Our chapter opened with warnings regarding speech - do not be rash with your mouth, be careful with vows, beware of forbidden words. From here onward, Shlomo HaMelech transitions to a completely different subject: matters of divine providence (hashgachah). And in the words of the Imrei Shefer, this is the third fundamental principle to be learned in the ways of serving Hashem. Many people raise complaints regarding divine providence, asking: If the Holy One, Blessed be He, oversees and protects, "Why are You silent when the wicked swallows up one more righteous than he," as the prophet asks? Why is Hashem silent when the wicked commit acts of wickedness, and why does He not rescue the oppressed from the hand of his oppressor? This is the eternal question - why the righteous suffer and the wicked prosper (tzaddik ve'ra lo, rasha ve'tov lo). Why does the Holy One, Blessed be He, allow a reality in which justice seems entirely absent from the world? The following verses address this directly.
אִם־עֹשֶׁק רָשׁ וְגֵזֶל מִשְׁפָּט וָצֶדֶק תִּרְאֶה בַמְּדִינָה, אַל־תִּתְמַהּ עַל־הַחֵפֶץ, כִּי גָבֹהַּ מֵעַל גָּבֹהַּ שֹׁמֵר, וּגְבֹהִים עֲלֵיהֶם׃ (ז) - "If you see the oppression of the poor and the perversion of justice and righteousness in a province, do not wonder at the matter; for one high above the high watches, and there are higher ones above them." (7)
Rashi explains: If you see in a province that they oppress the destitute - a "rash" is an impoverished person - and rob justice and righteousness, meaning that justice and fairness are not practiced, and the justice and righteousness rightfully due to people are stolen from them - do not wonder at the matter ("al titmah al hachefetz"). According to Rashi's first explanation, the meaning is: Do not wonder when you see that it is the will ("chefetz") of the Omnipresent to bring evil upon them. Do not wonder when you see afflictions, do not wonder when you see strikes of retribution. "For one high above the high watches" - there is One who is high above the high, and He watches and sees the wicked deeds perpetrated by human beings. And this High One has appointed agents, "and there are higher ones above them" - emissaries of the Omnipresent, angels, who are elevated above those evildoers, and they will extract punishment from them. Therefore, do not wonder at the will of the Omnipresent to punish them, for these are His emissaries sent to take retribution from people whose deeds are wicked.
In Rashi's second explanation, the perspective is essentially the reverse. If you see that the poor are oppressed and justice is robbed, and on the contrary - you see that the Holy One, Blessed be He, does not punish them, but rather "you see righteousness in the province," that the Holy One, Blessed be He, even deals charitably with them, bestows good upon them, and does not penalize the wicked as they deserve. To this, Shlomo says: Do not wonder. Do not wonder at the will of the Omnipresent to be patient with them and treat them favorably, for such is the way of the Holy One, Blessed be He, to show forbearance. And do not be confused - this does not mean there is no divine providence, nor does it mean that the Holy One, Blessed be He, does not know what is happening with them. "One high above the high watches (shomer)" - in the sense of "and his father kept (shamar) the matter in mind," waiting to see how it would be fulfilled. The Holy One, Blessed be He, is biding His time, waiting to exact retribution from them when the moment arrives. If they repent - He will forgive them; but if not - He watches and waits, and when the time comes, He will punish them as they deserve.
The Midrash follows this same principle: You see that Hashem showers goodness upon the wicked, and concerning this it is said, "you see in a province (medinah)" - read it as: you will see upon him the judgment (dinah) of Gehinnom. That is to say, do not worry; ultimately, know that he will yet receive the judgment of Gehinnom, and you will yet see the attribute of strict justice meted out against him. And do not be astonished that you do not see it at present, for the Holy One, Blessed be He, watches and waits to bring upon him what he justly deserves.
The Midrash further explains: Rabbi Yose ben Rabbi Chanina applied this verse to Esav. If you see the great metropolis of Rome oppressing the poor and robbing the destitute, while the Holy One, Blessed be He, grants it tranquility - do not be dismayed; wait, and you will see the attribute of justice fall upon it. In their times, this was the great metropolis of Rome; today you might look at the great capitals of the nations of Ishmael - you see them committing acts of wickedness and terrible, dreadful atrocities. Rome, too, is far from lacking in this regard, when speaking of European nations and all those who assail us, the proponents of boycotts and the rising tide of antisemitism. Regarding this, the verse tells you: Do not wonder, for you will yet witness the attribute of justice befall them.
And what else is included in "do not wonder"? Do not wonder at what the Elder said and whose desire was fulfilled. That is, you might have a difficulty: How can this be? After all, this prosperity stems from the Elder who blessed him, "Behold, of the fat places of the earth shall be your dwelling," which is why you see him in such prosperity and abundance. To this the verse replies: Do not wonder at what the Elder, Yitzchak, spoke, blessing him so that his desire was realized - for one high above the high watches, and there are higher ones above them. There is One who waits, and ultimately, "Saviors shall ascend Mount Zion to judge the mountain of Esav, and the kingdom shall be Hashem's" - there is One who will judge him for everything he has done. All his success is purely temporary and fleeting, but in the realm of eternity itself, there you will see how he pays the full and fitting price for all his deeds.
The Imrei Shefer explains the verse as an answer to the question of divine providence. A "medinah" (province or realm) is a collection of cities ruled by a single king. If you see the poor being oppressed, and justice and righteousness are also robbed from the province - theft is rampant, and justice and righteousness themselves are stripped away, with no one saving the robbed from the robber or the oppressed from the oppressor - "do not wonder at the matter (al titmah al hachefetz)": do not wonder at the will of the Creator, blessed be He, and do not come to accuse the Holy One, Blessed be He, Heaven forbid, as if He desires wickedness, asking: Will the King of justice not execute justice, and how could He permit such conditions?
And the answer is: "For one higher than the high watches." The guardian of whom Shlomo speaks is the king. In a country there is a king, the highest authority, and there are also officials placed above others. In simple terms: if a person is found liable in a local court, there is a higher court; and if he is found liable there, there is another opportunity to appeal; and above them all - the king. When justice is not carried out fairly, it is in your power to turn to the one who holds authority, and he will administer justice. So when a person sees oppression of the poor and the perversion of justice and righteousness, he has "one higher than the high," and he can approach the higher court, and above them are "higher ones over them," namely the king, whom he can approach to receive justice. And if he did not do so, he has only himself to blame. It turns out, then, that if you claim there is injustice here, your problem is: Why did you not approach the higher courts, which surely would have brought justice to light?
All of this assumes that there is genuine justice. Shlomo did not know our reality, where the wicked themselves preside over the "robbery of justice and righteousness." The High Court of Justice - is this not the robbery of justice and righteousness? They hijacked the judicial system and seized powers for themselves that the legislature never granted them. Mr. Barak and those like him decided that everything is justiciable and everything falls under the High Court, and so it runs the country, striking down laws as it pleases. If the state decides to take action against terrorists, it can rule that no action may be taken against them. And when there was a procedure like the "neighbor procedure," where a neighbor is asked to knock on his neighbor's door on the assumption that they will not harm him, a judge came along and ruled that this is illegal, and that instead you must send a soldier. How appalling this is to an observer! One of the settler leaders already wrote about this: I, too, think we should stop the "neighbor procedure" and start a "judge procedure" - send a judge, let him knock on the door. Why should we send our children? As Chareidim, we are not involved in decisions about whether or not to wage war, yet the question still arises: How can you decide whether or not to send someone else's children into danger? All these judges - where are their children? Most of them do not serve in the military at all, and those who do serve in roles where no one is put at risk. That is why they have no qualms about sending our children to knock on the door.
At the time, the late attorney Weinroth, of blessed memory, said that if a Chareidi client came to him, especially one with the added "flaw" of being Sephardic, he would advise him not to go to the High Court at all, but rather to settle out of court - because from the outset you are found guilty. This caused a great stir, yet no one could refute his words, for he knew the system from the inside, and he said: I advise him not to go to court, because you will not see justice there. The reality is well known and proven: it is enough to see what happens when the judicial system decides that the Prime Minister does not suit them. Not that the Prime Minister is our cup of tea, nor is he exactly pure and blameless, but it is clear to all that what they did to him has never been done to anyone else - because he was targeted. Certain people simply do not want him, and the media, the press, and the court joined forces. Professor Ruth Gavison, an Israel Prize laureate whom they once wanted to appoint to the High Court - and Mr. Barak refused because "she has a different agenda" - already noted that in today's reality it is nearly impossible for Mr. Netanyahu to receive a fair trial in court. She was probably being polite when she said "nearly"; we all know it is impossible. The target was marked in advance, and true justice is certainly not to be found there.
Yet Shlomo is not speaking of such a reality; he is speaking of a situation where, at least in the higher echelons, there is justice. Therefore, his question is: Why did you not turn to the higher court? And the Rav adds: If one did turn to them and still did not receive justice and righteousness, there is still One who is higher than them all, higher even than the king, and that is the Holy One, blessed be He. Cry out to Him! And if you did not cry out, once again the fault is yours. Why complain, "Master of the Universe, there is injustice"? Why did you not cry out?
And the Rav notes: These are not mere personal notions, but explicit verses, stated four times in the Torah. The first: "You shall not afflict any widow or orphan; for if he cries out to Me, I will surely hear his cry" - what do you see? Cry out. The second, regarding returning a pledge: "And it shall come to pass, when he cries out to Me, that I will hear" - once again, cry out. The third, regarding withholding charity, if one closes his hand and does not give: "And he will call out against you to Hashem, and it will be a sin in you" - he calls out to Hashem. And the fourth, regarding withholding a worker's wages: "Lest he call out against you to Hashem, and it will be a sin in you."
And if you should ask: Why does Hashem wait for me to call out to Him? Is anything hidden from Hashem? Does He not know that there is oppression here, that someone withheld wages or afflicted the orphan and widow? The Rav explains: From here we see that the Holy One, blessed be He, established His world in such a way that when a person cries out, he is answered. The verses state, "if he cries out," and do not say that Hashem will judge him without his cry. This does not mean the wrongdoer will not be held accountable later - certainly the robbery and extortion he committed are stored up for his punishment in the World to Come, of that there is no doubt. But if you ask why he is not punished here in this world - cry out to Hashem, and He will exact retribution from him here. What have we learned? When a person has complaints against the Holy One, blessed be He, he is told: Why did you not cry out to Hashem? The Holy One, blessed be He, surely would have executed true justice.
Now you might ask: Does this not seemingly contradict the teaching of Chazal that whoever hands over judgment to Heaven against his fellow is punished first? Yet here you are suggesting that one hand over judgment against his fellow before the Omnipresent - "Master of the Universe, You see that they are robbing me, why do You do nothing to him?" And why is one who hands over judgment punished first? Because by doing so, he arouses an accusation against himself. For what is he saying? "Master of the Universe, stand at my side, judge him, punish him" - which implies: I am righteous! And in Heaven they examine: Why do you consider yourself so righteous? On the contrary, there is great peril for one who hands over judgment against his fellow, as Chazal phrase it: Woe to the one who cries out, even more than to the one cried out against - he has more reason to worry.
The answer is: The Gemara explains that this applies only when there is justice on earth, but when there is no justice on earth, it is permissible to hand over judgment to Heaven. If there is justice on earth, you must summon him before the judge, before the sage, before the Beit Din, or before the king. But if there is no justice on earth, here it is permissible to hand over judgment to Heaven. We find this with David, who handed over judgment to Heaven regarding Shaul; for to which court could he go to summon King Shaul and receive justice? Therefore, in that situation it was permitted to him, and he said, "Let my pursuers be shamed," "Pull them out like sheep for slaughter," and many other verses from which we see that when there is no judge on earth, one may hand over judgment to Heaven.
In truth, however, the question itself may be fundamentally misplaced. Who spoke here of handing judgment over to Heaven? All the verses cited describe a person crying out to Hashem and praying that He save him, without handing judgment over to Heaven. "Handing judgment over to Heaven" means: "Master of the Universe, I have a dispute with so-and-so, step in and exact retribution from him; You judge him." But a person is not asking Hashem to judge his opponent; he is simply saying: "Master of the Universe, I am in distress, save me!" - and that is not handing judgment over to Heaven. Perhaps one could force such a reading into the two verses that say, "And he will call out against you to Hashem, and it will be a sin in you," which sound like a demand for Heaven to execute judgment against him; but in our verse, what compels such an interpretation? In our verse, we can understand that the intention is simply to cry out to the Holy One, blessed be He, and pray for His salvation. And if one did not pray, the complaint is against him - so why complain against Hashem as though He acted unjustly?
וְיִתְרוֹן אֶרֶץ בַּכֹּל הוּא, מֶלֶךְ לְשָׂדֶה נֶעֱבָד׃ (ח) - And the advantage of a land is in everything; a king is served by the field. (8)
The Midrash states in the name of Rabbi Yehudah: Even things that appear superfluous to you in the world - and this is "the advantage of a land" (yitron eretz), seemingly an excess here on earth - are part of the very existence of the world; they too are part of sustaining the world. "Is in everything" (bakol hu) - through everything Hashem brings His world into being; "hu" is related to the word hoveh (being). Take, for example, the fiber around a palm tree: one who looks at the fiber around the palm tree thinks it is completely superfluous, that the palm tree could grow without it - yet the Midrash says that they would make fences out of it. You see that something useful can be made from every single part. And so it is in factories: when producing juice from oranges, they do not throw away the peels; they make something out of everything as long as production is profitable, and whatever remains is sold as feed for cattle. Thus, everything Hashem created in His world serves a purpose. It is just that there are things we do not know and do not understand; there are things that affect the atmosphere that we have yet to discover - and that does not mean they are unnecessary. Therefore, do not be quick to wonder why this is needed or why that is needed: everything is designed by Hashem, and everything that seems extra and superfluous to you - it all has being, it is all necessary for the world's existence.
The Rabbis say: Even things you see in the world as superfluous, such as flies, fleas, and mosquitoes, which seemingly serve no purpose and it would seem better without them - they too are included in the creation of the world, as it is said, "And the heavens and the earth were completed, and all their host" (Bereishit 2:1); these too are included in "their host." We do not know the divine reckoning, but sometimes the Holy One, Blessed is He, exacts retribution from a person through a fly or a mosquito. And just as you understand that a prison is necessary in a place where there are criminals, so too understand that sometimes flies, mosquitoes, and the like are necessary where Hashem exacts retribution from man. And this is only one example; there may be many other reasons that we do not truly know.
The Midrash also takes this in another direction: Even things that appear as an "addition" (yitron) to the Giving of the Torah. Seemingly, we received the Torah from Hashem, yet we see that the Torah expanded greatly, containing things that seem additional to the Giving of the Torah - such as the Toseftas of the School of Rebbi and the Toseftas of Rabbi Natan, the laws of converts and slaves, the laws of tzitzit, tefillin, and mezuzot, the baraitot, and all kinds of things about which you might say "an addition to the land" (yitron eretz). The Midrash tells you: Even these were given to Moshe at Sinai, and not only that, but even whatever an experienced disciple is destined to innovate in the future was already transmitted to Moshe Rabbeinu. Thus, what appears to you as an addition, all these things are from Moshe at Sinai.
Another explanation of "And the advantage of a land is in everything": The Holy One, Blessed is He, said to the prophets, "What do you think, that if you do not go on My mission, I have no one to send?" Hashem sends the prophet to rebuke, and the Holy One, Blessed is He, says to him: "If you do not go, do I lack someone to deliver the rebuke? Through 'everything' I carry out My mission - even through a snake, through a scorpion, through a mosquito, and even through a frog." And Rashi adds: Just as He did to Titus - He sent a mosquito into his brain and finished the matter. In simple words, the Holy One, Blessed is He, has many messengers in His world, even if the prophet does not go and act. An incident was once related of a person who heard knocking at his door one day. He opened it, and it was not a person standing there but a snake, and the snake bit him and left. And how was this discovered? Later they saw on the security cameras how the snake climbed up, arrived, knocked with its head on the door, and bit him. Through everything, the Holy One, Blessed is He, carries out His mission.
The Midrash says: Even a king who rules from one end of the world to the other is served by the field - he is subjugated to the field. Even a king asks: Has the field yielded fruit or not? And do not think that things have changed; this remains true today. If we try to think what would happen if, Heaven forbid, the world's crops were struck by blight - could the world survive? And likewise with all fruits and everything that exists in the world; if these were wiped out, how could the world continue to exist? And that is in our time, with all the industrialization and mechanization. But in the past - if a person picked tomatoes from the field in the morning, he had food; if he harvested wheat, he had food; and if not, he had nothing. Today you say, I will bring it from Africa, I will bring it from Europe, there are airplanes. But in the past, even a king was subjugated to the field: if it bore fruit, he had what to eat, and if not - what would he do when he could not feed his people? Just as we saw with Pharaoh, where seven years of famine would have completely collapsed the kingdom were it not for Yosef, who stockpiled grain for seven years. Thus even a king becomes a servant to the field.
The Midrash expounds further: Who is a "king"? One who is a king in Scripture and Mishnah - expert in the verses; ask him anything and he will complete the verse for you and start the verse for you, and he is also proficient in the Mishnayot. He is a king and a ruler. And yet, "he is served by the field" - he is still subservient to the master of Gemara, who arranges before him the rulings of what is forbidden and permitted, ritual impurity and purity, and monetary laws. For knowing Mishnah alone is not enough, since halachah is derived from the Gemara; the Gemara raises objections from a baraita, identifies contradictions, and formulates distinctions, and none of this is written in the Mishnah. Thus, even the master of the Mishnah is subservient to the master of the Gemara. And the "field" is the one who cultivates what is written in the Mishnah, extracting fruit from it: a halachic conclusion from here, a question from there, and from that another conclusion - and to him you are subjugated.
And Rashi explains: "A king is served by the field" - the Holy One, Blessed is He, becomes, as it were, a worker for Zion, to avenge her humiliation from those who destroyed her. "King" refers to the Holy One, Blessed is He, and "field" refers to Zion, as it says, "Zion shall be plowed as a field" (Michah 3:12). As it were, He is obligated to her to claim her humiliation and to punish those who destroyed Zion. On the other hand, the reverse also applies: the Holy One, Blessed is He, is obligated to whoever builds the field, meaning whoever establishes the Beit HaMikdash, to pay him his reward.
The Alshich explains that our verse is a continuation of the previous verse. The Holy One, Blessed is He, has mercy on those who are oppressed, and executes justice, and concerning this it says, "And the advantage of a land is in everything." The meaning of this can be understood through Chazal's explanation of the verse, "Man and beast You save, Hashem" (Tehillim 36:7). What is the connection between man and beast? Chazal say: This is compared to Alexander the Great, who went to Africa and entered the palace of the king of India (and in the Yerushalmi it states that he came to the king of Katzya), wanting to see how the king judges the people of his land. And behold, two men were quarreling and crying out to the king. What was the dispute about? One said: "I sold a field to this man, and he found a treasure in it, yet he refuses to take it." And the other said: "I bought a field from this man and found a treasure in it; I bought a field, I did not buy a treasure, yet he wants to force the treasure onto me!" The king listened and said: "Do you have a son?" "Yes." "And do you have a daughter?" "Yes." "No problem - go and marry them to each other; they already have an apartment in Jerusalem, here is a treasure, arrange a match between yourselves, and the couple will have a livelihood."
Alexander of Macedon stood listening to the judgment and burst out laughing. The king asked him, "Why? Did I not judge well? How would you judge in your land?" He replied, "If this case had come before me, I would have killed both the buyer and the seller, and taken the treasure for the royal treasury." The king asked him, "Does grass grow in your land? Are there crops and fruits?" (And elsewhere: "Does the sun shine in your land?") He answered, "Yes." The king told him, "It is not in your merit, but in the merit of the animals. It is in the merit of the beasts in your land that the sun shines and there are crops and fruits, for you have no right to exist; the right to exist belongs to the beast. For the animal, at least, fulfills the will of its Creator: Hashem created it to live here - it lives; to give milk - it gives milk; to plow - it plows. And this is the meaning of 'Man and beast You save, Hashem' - You save man in the merit of the beast. And likewise in Tehillim 104: 'He causes grass to spring up for the cattle, and herb for the service of man, to bring forth bread from the earth' - all of this was originally for the beast, and along with it, the Holy One, blessed be He, provides for man as well."
According to this, the verses become clear. We saw, "If you see the oppression of the poor in a province" - you witness the perversion of justice, and you wonder: How can it be that Hashem still sustains the world, that the world is not destroyed, and that the earth continues to yield its fruit and produce? To this, he tells you: "Moreover, the profit of the earth is in all things; a king is served by the field." Know that the reason the Holy One, blessed be He, sustains the world is that "the profit of the earth is in all things" - for the Holy One, blessed be He, also sustains in His world all living creatures, even mosquitoes and flies. Even beasts, relative to man, might seem superfluous since man is the crown of creation, yet they too are included in "the profit of the earth." And if you see a king ruling a country, and the people still serve him even though he is a wicked king like Alexander of Macedon who executes unheard-of judgments - know that it is not because of him. The world still endures and the kingdom still stands, though by their wickedness they do not deserve to exist; rather, "the profit of the earth is in all things." Those things that you view as superfluous on earth - the Holy One, blessed be He, says: For their sake, I sustain the world; for their sake, I give life, cause grass to sprout, give fruit, bestow rain, and make the sun shine. And everything is "Man and beast You save, Hashem" - You save man for the sake of the beast. This is how the holy Alshich explains it.
אֹהֵב כֶּסֶף לֹא־יִשְׂבַּע כֶּסֶף, וּמִי־אֹהֵב בֶּהָמוֹן לֹא תְבוּאָה, גַּם־זֶה הָבֶל׃ (ט) - He who loves silver shall not be satisfied with silver, nor he who loves abundance with increase; this too is vanity.
The Midrash says: "'He who loves silver shall not be satisfied with silver' - he who loves Torah will never be satisfied with Torah." Just as one who loves money is never satisfied with money, so one who loves Torah and clings to it, no matter how much you give him and how much you add, will never be satisfied; he always wants another portion of Torah, to understand another matter, to delve deeper into another sugya. "'Nor he who loves abundance [be-hamon] with increase [lo tevu'ah]' - this refers to anyone who makes much noise and bustle over words of Torah, yet possesses no Talmud." Hamon (multitude/abundance) is called that, the Malbim explains, because when there is a large crowd there is commotion, noise, and rustle. Similarly, there are people you see bustling about and making a great fuss, but when you examine closely - here a bit of Tehillim, there a bit of Ein Yaakov, yet he has no Talmud. What benefit does he derive? "No increase [lo tevu'ah]." The "produce" (tevu'ah), the essential crop, is Talmud - that a person knows the halachah. But if a person learns many things, and you ask him what the law is in this matter or what the halachah is in that matter, and he does not know - because he possesses no Talmud - what benefit does he have?
The Imrei Shefer continues along the same line we saw earlier, that Shlomo advises us that if we must choose a livelihood, let it be working the soil. Come and see that those who occupy themselves with other matters pursue vanity: "He who loves silver shall not be satisfied with silver." And how could you be satisfied by it - can you eat it? If they give you money, will you eat it? Like that man who requested that everything he touched turn to gold, and he died of hunger, since everything he touched turned to gold: he went to take a loaf of bread, and it turned to gold; they told him to put it in his mouth, but as soon as it touched his lips, it turned to gold. So "he who loves silver shall not be satisfied with silver" - one cannot be satiated by silver; if they give you money to eat, it will not sustain you and you will have no existence from it. And one who toils to increase his honor, being "a lover of multitude" - a multitude of houses and a multitude of servants to bring him prestige - "has no increase [lo tevu'ah]"; from this you will yield no produce. These are expenses, but they will not give you food to eat. If so, this too is vanity, and even worse than the first part, as he will explain in the next verse.
In this section, King Solomon transitions from warnings regarding speech to the question of Divine Providence. "If you see the oppression of the poor and the perversion of justice and righteousness in a province" - do not marvel at the matter: neither at the will of the Omnipresent to bring evil upon them, nor at His will to grant them forbearance, for "One higher than high watches" - there is One who watches, waits, and preserves, and when the time comes He will exact retribution appropriately, and you will yet witness the attribute of strict justice against him, and the judgment of Gehinnom. On a practical level: there is a court higher than another court, and above them all is the king, and above the king is the Holy One, blessed be He; and if you did not cry out to Hashem, you have no one to blame but yourself, for the Torah emphasized the power of the outcry four times. "Moreover, the profit of the earth is in all things" - nothing in the world is superfluous: the fiber of the palm tree, the fly, the mosquito, and all the messengers of the Omnipresent; even whatever appears superfluous beyond the Giving of the Torah - all was given to Moshe at Sinai. "A king is served by the field" - even a king is subordinate to the field, the master of the Mishnah to the master of the Gemara, and the Holy One, blessed be He, is, as it were, bound to avenge the insult of Zion and to reward its builders. According to the Alshich, this is also the explanation for why a world devoid of justice can continue to exist: "Man and beast You save, Hashem" - man is saved in the merit of the beast. Finally, "He who loves silver shall not be satisfied with silver" - one can never find satisfaction in money or honor; the only true satisfaction belongs to the lover of Torah, who, no matter how much he adds, can never be satisfied.