Counting Our Blessings

This week’s Parshah is Ki Tisa, “When you raise or elevate the children of Israel.” This refers to when you take the census of the Jews. You are not supposed to count them directly, but rather let each one give half a shekel for the Holy Temple’s purposes. Then you count the shekels, and you’ll know the number of the Jews.

Rashi explains that counting the Jews causes the evil eye to rest upon them and can cause a plague—even death—as we find in the Book of Shmuel (2 Samuel 24), when King David ordered a census and a plague beset them. This is as the Talmud states (Bava Metzia 42a): “A blessing is found only in something not measured (i.e., counted).” If we take a census, we are removing the blessing, and then judgments, plagues, and other difficulties reign.

We thus find the phrase, “Count your blessings!” What does this mean to us? We can count our blessings simply because we cannot truly count our blessings. They are beyond numbers—beyond our ability to count them. Every day we witness many miracles, many, many miracles. We arise in the morning, we can get dressed, we can move about and tackle our daily routines. We are free to choose our goals and pursue them. How many people in the world can really say enough thanks to HaShem for these blessings? They are actually found every hour, every minute, every second!

Funny thing. I (Chaim Kramer) find that my ability—or chances, or opportunities—to say thanks to HaShem increases when I give charity. I’ve often wondered why this is so. But it seems to me that just as we give the half shekel as charity to the Temple, we are protected from the evil eye—from that evil characteristic of stinginess, from the attribute of not being willing to share, from the trait of selfishness. We learn to give of ourselves to others. This is actually one of the greatest blessings we can ever experience.

And there are untold benefits that emerge from our gifts, because we cannot really know how far-reaching the kindnesses we show to others can extend. But for sure, we are actively experiencing a spread of kindness that spreads out into the world. What can be a greater blessing than that?

Hopefully we will learn from this week’s Parshah the greatness of sharing what we possess with others. With this, we are, as it were, causing HaShem to spread His Kindness upon us. So let us count our blessings!

Have a great Shabbos!

Chaim Kramer