DEUT1310 The Satmar Rebbe compares the Jew accumulating wealth in this world to the worker in the field that produces fruits (Quoted in "Priorities in Tzedaka," Rabbi Moshe Goldberger, 2007, pp. 41-42). The Torah permits the worker to eat from those fruits that he is picking, as long as the worker is working and remains in the field [this verse]. Maimonides requires as part of Jewish law that the owner gives food to his worker while performing this task (Maimonides, Hilchot Sechirut 12:1). But this Jewish law does not apply to a worker performing any other task in the field (such as fence building) or after a particular task is complete. The Jew in the physical world, says the Satmar Rebbe, is similarly, working for God in "His field" (the world) to accumulate funds in order to give some of them to Tzedaka. As long as the Jew is engaged in this work, he too is permitted to use these Tzedaka funds for his own benefit--i.e., he can receive something for giving them away, just as the worker can use what he is picking for his benefit. Thus, a Jew can "control" these earned charity funds by making conditions for how they are spent.

SHOW FULL EXCERPT

DEUT1309 See [[DEUT1318]] Deuteronomy 23:26 pluck CCCBM 81

SHOW FULL EXCERPT

DEUT1308 Let workers eat of what they are handling. Allow hired laborers working with your produce to eat of it while on the job. The mitzvah applies to workers who pick the produce and to those who work with the picked produce, as long as the picked produce is not ready to be tithed. When working with already picked produce, the laborers may eat it only while they actually are working with it. As for harvesters, they are allowed to eat only after having completed a portion of the work, such as after they fill a basket. The Rabbis instituted that harvesters may eat also after finishing one row, while they walk to the next row, so as to avoid eating when they should be working. Key concept: To teach our nation goodwill and positive character traits, so that we will be worthy of Hashem’s blessings. When someone hires workers to attend to picked produce but forbids them to eat of the produce, he is being cruel and insensitive. All the more so if his workers are picking the produce, for when one sees the Creator’s blessing ripe for picking, one's heart is gladdened, and to then deprive a worker the pleasure of eating the produce shows great cruelty and an evil nature.

SHOW FULL EXCERPT

DEUT1307 In The Golden Rule, Professor Jeffrey Wattles concludes that "golden rule thinking may ... be characterized as recognizing moral implications in the fact that others are like oneself" (page 42). Obviously, this is a basis for applying the Golden Rule in our interactions with other human beings. But while biblical ethics presupposes a deep chasm in intelligence and free will between human beings and animals, there are also significant similarities (particularly in the physical sphere), and the Golden Rule should apply in those areas as well. Thus, animals hate pain, and therefore, as we have seen, the Torah prohibits unnecessary pain, such as that brought about by yoking a weaker animal to a stronger one. And animals, like humans, crave food, hence it is forbidden, as noted, to muzzle an animal working in the field, just as it is prohibited to prevent a laborer working in the field from eating [this and next verse].

SHOW FULL EXCERPT

DEUT1306 "you may eat" -- but not suck [out the wine and discard the rest, for this would result in his eating a greater number of grapes] (Bava Metzia 87b)

SHOW FULL EXCERPT

DEUT1312 See [[GEN406]] Genesis 3:16 urge OXFORD 386-7

SHOW FULL EXCERPT

DEUT1313 Now would it enter your mind that he should eat sticks and stones? Why, then, need "grapes" be mentioned? The intent is that he should not peel figs [and eat only the core, in which instance he would eat a greater number of figs], and he should not suck out [the wine of] grapes [and discard the rest] (Yerushalmi Bava Metzia 7:2)

SHOW FULL EXCERPT

DEUT1314 "so as to satisfy," and not gluttonously (Bava Metzia 87b)

SHOW FULL EXCERPT

DEUT1315 Workers handling produce shall not take more than they eat. See [[DEUT1308]] Deuteronomy 23:25 eat CHINUCH 367-8. Although such behavior on the part of laborers is actually theft and the Torah already forbids theft, the Torah adds this precept because workers might rationalize and think that such behavior is not sinful. They might imagine that since the employer sees a bountiful harvest, he will not be particular if his workers take of it even in substantial amounts. Therefore, out of His great kindness, Hashem adds a specific prohibition to his Torah, to save workers from stealing.

SHOW FULL EXCERPT

DEUT1316 This tells me only of a vineyard. Whence do I derive [the same halachah] for all [similar] instances? It is derived from "vineyard," viz.: Just as a vineyard is characterize3d by being a growth of the soil, and at its fruition the laborer eats of it, so, the laborer may eat of all growths of the soil at their fruition (Bava Metzia 87b)

SHOW FULL EXCERPT