Today's Mussar Lesson

(Divrei Yonah - Reb Yonah Forst z"l,)

It seems like Reb Michoel Ber Weissmandl wasn't such a Satmarer after all, at least when it came to finding reason within some of the tragedies that the Jewish people bore witness to. While the Satmar Rebbe blamed the Tziyonim for all the ills that befell the Jewish People during WW2, since it was in essence a revolt against G-d, RMBW blamed even the anti-Zionists. He blamed the Yidden who weren't honest in their business dealings with Goyim, which is why they got what was rightfully theirs. The word scary comes to mind, since he's essentially excusing the looting and reacquisition of Jewish property done by the Poles, Magyars, Ukranians, Lithuanians and any other local Goy. I had this as a joke in private conversations, where people would say how the Goyim allowed for this to happen, but never as an official excuse by a Rov BeYisroel .

A free translation:

Reb Yonah says that we can be MeOrer those that are lenient with regards to Gezel Akum and To'us Akum, that although the Mogen Avrohom says that To'us Akum is Muttar, still it's not considered LoChem, yours. We can allude to what I heard from Reb Michoel Ber Zt"l when he tried to explain what happened in the last Churbon, that although the beginning of the Tzores was in Germany (birthplace of Reform - HT) and from it spread to other countries, still we see that the Yidden in Germany managed to save themselves and to a great extent their belongings and holdings as well, whereas in other countries, in those places all of the belongings and holdings eventually made their way to the local Goyim and to the German conqueror. - HT) Why was this?

RMBW said that the reason this happened was because the Yidden in Germany were honest in their business dealings with the Goyim, they didn't rob or steal, therefore the money and property that they had was really theirs, it wasn't attained by dishonest means, so there was nothing that belonged to the Goy. Whereas, in the other countries, where poverty was so great, the Yidden in those were Mattir for themselves to be "lenient" sometimes when it came to dealings with Goyim. Therefore when the Tzores started Hashem made it so that the property that was in Yiddishe Hent that should've belonged to the Goy returned to its "rightful owners!" - VeHadvorim Noroyim. Maybe we can say - says Reb Yonah - that this is what is alluded to when the Mogen Avrohom says that although To'us Akum is Muttar still it's not yours, LoChem, because in the end all that doesn't rightfully belong to you - that you didn't get via honest business practices, even if it was from a Goy - will be returned to its rightful owner.

From this we can see how careful we need in all of our business dealings, because we can never know what the end result can be, and in heaven there's a Cheshbon for everything.