Holy commerce

Kedoshim

Leviticus 19:1-:20:27

Précis:  The opening words of Kedoshim are “You shall be holy” (kedoshim tihyu), and it continues with various descriptions of how the People are to strive for holiness. This parasha is often viewed as the very core of moral teaching for the Jewish People.

Lev. 19:13 “You shall not defraud your fellow and you shall not commit robbery and the wages of a laborer shall not remain with you until morning.”

This verse is an example of how the command to “be holy” applies in a commercial setting. In the agrarian society for which it was first intended, a worker likely needed to be paid so that he could feed his family that day. In the context of today’s world, we may fairly read into this mitzvah the concept of paying fairly for work that is performed. This is certainly applicable to the current debate over raising the minimum wage.

         

Some contend that an increased minimum wage will mean that workers at the lowest end of the pay scale will lose their jobs (and this is not an absurd point of view). It seems however that the strongest opposition to an increase comes from those who believe that it simply adds cost to employers, who will earn less profit, invest less, and thereby cease being “job creators.”

With due respect for that point of view, I believe that there is something essentially wrong when an individual working full time at a minimum wage job earns less than the poverty level for a family. An increase in the minimum wage would certainly spur our economy, since those at the lowest end of the workforce would spend anything extra they might earn. Call it “trickle up” economics.

Perhaps more importantly, this verse teaches us that treating employees fairly is part of our mission to “be holy.” As Rabbi Steven Carr Reuben has written (Raising Jewish Children in a Contemporary World: The Modern Parent's Guide to Creating a Jewish Home) “Judaism has never seen holiness primarily in... otherworldly terms. To be ‘holy’ in Judaism means to act in such a way as to bring our highest and noblest ideals and values into play in our everyday lives. It's about… clothing the naked, housing the homeless, caring for the elderly and frail, treating people with dignity and compassion and justice. That's holiness for Jews.”