I Will Not Leave the Place of Torah and the Greater Blessing

Once I was passing from place to place, and it was a year of drought, and a certain man found me and said, "Rabbi, from what place are you?" I said to him, "My son, I am from such-and-such a place, where all are sages and rabbis." He said to me, "Rabbi, dwell in my place, and I will provide for you and give you wheat and barley and all kinds of legumes." I said to him, "My son, even if you give me a thousand thousand golden dinars, I will not leave the place of Torah." He said to me, "Rabbi, why?" I said to him, "Because all those people you see in the world who provide for themselves and dwell in a place that has no words of Torah - after a time they die and depart. For nothing accompanies a person to his eternal home except words of Torah and good deeds alone, as it is said, "When you walk it shall guide you, when you lie down it shall watch over you, and when you wake it shall converse with you" (Proverbs 6:22). And it says, "Your righteousness shall go before you; the glory of the LORD shall gather you in" (Isaiah 58:8). And it says, "And it shall be righteousness for you before the LORD your God" (Deuteronomy 24:13). And whenever Israel occupy themselves with Torah and do the will of their Father in Heaven, the Holy One Himself turns toward them for blessing, as it is said, "Truth springs up from the earth, and righteousness looks down from heaven" (Psalms 85), and "looking down" means nothing but blessing, as it is said, "Look down from Your holy dwelling... and bless Your people" (Deuteronomy 26:15). And whenever Israel do not occupy themselves with Torah and do not do the will of the Omnipresent, God forbid, He turns toward them for a curse, as it is said, "It grew up to the host of heaven, and it cast down to the ground some of the host and of the stars, and trampled them... and the host was given over to it together with the daily offering through transgression, and it cast truth to the ground, and it acted and prospered" (Daniel 8:10). And "the host of heaven" means nothing but Israel; "through transgression" - this is the transgression of Torah, as it is said, "and it cast truth to the ground" - thus you have learned that if Israel cast words of Torah to the ground, God forbid, immediately the kingdom of the nations acts and prospers. Come and see that the measure of the Holy One is not like the measure of flesh and blood. The measure of flesh and blood: his curse is greater than his blessing. But the Holy One is not so; His blessing is greater than His curse. When the Holy One blessed Israel, He blessed them from alef to tav, from "If you walk in My statutes" to "upright" (Leviticus 26). And when He cursed them, it was from vav to mem, from "But if you will not listen" to "their soul abhorred" (Leviticus 26). Similarly you say, "And all Israel transgressed Your Torah" (Daniel 9:11) - what does this teach? It teaches that they transgressed it from alef to tav. Come and see how great is the power of the transgression of Torah, for Jerusalem was not destroyed and the Temple was not destroyed except through the transgression of Torah, as it is said, "For the transgression of Jacob is all this" (Micah 1:5), and "this" means nothing but Torah, as it is said, "Who is the wise man who can understand this... why is the land ruined? And the LORD said, Because they forsook My Torah" (Jeremiah 9:11).