In the two verses before us, King Solomon continues to teach us the power of one's environment and the ways of retribution: first - the extent to which the company one chooses shapes him for good or for bad; and afterward - how sin and mitzvah operate, and what "punishment" and "reward" truly are. We will examine the verses in order, with the explanations of Rabbeinu Yonah, Rashi, the Vilna Gaon, and the Malbim.
הוֹלֵךְ אֶת־חֲכָמִים יֶחְכָּם וְרֹעֶה כְסִילִים יֵרוֹעַ׃ (כ) - He who walks with the wise grows wise, but one who shepherds fools will be broken. (20)
Rabbeinu Yonah explains: "He who walks with the wise" - walks alongside them, becoming subordinate to them. Consequently he will grow wise, for what does a person receive from a wise individual? Words of wisdom, words of Torah, words of encouragement, derech eretz, and holiness. And what is "a shepherd of fools" (ro'eh ksilim)? From the language of tending sheep, as in the verse, "And I will give you shepherds after My own heart, who will feed you" - he becomes the leader of the fools. Rashi explains differently: "ro'eh ksilim" is from the language of associating (mitro'ea), from the root rei'a (companion) - he takes the fools to be his companions.
"Yero'a" means will be broken, as in the phrase "the earth is utterly broken down" (ro'ah hitro'a'ah eretz), and "it will crush and break" (tadik vetaroi) said of the beast in Daniel's dream that tramples and shatters, and likewise "You shall break them with an iron rod, dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel" (tero'eim) - all expressions of shattering. We have already explained why a friend is called a "rei'a" from this same root of breaking: because to be a true friend to someone, you must break down your other friendships. A husband and wife are called "beloved companions" (re'im ahuvim); if a man were to say to his wife, "You are precious and important to me, but I also have a lot of buddies" - she will tell him: "Go find your friends." There are no shortcuts: true companionship must come at the expense of other associations. This does not mean one must quarrel with others, but without doubt, a genuine bond with one requires setting aside other ties.
Regarding this, Chazal said: "Be a tail to lions rather than a head to foxes." Even if you merely "walk with the wise," subordinate to them - this is better than being a "shepherd of fools," a leader. A leader of whom? Of fools. It is far better to be secondary to the wise than to be head over fools.
The Vilna Gaon explains in the same vein: "He who walks with the wise" - makes himself subordinate to them, in the words of the Tanna, "Dust yourself in the dust of their feet," and because of this he will grow wise, for he hears their wisdom and observes their deeds. For it is human nature to be drawn in one's character traits and actions after those with whom one associates.
And let a person not say: "I am not influenced; I am immune; for me it is merely a technical connection." For Yehoshaphat was called to account in just this way: "Because you have joined yourself with Ahaziah, Hashem has wrecked your works." Yehoshaphat was a righteous king, yet he was held accountable for allying with Ahab and later with Ahaziah, even intermarrying with them by marrying their children to each other. Such a thing is fundamentally destructive. One who associates with a wicked person becomes part of him and learns his ways.
"And a shepherd of fools" - the Vilna Gaon also explains "shepherd" (ro'eh) as a leader, a head and officer over fools. And as we have already seen regarding fools in the previous verse, "it is an abomination to fools to turn away from evil," so he too "will do evil" (yero'a) - he too will perform evil deeds and become corrupted, even if he was originally righteous. Here, "yero'a" is not from the language of breaking, but from the language of evil deeds (ra).
In an additional explanation, the Vilna Gaon explains like Rabbeinu Yonah: "Yero'a" - will be broken along with them. When the Holy One, Blessed is He, brings upon them their day of calamity and ruin, you will be part of the story as well. Do not say, "I am the leader here" - you attached yourself to fools, and when they must give an accounting and pay the price, you will be broken with them. This is what Chazal said: When the shepherd is angry at the flock, he makes the lead goat blind. When the Holy One, Blessed is He, sees that the Jewish people are not walking properly, He places blind shepherds over us, and the blind goat leads everyone into pits, ditches, thorns, and briers, with the entire flock following behind. Thus, according to the Vilna Gaon: either the leader will do evil like them, or he will be broken along with them - and all because he associated with them.
The Malbim explains: One who walks with the wise learns from their deeds and their wisdom, and acts according to the laws of wisdom; whereas one who associates with fools will be broken, because he pursues desires and distances himself from the laws of wisdom, as we have seen that "a fool spreads folly."
Yet the Malbim adds a subtle distinction: Notice that regarding the wise, Scripture uses the word "walks" (holech), whereas regarding fools, it uses "companions" (ro'eh). Why? Because with the wise, one does not immediately become their equal companion. You arrive at the Beit Midrash, you begin to learn, you are a novice - and a long time passes before you attain any real understanding and before you reach their level. Therefore, the first stage is merely "walks with the wise." But with fools - "a companion of fools" (ro'eh ksilim) - he immediately becomes their companion, and even their leader. Why? Because becoming wicked can happen in a single moment; falling, descending, and breaking down can happen in an instant, whereas building is immensely difficult. The Twin Towers took a decade to build, and within an hour or less, everything collapsed like a house of cards. Destroying is easy; building is hard. Therefore, "a companion of fools will be broken" - he immediately becomes their equal; whereas to connect with the wise, how far a person must still walk before he merits to achieve true understanding!
חַטָּאִים תְּרַדֵּף רָעָה וְאֶת־צַדִּיקִים יְשַׁלֶּם־טוֹב׃ (כא) - Evil pursues sinners, but the righteous will be repaid with good. (21)
Rabbeinu Yonah explains: The evil that the sinner committed pursues him in order to trip him up in a more severe transgression, until he is lost without hope. And as Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin says: The evil inclination initially presents the transgression to the person as a mitzvah - an obligation to perform; then it shows it to him as permitted; and finally, it reveals to him that it is forbidden. And why? What is its interest? The evil inclination wants to cast you as deep down as possible. If it tells you in advance, "There is a prohibition here," you would never come near it. Therefore, it begins with "This is a mitzvah" - and a person loves to fulfill mitzvot. Then it lowers the bar to "permitted," and finally reveals that it is forbidden, and even a severe prohibition. For if you continue thinking it is a mitzvah, it has only tripped you up in a small way; it wants to bring you down big, and then ascend and prosecute: Behold, this person knows it is forbidden and acts willfully! The evil inclination has an interest that you know it is forbidden, because once you know - you are acting willfully, and the claim against you is far greater.
This progression is seen in the parable that Natan the prophet told David. At first, "There came a traveler (helech)" - a traveler, meaning a poor man; and there is a mitzvah to give him charity. That rich man said: If it is charity, why am I the only one obligated? My poor neighbor also has a lamb - let him bring his lamb and the two of us will fulfill the mitzvah of charity, I with my body and he with his property; fortunate are you and fortunate is your lot. In the second stage, "for the guest (ore'ach)" - this is no longer strictly charity, but hospitality (hachnasat orchim). And in the third stage, "for the man (ish)" - this is already a social feast: neither a needy person, nor a guest, nor poor, merely sitting together to dine, an entirely optional matter. Such is the way of the evil inclination: slowly, step by step, it ensnares a person.
And so it was with David himself. In the beginning, everything started as entirely permissible: whoever went out to the wars of the House of David wrote a conditional bill of divorce for his wife, and therefore she was unattached, and furthermore, there is a mitzvah to marry a woman. Afterward, matters began to unravel, and once she was pregnant, David summoned Uriah the Hittite and told him, "Go down to your house" - yet if he were to go down to his house, the divorce would become nullified and it would turn out retroactively that she was a married woman. David thought: It is better for me to transgress the prohibition of a married woman retroactively than for the kingdom to fall apart, for if the sin becomes known, there will be a terrible desecration of God's Name. Here, it is no longer a mitzvah, but a prohibition born of having no choice. And in the third stage, he sends Uriah to die by the sword of the Ammonites - and that is outright murder. It began as completely permissible, moved to a transgression born of necessity, and ended in a deliberate sin from the outset - precisely as in the parable of Natan the prophet.
And this is the meaning of "Evil pursues sinners": Initially, a person stumbles in small matters, but the sin draws him further. In the words of Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin, a spirit of impurity envelops him following the first transgression, and that spirit draws him toward further impurity, going from downfall to downfall until evil pursues him and brings him to utter ruin, until he is lost without hope. At first he was merely a sinner (choteh) - how did he become truly wicked (ra)? That spirit of impurity within the sin pursued him. But with the righteous, the good they performed saves them from stumbling and sin. As the Sages said: If a person guards himself slightly from sin, he is guarded greatly; if a person sanctifies himself a little, he is sanctified much; if he sanctifies himself from below, he is sanctified from Above, and "no iniquity shall befall the righteous." When one strives to overcome and distance himself from all evil, the Holy One, Blessed is He, ensures that no sinful matter comes to his hand and rescues him - and that itself is his reward in this world.
The Vilna Gaon connects this to the earlier verse: "and wickedness subverts the sinner" - as we explained there, a person who initially merely neglects positive commandments ultimately arrives at wickedness, transgressing negative prohibitions. And which is more severe: neglecting a positive commandment or transgressing a negative prohibition? Certainly a negative prohibition: for neglecting a positive commandment there is no penalty of lashes, whereas for transgressing a negative prohibition there is. In neglecting a positive commandment, the Holy One, Blessed is He, said to me, "Do such and such," and I did not do it - I remained passive; in a negative prohibition, He warned me, "Do not do it" - and I went and did it, actively violating an explicit command. That is far more severe.
So too here: "Chet" (sin) is an expression of deficiency or lack, as in "and I and my son Solomon shall be counted offenders [chata'im]" (I Kings 1:21) - meaning lacking the monarchy; and likewise, one who misses a target is said to have missed ("hechti"), meaning he fell short. At first, a person merely falls short in fulfilling positive commandments. Do not think it will stop there - "evil pursues sinners": it will pursue him until it brings him to complete evil, violating negative commandments as well. In contrast, "to the righteous, good shall be repaid": the Holy One, blessed be He, gives the righteous their good reward, and the reward is that they perform further mitzvot, which are called "good" - and this is the principle that the reward of a mitzvah is a mitzvah.
Another explanation in the Vilna Gaon: "Evil pursues sinners" - evil pursues those sinners and takes them before their time, as it is written, "there is that is swept away without judgment" (Mishlei 13:23). What is "without judgment"? It is on account of sins. When a person begins to sin, he may be taken before his time, like Enoch - "and he was not, for God took him" - it is better that he die innocent than die guilty. Ostensibly, he was swept away without judgment, for he might claim: Are they punishing me for what I have not yet done? Even so, regarding one who is destined to sin, evil pursues him and takes him before his time.
And what is done with his years, since he died before his time? This very question was asked of none other than the Angel of Death himself, who is responsible for taking a person's years. He replied: We add these years to the life of a Torah scholar who overlooks slights (ma'avir al midotav). And this is "and to the righteous, good shall be repaid" - the good that was taken from that person who was about to become wicked is given to the righteous, and those years are added to their lifespans.
Another explanation: it is the evil of the righteous that pursues the sinners. When a tzaddik rebukes a wicked person, one of two things happens. Either the wicked person accepts the rebuke and repents, and nothing could be more wonderful; this merit stands for you forever, a person became righteous because of you. But it is also possible that he did not listen at all: you spoke with him and it was like talking to plywood, like Formica, nothing penetrated. You ran after him, sent people to him, signed him up for a seminar and even paid for it, visited him, invited him for Shabbat, spoke to him - and he remained completely unchanged. It seems as though we labored in vain.
The Zohar says that this is not so: know that you, the tzaddik, have lost nothing. Within every wicked person there is a holy spark, and by the very fact that you tried to speak with him and he did not repent, you draw out his holy spark from him. And within every tzaddik there is also a subtle root of evil, for following the sin of the Tree of Knowledge nothing in this world is perfect, and everything is a mixture of good and evil. "Da'at" (knowledge) signifies connection, as in "And the man knew Eve his wife" and "neither had any man known her"; the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil is the tree through which good and evil became intermingled in the world. That subtle root of evil within the tzaddik now passes to the wicked person. It turns out that this connection between the tzaddik and his wicked neighbor in order to bring him close must yield positive results: either the neighbor is brought close, or you give him the spark of evil within you and take the holy spark from him. And this is "evil pursues sinners" - what evil pursues the sinners? The evil of the tzaddik, that imperfection and spark of evil within him, passes to the wicked person, who absorbs it. "And to the righteous, good shall be repaid" - in either case, the tzaddik receives good, whether that person repented or not. Thus, it is always worthwhile to rebuke the wicked.
Another explanation: "Evil pursues sinners" - the Sitra Achra (the side of impurity) pursues a person to exact retribution for the evil he committed, wanting the evil to befall him immediately. Why, then, in reality does the wicked person not receive his blow at once? Because the Holy One, blessed be He, is willing to sustain that destructive angel created by the person's sins, lest he repent. The force of impurity, which the person sustained through his evil deed, wants to exact retribution from him right away; you created a destroyer, and the destroyer wants to go out to do its work - and its work is to destroy the one who created it, drawing its vitality from this. Who is it that forgives iniquity and passes over transgression? The Holy One, blessed be He. And what is "bearing iniquity" (noseh avon)? The Holy One, blessed be He, says to that destroyer: Come, and I will sustain you, perhaps this person will repent and change his ways. And this is what we recite in the Thirteen Attributes of Mercy: "The Lord, the Lord, God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving [bearing] iniquity and transgression" - that the Holy One, blessed be He, bears the iniquity until the person repents.
As for the righteous, however, the Holy One, blessed be He, pays them a good reward, but when? When they complete their service and when there is no blemish in them. And when can it be said of a person that he is unblemished? Only after one hundred and twenty years, for "Behold, He puts no trust in His holy ones, and His angels He charges with folly." The righteous receive their reward only when it is certain that they are good; but the Sitra Achra seeks to exact retribution immediately.
The Malbim explains a fundamental principle that we have touched upon before: the punishment for sin is not separate from the act of wrongdoing itself. People think it is like driving: you run a red light, you get a ticket. But really, what is the intrinsic connection between the act and the fine? The authorities decided to penalize you for violating the law or endangering the public - that is an external punishment. But if someone drives wildly and crashes into a wall, and the wall collapses on him and crushes him - is that a punishment? He did it to himself. He might complain: Why was I punished, I just did not pay attention for a moment? But who punished you? There was an innocent wall standing there, bothering no one, and you drove into it and brought it down upon yourself.
Thus, explains the Malbim, work man's punishments: it is not a case of "you sinned - you will be punished," but rather "you sinned - you brought the punishment upon yourself." You created the destructive force that exacts retribution from you. It is not a question of "why was this done to me?" but rather, you brought it upon yourself. And this is the meaning of "Evil pursues sinners" - their own evil pursues them, for "From the mouth of the Most High does not come evil." The Holy One, blessed be He, does not bring evil upon you; rather, your own evil pursues you until it overtakes you. Not Heavenly providence, but "sin-providence" - retribution born of the sin itself.
However, the reward for mitzvos is not like this. The reward for a mitzvah is received directly from Hashem - "and the righteous will be repaid with good." The Holy One, blessed be He, pays an actual reward. Even though one might not be naturally entitled to reward for fulfilling a mitzvah, the Holy One, blessed be He, grants a reward nonetheless. This comes in addition to the natural good inherent in the performance of the mitzvos, for every mitzvah benefits a person: a bris milah is beneficial even from a health perspective, and so it is with every single command. Beyond its natural benefit, the Holy One, blessed be He, promises to pay something separate from the mitzvah - a payment that is not an inherent part of the deed, coming directly from Him, blessed be He.
The Malbim offers a parable: A king commanded his servants not to eat a certain food - "Do not eat this mushroom, for it is poisonous and lethal; but eat this other fruit, for it promotes health, provides iron, and offers countless benefits to the body." Some disobeyed the king's command and ate the mushrooms. What must the king do to them? Arrange for their burial society. They brought harm upon themselves; "I warned you it was poison, do I need to punish you?" By contrast, those who ate the good fruit already derived benefit from the fruit itself, and on top of that, the king says to them: "I will also pay you a reward for eating it." It emerges that the reward is separate from the deed: fulfilling the mitzvah benefits the person inherently, which is one thing; and beyond that, an independent reward awaits him Above, distinct from the act itself. This is the assurance that the Holy One, blessed be He, repays - "and the righteous will be repaid with good."
The two verses complement one another. "He who walks with the wise will become wise" - stature is built gradually, by walking with the wise and attaching oneself to them; whereas "one who companions fools will be broken" - the downfall is swift, whether he becomes corrupt like them or is crushed with them on the day of their ruin; and "Be a tail to lions rather than a head to foxes." And "Evil pursues sinners" - one sin drags along another sin; the evil inclination leads step by step from a "mitzvah" to "permitted," and from "permitted" to the forbidden, and the evil a person created pursues him of its own accord, for evil does not proceed from the mouth of the Most High. Whereas "and the righteous will be repaid with good" - the righteous person is safeguarded from Above, the reward of a mitzvah is a mitzvah, and the Holy One, blessed be He, adds to this by paying him an independent, special reward directly from Him, blessed be He.