You May Take Your Pledge and Still Keep the Poor Man Clothed

"If you take a pledge." Rabbi Ishmael says: Scripture comes to teach you that you may perform a mitzvah and still take what is yours. "Until the sun sets" — this is the daytime garment, which you return to him for the whole day; the nighttime garment, which you return for the whole night, from where? Scripture teaches, "You shall surely restore to him the pledge" and so forth. From here they said: We take as a pledge a daytime garment at night and a nighttime garment by day, and we return a daytime garment by day and a nighttime garment by night. (Exodus 22:26) "For it is his only covering" — this is the cloak. "It is his garment for his skin" — this is the tunic. "In what shall he sleep?" — to include a hide for bedding. Rabbi Natan says: If a man is found liable to his fellow for a hundred in court, and he has a garment worth two hundred, one does not say to him, "Sell your garment, clothe yourself with a hundred, and give me a hundred." Therefore it says, "For it is his only covering"; you are not permitted to deny him a garment that befits his station. "And I will hear, for I am gracious" — for I created My world with mercy.