If You're a Stonemason, Remain a Stonemason: 5 Fables for Reflection

Gossip - A Terrible Affliction!

While traveling on the bus, Michal and Merav discussed the sensational news: Ronen and Shirael's engagement.

"Why would Ronen want to marry such a girl?", Michal asked Merav. "She is so quiet, serious, stern, and not particularly smart. He is a young, educated guy, full of life!"

"I think so too," Merav agreed. "I always thought Ronen Barkowitz would find someone better for himself."

"Exactly," Michal added, "she's entirely beneath his level."

The woman sitting behind the friends could not resist. She stood up from her seat and shook Michal's surprised hand.

"Thank you both," the woman said. "I'm Edna Barkowitz, Ronen's mother. I didn't know all these things you said about Shirael, and they're giving me something to think about. Maybe this wedding is a mistake; we'll see what we can do to prevent it."

Michal and Merav blushed with embarrassment, and Michal mumbled, "Maybe we exaggerated a bit... she's not that terrible... she can even be amusing at times." "Yes," Merav added. "And when you think about it... they did seem really perfect together."

"Maybe you really did exaggerate a bit," the woman told the girls, "this couple chose to get married, and they probably have good reasons for it."

"We didn't mean to spoil and harm," Michal told Edna, who by then was signaling the bus driver to stop for her. "And send regards from Michal and Merav to Ronen."

"I can't send them, you see, I'm not really his mother," the woman riposted while getting off the bus, "but I very well could have been...".

Friends, this incident could happen to any of us. Remember, gossip is a terrible affliction! Beyond the severe prohibition in the Torah of gossip and slander. Sometimes we don't know when and how much our words can hurt and harm others...

"May it be Hashem's will that we protect our tongues from speaking evil and our lips from deceit," Amen!

(Photo: shutterstock)

Only You - Really Only You!

A story about a Jewish man who was forced to live in a non-Jewish village, far from Jewish communal life. Without a synagogue, without a prayer quorum. All day he had to toil for his livelihood, surrounded by coarse non-Jews. He prayed alone, and only once a year, before the High Holy Days, was he able to travel to the city to the Jewish community and pray with the congregation.

During one of these times, he approached the rabbi and poured out his sorrow. No, he wasn't complaining about financial hardships. G-d forbid, he tries to be happy with his lot. Yet, it pains and troubles him, why is he deprived of serving Hashem properly, like any other Jew in the House of Israel?!

The rabbi looked at him fondly and said: Surely you wish to see yourself in a room full of sacred books, surrounded by Torah and holiness. You believe this is how you could be a true and perfect servant of Hashem. But know, my dear, Hashem has plenty of angels. That's not why He created you. Hashem assigned you a special and unique role, which you can fulfill perfectly - specifically from your remote village. You have the opportunity to bring Hashem unique delight, that only you, yes only you, can bring before Him, from your situation, from your remote village!

Every Jew and their "remote village." One succumbs to laziness, another to indifference, a third to anger. The fourth is in a distant and unsupportive environment, the fifth trapped in negative habits, and so on... And a person thinks in their heart: It's a shame it’s this way, I could serve Hashem better if it were different. But the opposite is true, for Hashem wants a person to serve Him precisely with the unique conditions and tools He's given them...

Sustenance Only from the Creator

A poor man went to collect money in one of the large towns, approached a wealthy man and told him he needed money to marry off his daughter. The wealthy man opened the door, gave him $20, and sent him on his way. A few days later, the poor man came back and knocked on the door, and as soon as he began to talk - he started crying. "Listen, my situation is dire, I have no way to marry off my daughter. I don't know what to do. Please help me!"

The wealthy man brought him inside and immediately wrote him a check for $10,000.

The poor man asked: Why, when I first came to you, did you give me only $20, and now you gave me everything I needed?

The wealthy man said to him: The first time you came to me, I saw you were collecting money in the city, you have several people you are going to, and I'm one of them. Therefore, I gave you only a little. But now that you told me you have no one to help you, and only I can rescue you from your situation, I gave you everything.

The same is true, when a person prays to Hashem and says: Master of the Universe, give me sustenance! And in his heart, he thinks, if You do not give me, I will manage. I'll take a loan from someone else. Hashem says to him: No problem. I'll give you a little, and the rest you'll manage on your own.

But when a person comes and cries out to the Creator of the Universe, I have nothing to eat! Give me sustenance! Only You can help me! I have no one else but You! Then the Creator "opens His hands" and gives him everything!

(Photo: shutterstock)

In the End, It All Returns to the Box

My grandmother taught me how to play the game of Monopoly. She understood that the game's objective was to acquire. She gathered all she could, and eventually became a master of the board.

Every time, she would take my last dollar, and I would surrender in complete defeat. Then she always looked at me and said the same thing - "One day you will learn to play the game!"

One summer I played Monopoly with a neighbor, almost every day. We would play for hours, and that summer I learned to play the game. I understood that the only way to win was to commit completely to acquisition. I realized that money and property are how you accumulate points, and by the end of that summer, I was more ruthless than my grandmother. I was ready to bend the rules if I needed to, to win this game!

Then, in the fall, I sat down to play with grandma. I took everything she had... I ruined her financially and psychologically. I watched her give me her last dollar and surrender in complete defeat. Then, she had something else to teach me...

She looked at me and said: "Now, it all goes back to the box". All those houses and hotels, all the railroad and utility companies. All those assets and all that wonderful money, now, it all goes back to the box. "Oh no"... I didn’t want it to go back to the box. "No," she said. "None of it was ever really yours... you get excited about it for a while, but all of this was here long before you sat down at the board, and it will be here long after you go. You know, players come and go. But, it all goes back to the box. Cars, titles, clothes, bags, possessions... even your body."

I realized that the fact is, everything I consume and gather and keep, goes back to the box, and I'm going to lose it all... There isn’t much return on this investment, huh?...

Friends, you finally got that ultimate promotion, made the ultimate purchase, bought the perfect house, achieved financial security, and climbed the ladder of success to the highest place you could reach, and then the thrill... disappears. Then what? Surely you understand it will never be enough... then you must ask yourself the question: What truly matters? What is the purpose of life if everything, in the end, goes back to the box?...

In our lives, we gather and collect, buy and invest, dedicate days and nights to creating a comfortable and quality world. But at the end of the day, we will all have to return everything to the "box", all that we have labored over - the houses, the cars, the businesses... everything will remain here!

If we only pause for a moment and think, we would understand that everything will return to the "box". We spend our lives investing in this world and sometimes forget what our purpose is - to secure our portion in the world to come.

Hashem created His world so it serves man, so that he can serve his Creator in the best and most comfortable way. Don’t put your best strength in the temporary and fleeting world, pay attention and invest in your eternal world. We must do soul-searching, in what is worth and desirable to invest our energies, thoughts, desires... and in what we should invest less, for everything, in the end, will stay in the "box"...

To Be Someone Else

A stonemason (a craftsman who carves and shapes stone) was dissatisfied with his life. Once, as he passed by the house of a wealthy merchant, and saw the grand house and its important guests, the stonemason thought, "How powerful this merchant is! I wish I could be a merchant too." Suddenly, as if by magic, the stonemason became a wealthy merchant, owning a huge house with riches and honor.

One day, he saw the minister passing by in his golden carriage, accompanied by servants and soldiers beating drums in his honor. He envied him and thought, "I wish I could be an important minister." And behold, he became an important minister carried by his servants. But it was a hot summer day, the sun was scorching, and he became uncomfortable in the royal garments as he wandered the city.

He looked at the sun and thought, "How powerful the sun is, I wish I could be the sun."

In an instant, the minister turned into the sun and spread his light from the sky. But suddenly, a dark cloud came and concealed him. In one second, the sun's power was lost. Again, he thought to himself, "I wish I could be this cloud."

The man became a cloud and started wandering above the mountains and fields. But suddenly he felt pushed strongly. When he looked back, he saw the wind blowing at his back. "How powerful the wind is, I wish I could be the wind," the man prayed.

The man became the wind and began to wreak havoc on nature - uprooting trees, blowing shifting sands. But when he came upon a huge rock, he saw he couldn't move it. No matter how hard he tried, the rock stayed rooted and immovable. "How powerful this rock is," he thought. "I wish I could be a rock."

The man turned into the massive rock and felt the strongest in the world.

But suddenly, miraculously, he felt intense pain in his body, and couldn’t believe: "Who can be more powerful than me, the great rock?".

He looked down and saw beneath him a stonemason holding a hammer...

Be yourself. Do not live the lives of others. Use the tools that the Creator of the Universe has given you to fulfill your purpose in the world. Because what you have received - is the best for you to reach the correction for which we came to the world! Everything that the Creator of the Universe presents to our lives must be beneficial for us!