Guarding Against Even the Lightest Sin

"And he said, O Lord GOD, by what shall I know?" (Genesis 15:8). A person should always guard in his heart that he not come to sin, even a light sin. Go out and learn from our first fathers, who went down to Egypt only because of a light matter, that Abraham said, "By what shall I know?" And in reward for the small measure of reverence with which Ishmael feared his father, the Holy One, blessed be He, did not grant any nation or kingdom permission to rule over his children. And in reward for the two tears that Esau shed (as below, 27:38), they were given Mount Seir, from which the blessed rains never cease forever. And in reward for taking his vessels and going off before Jacob his brother, he was given a hundred provinces. And because Jacob listened to Joseph, he was punished over him twenty-two years. And on account of the waters of Meribah, Moses and Aaron were punished. The Sages said: If fire has seized the moist, what shall the dry do? And concerning that hour Scripture says, "A prayer of Moses" (Psalms 90:1). The Holy One, blessed be He, returned to appease Moses, saying to him: Am I not He of whom you are My children and I am your Father, you are My brothers and I am your brother, you are My companions and I am your companion, you are My beloved and I am your beloved? Have I forbidden anything to you? I ask of you nothing but - just as I examined Myself and found eleven attributes, so I ask of you nothing but eleven attributes, and these are they: "He who walks blamelessly and works righteousness" (Psalms 15:2), and so forth. Again the Holy One, blessed be He, returned to appease Moses, saying to him: Is there before Me any favoritism - whether Israel or gentile, whether man or woman, whether bondman or bondwoman? Whoever performs a commandment, its reward is at its side, as it is said, "Your righteousness is like the mighty mountains" (Psalms 36:7), and so forth. From here they said: Whoever increases the honor of Heaven and lessens his own honor, the honor of Heaven is increased and his honor is increased; and whoever lessens the honor of Heaven and increases his own honor, the honor of Heaven remains in its place and his honor is lessened. There was an incident with a man who was standing in the synagogue, and his son was standing opposite him, and all the people were answering after the prayer-leader, Hallelujah, while his son answered words of frivolity. They said to him: See, your son is answering words of frivolity. He said to them: What shall I do to him? He is a child; let him play. The next day he did the same, and through all eight days of the festival, and the father said nothing to him. And that year did not go out, nor two, nor three, before that man died, and his wife died, and his son died, and his grandson died, and fifteen souls went out from his household, and there remained to him only one pair: one lame and blind, and one foolish and wicked. Again there was an incident with a certain man who regretted that he had not studied Scripture and Mishnah. Once he was standing in the synagogue, and when the one passing before the ark reached the sanctification of the Name, he raised his voice and said, Holy, holy, holy. They said to him: Why did you raise your voice? He said to them: I have merited neither Scripture nor Mishnah, and now that they have given me permission, shall I not raise my voice and let my soul return to me? And that year did not go out, nor two, nor three, before that man went up from Babylon to the Land of Israel, and they made him commander of Caesar's army, and appointed him head over all the fortresses in the Land of Israel, and gave him a place, and he built a city and dwelt in it, and they called it Kelanya, for him and his children and his children's children until the end of all the generations. There was an incident with a certain priest who fed his animal heave-offering, and a fire fell upon him and consumed from him thirty heaps and thirty garments and twenty-four jugs of wine and sixteen jugs of oil and the rest of the money he had. And he came and stood before the Sages and told them what had befallen him. He said to them: I am a priest, and I fed my animal heave-offering. And the Sages heard and said: Blessed is the Omnipresent, before whom there is no favoritism. And do not heave-offering and holy food that have no one to eat them go to nothing but burning? He said to them: Did you not teach me thus - bitter-vetch of heave-offering may be fed to beast and animal and fowl? They said only bitter-vetch, which from their beginning are food for animals, and in a year of famine they permitted human beings to eat them; therefore David decreed against them. From here they said: Whoever feeds his animal heave-offering, even from the heave-offering of outside the Land, of him Scripture says, "He who despises his ways shall die" (Proverbs 19:16). And it says, "And the holy things of the children of Israel you shall not profane," and so forth. We have learned from Abraham that from the beginning of his deeds he feared before the Holy One, blessed be He, as it is said, "Fear not, Abram" - one does not say "Fear not" except to one who truly fears Heaven. They made a parable: to what is the matter like? To a king who said to his son, Go out and kill these bandits, and if they fall into your hand do not benefit from their money, so that they should not say, the king's son went out to kill these bandits only in order to seize the money. He went out and killed them. On his return his father came out to meet him and said to him: My son, blessed are you, and may you have peace of mind in the world, for you took no benefit from their money at all; and now behold, I will repay you from my treasury with silver and gold and precious stones and pearls and every precious vessel in the world. To this Abraham our father was likened when he slew the kings. The king of Sodom came out to meet him and said to him: Give me the persons, and so forth. He said to him: Fool of the world, do I need silver and gold, precious stones and pearls and every precious vessel from what is yours? "From a thread even to a shoelatchet," and so forth. Therefore it is said, "I am a shield to you," and so forth. We have learned from Isaac that from the beginning of his deeds he feared before the Holy One, blessed be He. Isaac was seventy-five years old when Abraham our father passed away. He said: Woe is me, perhaps I do not have good deeds as Abba had, and what will become of me before the Holy One, blessed be He? Immediately the mercies of the Holy One, blessed be He, were stirred, and He spoke with him on that night, as it is said, "And it came to pass after the death of Abraham" (Genesis 25:11), and so forth. We have learned from Jacob that from the beginning of his deeds he feared Heaven, as it is said, "And they gave to Jacob all the foreign gods" (Genesis 35:4), and so forth. And so our first fathers, as it is said, "And Israel saw the great hand" (Exodus 14:31), and so forth - to teach you that in reward for the reverence and in reward for the faith with which they believed in Him from the beginning, the Holy One, blessed be He, is destined to come and redeem them from among the nations of the world, as it is said, "Writhe and burst forth, O daughter of Zion," and so forth.