“If you afflict him.” It should have said “them” [plural form], and what is the double language afflict afflict, cry cry, hear hear? By way of the simple understanding, we can say that sometimes a person afflicts the orphan alone, and his mother, the widow, sees and is consumed with sorrow but is powerless to save her son. And through the affliction of one of them, both are afflicted and both cry out, and the Holy One, blessed be He, hears both of them and punishes the offender doubly, so that his children become orphans and his wife a widow. And by way of allusion, we can say that since the Holy One, blessed be He, is the father of orphans, then certainly in all their troubles He feels their pain, as it were. Therefore it says if you afflict then you also afflict “Him”, who is the father of orphans. And indeed both cry out: The attribute of judgment criticizes him above, and the orphan cries out below, and the Holy One, blessed be He, the Merciful One, receives the cry of both.

“If you lend money to My people, to the poor among you.” There appears to be a redundancy here, for it should have said “If you lend money to the poor.” Initially, it calls them My people, then poor, and afterward your neighbor, as it says, If you take your neighbor’s garment as security. But since it wanted to command about two things, it prefaced with two introductions, showing that from two perspectives you are obligated to lend to him. The first perspective is that he is among My people, and it is the way of a king that when his people and servants lack provisions, anyone can lend to them with confidence that the king will repay the debt. For it is the king’s responsibility to provide for his people, and whoever gives to them is as if giving to the king himself, and thus is assured of repayment. Similarly, this poor person dwells among My people, and casts his burden upon God, and one who is gracious to the poor lends to God — for one who is gracious to the poor lends to God, not to the poor person himself. The second perspective is that the poor person does more for you than you do for him, as stated (in Bava Batra 10a): “It was taught: Rabbi Meir used to say, etc.” And it concludes there: “If your God loves the poor, why doesn’t He support them?” You should reply, “So that through them we may be saved from the judgment of Gehenna.” If so, you provide him with temporary life, while he provides you with eternal life; you give him a coin, and the Holy One, blessed be He, repays you double. Therefore it is said which I have done with him today — Boaz (Ruth 2:19) and our Rabbis said (Leviticus Rabbah 34:8): “The poor person does more for the householder than the householder does for the poor person.” Therefore it says here, the poor among you, and the phrase among you implies that he is with you; therefore, he has come to poverty in order to give you merit.

And corresponding to these two things, He commanded him on two matters. Corresponding to what is said, If you lend money to My people, He said, you shall not be to him as a creditor, as if to say, “you shall not be as a creditor to him,” because you are not lending to him but to the Holy One, Blessed be He. For one who is gracious to the poor is called a lender to God, not to him. And your Employer is faithful to pay you on behalf of His people. Therefore, do not pressure him by demanding forcefully, as Rashi explains, for why would you pressure him, since you did not lend to him but to his King, the Blessed One. And corresponding to what is said, the poor with you — this is the poor person who does more for you than you do for him — regarding this He said, you shall not impose upon him interest in order to profit from your money. Is it insignificant in your eyes what the poor person does for you, many times over? Both from the perspective that your reward is very great and yet you seek additional profit from him, and from the perspective that this poor person became poor because of you, for in order to save you from the judgment of Gehenna, the Holy One, Blessed be He, does not support him directly, as explained above. And if he endures all this poverty and distress with you, for your sake, to give you merit, how could it enter your mind to seek additional profit? This is nothing but wickedness of heart.

And the reason it says “you shall not place” in plural form, is to warn all of them — the lender, the borrower, the guarantor, and the witnesses — they all transgress the prohibition of you shall not place [interest]. And if you take a pledge [from a poor person] because you lack faith and do not believe that you will be repaid from the heavenly treasury that is reserved for those who perform charity in the midst of the earth, then this is your punishment: that eventually you will take your neighbor’s garment as a pledge — for you too will come to poverty and will become the neighbor and companion of the poor person in poverty. And you will be forced to take a pledge from him since you will be poor like him. This is the meaning of the doubled expression if you take a pledge, you will take a pledge. Nevertheless, I warn you that you shall return it to him before the sun sets, because if you have strayed from the path of righteousness and have already taken a pledge from him, then see to it that you return the pledge before sunset. And it appears that this is referring to a night garment, as it says in what shall he sleep?

And as a hint, [the text] mentions the sun, to say, look at the sun that I created to serve you as an act of kindness and charity, for the Holy One, blessed be He, renews in His goodness every day, continually, the work of creation. And all the commandments that God-fearing people who contemplate His name perform in this world are not sufficient to repay this great kindness that the Holy One, blessed be He, does by making the sun shine for them every day, as it is written, But unto you that fear My name shall the sun of righteousness arise (Malachi 3:20). For even for those who fear God, the sun shines as an act of charity. And therefore, Solomon aptly said, There is no profit under the sun (Ecclesiastes 2:11), meaning that in all of man’s deeds there is not enough to repay the Holy One, blessed be He, for this great kindness. And therefore it says, Return it to him before the sun sets. For you should look at the sun of charity that I do with you, and then you will learn a lesson, and from Me you shall see and likewise do — just as I make the sun shine for you, so should you shine light for this poor person who walks in darkness with no brightness, as it is written, Is it not to share your bread with the hungry (Isaiah 58:7-8), and adjacent to it, Then shall your light break forth as the morning, and Your light shall shine in the darkness.

There is yet another hint in the saying “until the sun sets, you shall return it to him.” It refers to the wealthy among the Hebrew camp who have pledges of the poor and who command their heirs to return them to the poor after their death, meaning after their sun has set, as it is written Before the sun darkens, etc. (Ecclesiastes 12:2). Therefore it says, “until the sun sets, you shall return it to him.” For who is so foolish to turn aside here and not fulfill the commandment during his lifetime when he is commanded to do it, but instead performs the commandment after his death when he is no longer commanded to do so, as it is said Among the dead who are free (Psalms 88:6) — once a person dies, he becomes free from the commandments. And those who act this way undoubtedly receive no reward for their labor, since they did not fulfill the commandment in its proper time when they were obligated to do so, but wish to fulfill it after death when they see that they can no longer use their wealth at all. What advantage is there for one who gives charity at that time? Whether from the perspective that his wealth is no longer under his control, or from the perspective that he no longer needs it, or from the perspective that he is free from the commandments — yet in his lifetime his hands refused to act, while in his death he wants to be righteous.

And as a hint, we can interpret also the verse for it is his only covering, it is his garment for his skin, in what shall he sleep? as referring to a person whose eye is evil toward the poor and does not want to give charity during his lifetime, before the sun sets. If so, in what shall he sleep in the grave? For it, meaning charity, is his only covering, because when he dies, he is buried naked without this mitzvah, and he has no other covering except charity, as it is said I put on righteousness, and it clothed me (Job 29:14). And our Sages of blessed memory said (Bava Batra 9b) that charity is compared to a garment, for every single thread combines to make a large garment, so too with charity, every penny combines into a great account. Therefore it says, in what shall he sleep, and therefore it is written kesutah [his covering is written as if it were her covering] with a heh to teach that it is the covering of the soul [neshamah, which is feminine] of the lender.

We can further say that this entire verse is according to its simple meaning, and nevertheless it specifies these details so that the giver or the non-giver may learn from them that whatever one does with the poor is also done with them [in return]. For the warning until sunset you shall return it to him implies both a general return in this world and a return to the poor, until the coming of evening — his time of freedom and liberty, which is before the time of death, as stated. And afterward it says that if one does not give to the poor before sunset, then the poor person has nothing to lie upon; similarly, he [the non-giver] will not have anything to lie upon in the grave, because charity alone is his covering and his garment for his skin, and without it he has no other garment and lies naked in the valley of the shadow of death. As he did to this poor person at night, so will be done to him as well. This is a correct and very precious allusion, all the more so for those groups who do not even command their heirs to return [what they borrowed], and behold, the heirs will take their money and they [the deceased] will bear their iniquity. Woe to such humiliation and shame, for I have seen in our generation many wealthy people who sit in lowliness because they stumble in this and similar matters, and they do not take moral instruction during their lives. The stinginess of the eye becomes a trait that clings to them in their lives, and in their deaths they are not separated [from it]. And this small observation is sufficient.

“And it will be when he cries out to Me.” This means that if the wealthy person blocks his ears from the cries of the poor, he should not imagine that because of this the poor person’s hope is lost. Rather, “when he cries out to Me, I will hear him.” For if the wealthy person is cruel, I am not like him; instead, “I will hear him because I am compassionate.” Alternatively, it may mean, “Look to Me and follow My example with all the more reason [kal vachomer].”