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EXODUS | 20:14 covet — EXOD486 We are forbidden to pressure someone into...

EXOD486 We are forbidden to pressure someone into selling that which he does not want to sell. A person who covets any possession belonging to his friend and pressures him into selling the article violates this prohibition. (In connection with "your fellow man's wife" this would be the case if one persuaded somebody to divorce his wife or otherwise induced him to do so, so that one could marry the wife afterward--Rabbi S. R. Hirsch). It makes no difference whether he applies the pressure himself or asks his friends to do so for him. Moreover, the very desiring of someone else's possession is a violation of a different prohibition: "You shall not desire the house of your fellow man, nor his ox and his donkey, nor anything which belongs to your fellow man" (Dvorim 5:18). (Rambam, Hilchos Gzaila v'avaida 1:9, 10) Desire leads to coveting (that is, pressuring someone to sell) and coveting leads to stealing. For if a person strongly wants someone's possession and is unable to acquire it through payment, he may eventually steal it, and if the owner tries to protect his possession from being stolen, the coveter is apt to kill him, as was the case with Achav and Navos (I Melachim, ch. 21). (Mechilta; Rambam, ibid.). Some people might wonder how a person who desires something belonging to another person can overcome that desire. Ibn Ezra explained that it is all a matter of attaining the proper perspective. If a man sees that another person has a luxurious home, he should realize that it is God's will that this should belong to that person and not to him. His fellowman's possessions should be in his eyes as completely out of reach. A poor peasant will not desire to marry the king's daughter, writes Ibn Ezra, because he knows that she can never become his. This should be our attitude toward the possessions of others. We should be satisfied with what God has given us, and realize that what He has given to someone else is entirely unobtainable for us. Rabainu Yonah writes that if you desire to buy an article belonging to someone who does not want to sell it, but by pleading with him he will be too embarrassed to refuse, you are forbidden to plead with him. Your pleading with him would be tantamount to forcing him to sell the item. Similarly, if a respected person desires something and knows that because people respect him he will not be refused, he may not ask the owner of an article to sell or give it to him unless he knows that the person will do it willingly. (Shaarey Tshuvah 3:43).

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Source KeyPLYN
Verse20:14
Keyword(s)covet
Source Page(s)164-5
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