I've been thinking a lot about comment The Rebbitzen's Husband left on my last bog post, the one about the man who was giving so much tzedaka that his family was suffering. The one question that I keep turning over and over in my head is-- should I try to do anything about it? Does my friendship give me the right to interfere?
I haven't been doing much interfering with anything recently. I've been spending a lot of time at home, trying to take care of things. One of my pets passed away, so haven't wanted to spend shabbos away from the ones that are left to me. I think they're mostly through the grieving process now-- or at least I am. I am a single, childless woman in my 30s. Pets are good substitutes for babies or... at least they're the substitutes left to me.
At any rate, I've had a number of shabboses at home to search for clarity and work on myself. I've started to work on my Rosh Hashanah resolutions:
I joined Partners in Torah and downloaded some shirim (although I haven't started listening to them yet.) Also, after shabbos, I sat down and wrote out checks to a number of causes I wanted to support. I hope they won't mind receiving a dozen post-dated $15 checks, but that was the easiest way to put my thoughts into action.
Partners in Torah is interesting. My partner is very nice, but I'm not so sure that I agree with a lot of stuff in the book we're studying. For example, one of the things I learned this week is that I'm supposed to have a dedicated shabbos wardrobe that is nicer than anything I wear during the week. Does she have any idea how much that would cost? Which shul should not get tzedakah money from me this year so that I can do this?
4 comments:
A dedicated Shabbos wardrobe can be two items (even one), and they don't necessarily have to cost a fortune...you can bring it in for under a hundred, if it's just two nicer sweaters or blazers that you only wear on Shabbos. I personally think this is a halachic shaila: there are hilchos tzedakah, what you're supposed to give, what takes priority...and I would not be surprised if your Rabbi would say that tzorchei Shabbos take precedence over some of your charity recipients.
It just feels wrong that buying new clothing for myself could possibly be more important than giving tzedakah-- particularly now when so many more people and organizations are in need.
But, admittedly, part if my problem is that I'm balking at the idea of wearing the same clothes every shabbos. A lot of my friends only see me on shabbos and it would look like I'm wearing the same two things all the time. The idea makes me feel uncomfortable-- particularly when *they* all have varied wardrobes.
You're not buying the clothes for yourself, you're buying them l'kavod Shabbos. However, if you don't want to do it because of what your friends will think, then you might be entering murky waters. Are you buying a Shabbos wardrobe for Shabbos or for your friends?
You can start out small. You don't have to go out and buy a whole wardrobe at once. You buy one piece this month (there are great holiday sales out there!), another in another two months, another a month later...you build it up.
I've seen people use "l'kavod shabbos/yom tov" as reasons to get into all kinds of debt. That makes me uneasy. Hashem can't possibly really want us to drown in debt to "honor" shabbos; that's not how my great-grandparents lived.
Honestly, if I do buy a shabbos wardrobe, it will be because my rabbi convinced me that halachically I had to. I don't want to do it for myself OR my friends. It will make me feel worse to be wearing the same couple of pieces of clothing all the time.
Yes, there are some great sales out there, but every penny is either going to expenses, loan repayments or tzedakah right now. Maybe it's part of my Reform background, but I feel very strongly that it's important to live in a way that society will find honorable and admirable. My parents drilled into me that being fiscally responsible and making sure that I am never *ever* a burden on the community is Very Important.
Buying special clothes just for shabbos feels wasteful and wrong.
Maybe I should be driving a beat up car so that I could have more money to honor shabbos and yom tov, but unfortunately that decision can't be undone. Neither can my decision to own a home or the payments to the Bank of Mom and Dad from when my heat pump needed to be replaced.
If the money isn't there, then it isn't there-- and being in debt means that the money *definitely* isn't there right now.
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