’t mean we have to stay away from improving the quality of our life. We are encouraged by Jewish teaching to be productive and that wealth is one sign of blessing. However, without a regular awareness and appreciation of what we have in the moment, what we have already experienced, enjoyed, partaken in, it is not the drive for comfort or rest or happiness that motivates us. Its just the drive for more of what we feel like we don’t have enough of. More time, more energy, more money, more power, more money. But more is an ever-deepening pit.

In Malibu, in 1996 I worked as the program director at Hilltop Camp for the summer. Natalie would come up and see me on the weekends and together we would go out for my weekly meal away from camp. Crazy Fish had the best sushi I had ever eaten and especially because six days of camp food preceded this meal away, I always wanted to order more than I could have eaten, more than I could have afforded and more than I could have enjoyed. There was this one kind of California Roll that was so delicious (white fish, not crab); my tendency was just to devour my four pieces. But Natalie insisted that we eat each piece slowly and at the same time, to appreciate the taste together. The awareness of what I was eating, how it tasted, who I was eating with, and the gratitude I felt because of that awareness made each of those moments in time eternal. In those moments, I learned to tap into something magical that exists at all times, in all places and in all relationships – the eternal potential for creating meaning. In meaning making, neither time nor quantity plays a role.


Let us learn to state as the Gadites and Reubenites restated in their response to Moses, “Our little ones, our wives, our flocks, and all our cattle shall be there in the cities of Gilead.” Our families. Our values. Our time. Our livelihoods. Our days lived in this order will create the fullness of our lives, marked not by ever-deepening pits of need and desire, but by ever-deepening levels of meaning, connection and wholeness.