Making plans
The holy Rebbe of Tzanz used to tell the following story, 'There
was once a poor women who had many children. They asked her for food
to eat, but she did not have any to give them. Once she found an egg.
She called her children to her and told them: "My children, we no
longer have anything to worry about. I have found an egg. And since I
am a person who is foresighted we will not eat this egg. I will ask
our neighbor to allow me to place this egg under one of his hens, and
there will come from it a small chicken. And we will not eat the
chicken, since she will be able to lay eggs. And these eggs we shall
not eat but we shall place them under her and there will be more eggs
and more chickens. We shall not eat of them, but we shall sell them
and I will buy a calf. And we shall allow the calf to grow and become
a cow. The cow will have calves, and we will allow them to grow, and
we shall have many cows and calves. Then I will sell them and buy a
field, and we shall have fields and cows and calves and chickens and
eggs. We will not be lacking for anything." And while she said this
to her children she was holding the egg in her hand, and the egg fell
from her hand and broke.'
The Holy Rebbe explained, 'This is the way people act. When the holy
days come everyone makes plans in his mind and accepts upon himself
to begin to do tshuva, and he considers in his heart, "I will do so
and so." But when the days have passed all the plans fall apart, and
are broken. Therefore people should be careful to not to fall. (p.
267 Otzer HaChaim customs of Rebbe Chaim of Tzanz)
Copyright (c) 1997 by Moshe Shulman (mshulman@virtual.co.il)
All rights reserved.
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