Rabbi Shimon ben Yoḥai, when he was sleeping on the night of Rosh Hashanah, saw in his dream his sister’s children being sued by the kingdom for six hundred dinars. He forced them to be appointed charity fund administrators. They said to him: ‘From whose money will the expenditures come?’ He said to them: ‘You expend [the necessary funds] and record it, and at the end of the year, if you have a deficit, I will pay you.’
At the end of the year, slander was spoken about them.30From context, it is likely that someone told government officials that they were breaking the law in their silk trade. While they were sitting and engaging in the silk trade, a man from the government came and said to them: ‘Either you craft a royal garment for the king, or you will be fined six hundred dinars.’ He took them and incarcerated them in prison.
When Rabbi Shimon ben Yoḥai heard, he went to them and said to them: ‘What did you expend?’ They said to him: ‘This is the ledger.’ He began reading the ledger and found that they had expended six hundred dinars, less six dinars. He said to them: ‘Give me six dinars and I will get you out.’
They said to him: ‘Do you see that old man? He is suing us for six hundred dinars, and you say: Six dinars and I will get you out?’ He said to them: ‘Give me six dinars and you need not be concerned.’ They gave him six dinars in his clenched hand,31In secrecy. he went and gave it as a bribe to that old man so he would not say anything to the king, and he got them out of there.
They said to him: ‘Did you perhaps know that we would be summoned?’32Did you know that we would have to pay exactly six hundred dinars, such that after we had spent five hundred and ninety four on charity, we would need to pay only another six? He said to them: ‘As you live, from Rosh Hashanah eve I knew that you would be sued for six hundred dinars.’ They said to him: ‘Had you told us, would we not have given even the six dinars for a mitzva?’
He said to them: ‘Had I told you, you would not have believed me. Moreover, I distracted you so you would perform the mitzva for its own sake.’33Had you known that you would thereby save six hundred dinars, you would have paid the six dinars for that reason rather than to help the needy.