Habol Tahbol. 22 Though 22 25 Speaks Only of Night Garments

There are two matters here. "You shall surely take in pledge" (Exodus 22:25). Scripture teaches you that if one takes the peg of the plow, when he rises early he must return it to him. One verse says: "Until the sun goes down you shall return it to him" (Exodus 22:25), and another verse says: "When the sun goes down" (Deuteronomy 24:13). Say therefore that you must return to him that in which he sleeps, as it is said, "until the sun goes down"; and in the morning you must return to him the peg of the plow. And likewise, "On his day you shall give him his wages" (Deuteronomy 24:15). Why? "For he is poor." And it says: "For it is his only covering, it is his garment for his skin; in what shall he sleep?" (Exodus 22:26). Behold, the cold strikes him in the night. "And it shall come to pass, when he cries out to me, that I will hear" (Exodus 22:26). Two matters here resemble one another. Concerning the hired laborer it is written: "On his day you shall give him his wages" (Deuteronomy 24:15). This is like one who was walking on the road with his donkey behind him. They sold him a sheaf of standing grain; he placed it on his shoulder, and the donkey came along the road behind him, hoping to eat that sheaf. What did his master do to him? He came and stood him in his house and tied the sheaf up above him. They said to him: Wicked one, all along the road it ran on account of it, and you did not place it before it. So too the hired laborer: he toils and suffers all day long, hoping for his wages, and you send him away empty; "and to it he lifts up his soul" (Deuteronomy 24:15). And here (Exodus 22:26) it is written: "And I will hear, for I am gracious." What is written after it? "You shall not revile God" (Exodus 22:27). What has this matter to do with that one? There was an incident concerning a certain man who went to the judge with his fellow. He acquitted him; he came out praising the judge. He said: There is no sage in the world like so-and-so the judge, and he is an angel. After a time he came back before him for judgment, and he found him liable. He began to revile him and say: There is no fool in the world like him. They said to him: Yesterday an angel and today a fool? Therefore it is written: "You shall not revile God." What is written after it? "Your fullness and the outflow of your presses you shall not delay" (Exodus 22:28). If you have reviled the judge, you are reviling your own produce. And so you find that whenever the judge is reviled, the produce diminishes and famine comes, as it is said, "And it came to pass in the days when the judges judged" (Ruth 1:1), a generation that judged its judges. Therefore it is said: "You shall not revile God," and adjoining it, "Your fullness and the outflow of your presses."