We arrive at the final chapter in the sefer Zera Shimshon on Shir HaShirim - chapter 19, the concluding chapter of the work. This is a relatively intricate chapter, so it is worthwhile to follow along carefully to keep track of the train of thought. The starting point is a Gemara in Sotah, and from it the author arrives at a marvelous explanation of the pasuk: "הָאֶלֶף לְךָ שְׁלֹמֹה וּמָאתַיִם לְנֹטְרִים אֶת פִּרְיוֹ" - "The thousand is for you, Shelomoh, and two hundred for those who guard its fruit."
The Gemara in Sotah: From Love and from Fear
The Gemara in Sotah (end of chapter 6, 31a) asks: What is the difference between one who acts out of love and one who acts out of fear - between someone who serves his Creator out of love and someone who serves out of fear? The Gemara answers: "The difference between them is that which was taught: Rabbi Shimon ben Elazar says, greater is one who acts out of love than one who acts out of fear, for this one's merit is suspended for a thousand generations, while that one's merit is suspended for two thousand generations." For one who serves out of fear, his merit is suspended and preserved for a thousand generations; for one who serves out of love, his merit is suspended for two thousand generations - double the length of time that the Holy One, blessed is He, preserves His lovingkindness and brings salvations through him to his children after him.
And from where do we derive this? "Here it is written, 'and shows lovingkindness to thousands [la'alafim] to those who love Me'" - "alafim" is a plural form whose minimum is two, meaning two thousand, and this is said regarding "those who love Me." "And there it is written, 'and to those who keep His commandments to a thousand generations'" - "those who keep His commandments" refers to one who is vigilant against transgressions out of fear, who is not in the category of a lover but merely refrains out of dread of punishment, and regarding him the merit is preserved for only a thousand generations.
Immediately the Gemara raises a difficulty: "There too it is written, 'to those who love Him and to those who keep His commandments to a thousand generations'" - after all, in that very pasuk from which you derived a thousand generations, it also says "to those who love Him"! And from that same reasoning, a difficulty arises in the second pasuk as well: "and shows lovingkindness to thousands, to those who love Me and to those who keep My commandments" - there too, fear is mentioned alongside love. Both pesukim speak of both love and fear, so how can you apply the pasuk that says two thousand specifically to love, and the pasuk that says a thousand specifically to fear?
The Gemara answers: "This is applied to what is adjacent to it, and that is applied to what is adjacent to it" - each is understood according to the phrase juxtaposed with it. "And shows lovingkindness to thousands" - what is written immediately after it? "To those who love Me." True, it also says "and to those who keep My commandments," but that is no longer directly adjacent. And in the pasuk in Devarim, "to a thousand generations" is directly adjacent to "and to those who keep His commandments." Thus, the derivation is based on adjacency, even though both pesukim mention both those who love and those who fear.
Two Questions Raised by the Zera Shimshon
The author remarks: This requires careful examination. First, why specifically these numbers - this one a thousand and that one two thousand? What is the meaning of this absolute determination, like a fixed, set tariff? If you came to teach that love is greater, you could simply say its reward is double; but why were precisely one thousand versus two thousand established?
And second: if indeed the pasuk of "to thousands" refers exclusively to one who acts out of love, why did it mention "and to those who keep My commandments" in that very same verse? It should have simply said "and shows lovingkindness to thousands to those who love Me" and omitted "those who keep My commandments." And likewise in the pasuk of "to a thousand generations" - it should not have said "to those who love Him," but only "and to those who keep His commandments." The question is simple: if "those who love Him" pertains to two thousand and "those who keep His commandments" pertains to one thousand, let the Torah write only those who love Him in one pasuk and only those who keep His commandments in the other! Why did it write both in each verse, leaving us to explain what is adjacent to what?
The Premise: One Thousand Generations that Arose in Thought to Be Created
This can be explained based on what Chazal taught regarding the pasuk, "The word that He commanded to a thousand generations," that one thousand generations arose in Divine thought to be created, and when the Holy One, blessed is He, saw that their deeds would be evil, they were wiped from the world. And before the Holy One, blessed is He, thought is considered like action.
To be precise, the exact number is 974 generations that were snatched away before their time - "who were snatched away before their time, whose foundation was poured out like a river." After all, "The word that He commanded to a thousand generations," and when you calculate the difference between 974 and one thousand, 26 remain - corresponding to the 26 generations that existed until the Giving of the Torah. Those 974 generations were meant to be created prior to the creation of the world, but the Holy One, blessed is He, foresaw that they would be wicked and did not bring them into the world. Rashi explains that these generations were wiped out in the generation of the Flood, but the simpler understanding is that they were not created at all; rather, the Holy One, blessed is He, planted them throughout every generation - and they are the insolent people in each generation. There is a slight difficulty in the author's wording, as he tallies them as a thousand when in fact 974 were not created, but it appears he is simply using the round number.
Another foundational principle is presented: It is known that every created being has two portions - one in Gan Eden and one in Gehinnom. For every person, two dwellings are prepared in his name: in Gan Eden for the good deeds he might perform, and in Gehinnom for evil deeds. If he is worthy - he takes his own portion and his fellow's portion in Gan Eden, for the portions of the wicked in Gan Eden remain unused, and the righteous person's portion is expanded at their expense. Conversely, the wicked person takes his portion and his fellow's portion in Gehinnom, and his place is expanded at the expense of the unused place of the righteous.
We have already explained the logic behind this: the righteous person's effort to remain righteous was made much harder because of the wicked person, who spread venom, filth, impurity, and corruption in the world, making his task so much heavier - and therefore it is fitting that he receive the wicked person's Gan Eden. The same applies in reverse: if the righteous person still has any blemish, flaw, or portion in Gehinnom, it is because of the wicked person who caused him to stumble, corrupted him, and dragged him down - and therefore the wicked person will take his portion in Gehinnom.
If so, it is explained that one who observes negative commandments, meaning he is vigilant regarding the prohibitions, receives his reward plus a portion of one thousand generations from the merit that would have been due to them had they observed the negative commandments. For since they arose in thought, and thought is considered like action, the Holy One, blessed be He, built dwellings for them in Gan Eden and Gehinnom; but because they were never created, they did not utilize them - and the righteous person inherits them. And one who also fulfills the positive commandments inherits the merit that was due to one thousand generations both for the positive commandments and for the negative commandments, which is double - two thousand.
A Closer Reading of the Verses: Positive and Negative Commandments
Now we arrive at a precise reading of the verses. If the verse had only said, "and showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me" - since someone who loves is typically zealous in performing positive commandments, as the Bartenura writes in the first chapter of Avot, Mishnah 3, for a lover desires to give, bestow, and pour forth goodness upon the one he loves, and in this his love finds expression - I would have said that his reward would be for two thousand generations even if he only fulfilled positive commandments.
This is all the more so according to the Maharsha in the third chapter of Makkot, who writes that the primary purpose of man's creation is for positive commandments. After all, one can fulfill negative commandments even before being created - it is impossible to violate any of them when one does not exist! If the goal were merely refraining from sin, there would have been no need to create man at all. But as for positive commandments - if he is not created, how can he fulfill them? It turns out, then, that the core purpose of creation is the positive commandments.
The Bartenura writes there: "Serve out of love, serve out of fear; for if you come to hate, know that you love, and one who loves does not hate." That is, love and fear of God must be integrated together. Although the first level is fear and the next is love, and one might have thought that once a person reaches the level of love there is no longer any need for fear, the early commentators teach us that this is not so. Even someone who has attained the virtue of love must not abandon fear. "For if you come to hate, know that you love," and if you are tempted to cast off the yoke, know that you fear, and one who fears does not cast off the yoke.
Love is an immense and wondrous level, but it has an Achilles' heel: because a person feels such great closeness, he may come to do things that are inappropriate, like a child being overly familiar before his father, and speak without proper reverence. In contrast, toward someone one fears, one is extremely careful about how and in what manner he speaks. It turns out, then, that sometimes even the lover can come to act out of hate.
For this reason, the verse had to state, "and showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep His commandments" - to teach that they will receive all this kindness specifically when they observe both the positive commandments, meaning "those who love Me," and the negative commandments, meaning "those who keep His commandments." For it is only through positive and negative commandments together that one merits two thousand, whereas for only one of them, it is one thousand.
The Second Verse: The True Distinction Lies Between Love and Fear
In the second verse, in Devarim 7: if it had merely said, "and to those who keep His commandments to a thousand generations," without mentioning "those who love Him," it would have taught us nothing new. For if you were to say that it came to teach that one who has fear and is cautious regarding negative commandments receives only one thousand - we already learned this from the first verse, which wrote "to those who love Me and to those who keep My commandments," proving that one must fulfill both, and if he does not fulfill both, he presumably receives only one thousand.
Rather, now that Scripture reiterates "to those who love Him and to those who keep His commandments to a thousand generations," you must say that the verse intends to teach us that the core distinction depends on whether one serves out of love or out of fear: if he serves out of fear, he receives only one thousand. And what the first verse stated, "and showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and to those who keep My commandments," means that he fulfilled even the negative commandments out of complete love, and therefore he receives two thousand.
Thus, the shift in understanding is this: until now, we explained that the verses differentiate solely between positive and negative commandments, without addressing love and fear. But since there is no need for the second verse to repeat and teach that one receives a thousand for one of them, it perforce comes to teach about levels: the two portions of the thousand generations do not depend on the fulfillment of positive and negative commandments in and of themselves, but on whether one served out of fear or out of love. One who serves out of fear receives only one portion of those thousand generations; but one who serves out of love has two portions, the portion of love and the portion of fear, for love includes fear as well, while fear does not include love.
That is to say, do not think that one who serves out of love lacks fear. As we have seen, even one who serves out of love is also obligated in fear, and possesses both. In contrast, one who possesses fear does not necessarily possess love. Fear is a relatively lower level; the Rambam defines it as the service of women and children. And Rabbi Yisrael Salanter remarked: if only we could reach the level of service of the women and children of the Rambam's generation, of Rabbeinu Yonah, and of the early sages!
One Who Serves Half Out of Love and Half Out of Fear
The explanation continues: one who serves half out of love and half out of fear takes only one thousand. For neither aspect is complete in him. And this is what is implied by the verse, "To those who love Him and keep His commandments" for a thousand generations - meaning, even if he performs the positive commandments out of love and the negative commandments out of fear, he still receives only one thousand. For positive commandments are an expression of love, and caution regarding negative prohibitions stems from fear - fear of transgressing and stumbling. The main thing is to be meticulous throughout the entire Torah out of complete love, and then he takes his own portion and the portion of his fellow - twofold.
"Know Therefore That the Lord Your God, He Is God, the Faithful God, Who Keeps Covenant and Kindness"
And we have another complete proof from the verse, for a difficulty arises: why was it necessary to state here, "that the Lord your God, He is God"? Did we not know this until now, seeing that we stood at the Giving of the Torah? And what is meant by "the faithful God" - was there any reason to think He is not faithful? And what is meant by "Who keeps covenant" - what covenant is being referred to that God keeps?
Rather, these thousand generations and the two thousand are certainly the secret of "the word which He commanded to a thousand generations," those generations that were wiped from the world. Therefore it says, "Know therefore that the Lord your God" - Hashem, Who will pay your reward, which is the attribute of Mercy, "He is God" - He Himself is the attribute of Justice; He is the One Who executed judgment upon the wicked of the thousand generations and wiped them from the world, and by virtue of that very judgment, He gives you their reward.
"And nevertheless, the faithful God" - for the Holy One, blessed be He, promised goodness, and everyone has a portion in the Garden of Eden. And where is that portion taken from? From that very goodness destined for them, which He gives to the righteous in each and every generation. This is His faithfulness: the promise He made to the thousand generations that never entered the world is preserved - and given to those worthy of it. "Did He speak and not act, or declare and not fulfill it?" "God is not a man that He should lie, nor a human being that He should reconsider." Therefore, He is faithful because He "keeps covenant and kindness," specifically "keeps" - in that He preserves it for every righteous and pious person. This portion is preserved for the righteous person who will arrive many years later, for those generations were intended to be born before the creation of the world, and the Holy One, blessed be He, preserves their reward and grants it to the righteous yet to come.
"The Thousand Is for You, O Solomon, and Two Hundred for Those Who Guard Its Fruit"
כַּרְמִי שֶׁלִּי לְפָנָי, הָאֶלֶף לְךָ שְׁלֹמֹה, וּמָאתַיִם לְנֹטְרִים אֶת פִּרְיוֹ. (שיר השירים ח, יב) - "My vineyard, which is mine, is before me; the thousand is for you, O Solomon, and two hundred for those who guard its fruit" (Shir HaShirim 8:12).
And with this, the author of the Zera Shimshon explains the verse, "The thousand is for you, O Solomon, and two hundred for those who guard its fruit." It is well known that every mention of "Solomon" in Shir HaShirim refers to the King to Whom peace belongs, except for "Behold the couch of Solomon." Although we have studied Shir HaShirim at length with the Malbim, and the Malbim takes an entirely different approach to explaining the Megillah, here the explanation follows the path of Chazal, where every mention of "Solomon" refers to the Holy One, blessed be He, the One to Whom peace belongs.
Therefore it says: "The thousand is for you, O Solomon" - Master of the Universe, You have a thousand generations with which to pay good reward to those who walk before You, the entire reward of those thousand generations that were cut down before their time. "And two hundred for those who guard its fruit" - and these two hundred are the fruit of the thousand, which is the principal preserved for the World to Come. That is to say, twenty percent, as it were, is given to man here as fruit in this world, while the principal is preserved for him in the World to Come.
Charity Brings Wealth - and the Question of Interest
Do not be surprised that there is reward in this world here, because charity enriches the one who gives it, just like tithing, as it is written: "Aser te'aser" - tithe so that you will become wealthy. Here the Torah granted permission to test the Holy One, blessed be He: "U'vechanuni na bazot" ("Test Me now in this"), regarding charity and tithes. Our Sages state, and so cites the Vilna Gaon, that the primary blessing of wealth was said concerning the giving of a fifth (twenty percent) - and this fits beautifully with what is explained here: what a person receives in this world is the two hundred, which represents a fifth, and this is the wealth of which it was said that charity enriches.
Yet how is this possible? The verse states: "Malveh Hashem chonen dal" - "One who is gracious to the poor lends to Hashem." One who gives charity is considered as though lending to the Holy One, blessed be He, and Hashem, as it were, is obligated to repay him. If so, how can the Holy One, blessed be He, give him far more than he gave? Is that not considered interest (ribbit)? In a loan, one must repay the exact original sum, yet here we see that Hashem gives the thousand for the World to Come and an additional two hundred in this world! And do not say that the laws of interest apply only among human beings - for our Rabbis taught: "I am He Who kept My commandments first," showing that the Holy One, blessed be He, as it were, conducts Himself according to His own Torah and mitzvot, and in many places Chazal emphasize that He acts according to the rules He established. (In jest: here is proof that it is difficult to rely on a heter iska - otherwise, the author would have simply resolved the question by saying that the Holy One, blessed be He, uses a heter iska.)
Torah Scholars Are Permitted to Lend to One Another with Interest
The answer may be given based on the Levush: Torah scholars are permitted to lend to one another with interest, because they know it is forbidden and therefore give the addition as a complete gift. However, this applies specifically to a small amount that people are accustomed to giving as a gift, namely up to a fifth of the loan, and specifically regarding foodstuffs, which is a manner of honor and respect. Outside of foodstuffs, or even with foodstuffs if it exceeds a fifth, it is forbidden even for a Torah scholar.
This is an important halachah to know. Although the prohibition of interest means that one may not add even a fraction of a perutah to the loan, it was permitted for Torah scholars - with two conditions: that it involves food, and that it does not exceed a fifth. For example: you knock on your neighbor's door and borrow a tomato, and the next day you return a tomato. If we measure its diameter, weight, and mass, you might have returned more than you received - he gave a fifty-gram tomato and you returned a sixty-gram one. Seemingly, what about the prohibition of interest, which applies to food as well, as in "neshech ochel, neshech kol davar asher yishach" ("interest of food, interest of anything that may be lent on interest")? The answer is that Torah scholars know the law of interest, and they give the addition as a complete gift, not as an addition or as payment for the loan. Furthermore, this applies specifically to food, where it is dignified and respectful to send gifts to one another, and it is undignified to cut the tomato and weigh it, saying, "Give me back four grams." But with money, a person cannot borrow a thousand and return eleven hundred claiming that the hundred is a gift; with money, one must repay the exact amount. Even then, the leniency is only up to a fifth, and only between Torah scholars.
If so, the author explains, the Holy One, blessed be He, and the giver of charity also have the status of Torah scholars, as it were. The Holy One, blessed be He, is certainly the Master of the universe, Who teaches the world wisdom and imparts knowledge, and the giver of charity likewise shares the status of a Torah scholar. Therefore, they are permitted to lend to one another with interest and to give up to a fifth. That is why "u'matayim lenotrim et piryo" - the two hundred are the interest, representing a fifth of the thousand, and the Holy One, blessed be He, can feed him this fifth in this world over and above the thousand.
"These Are the Things Whose Fruits a Person Eats in This World"
A proof for this is from what our Sages of blessed memory said: "These are the things whose fruits a person eats in this world." One might ask: why did the Mishnah use the terminology of eating? It could have said that a person "takes" their fruits. It must be to hint that these fruits can be taken by man and given by the Holy One, blessed be He, specifically because they are classified as food. There is a wonderful insight here: regarding that "interest" which we receive in this world alongside the principal reward preserved for the World to Come, Chazal used the term "eats their fruits" - like eating fruit, and with food items between Torah scholars there is no prohibition of interest.
One might also ask why the verse does not say "and two hundred and fifty," for whenever the Torah speaks of a fifth (chomesh), it is a fifth from the outside (milbar) - twenty-five percent rather than twenty percent. However, regarding charity this is not so, and the fifth of charity is always from within (milgav). From where is this derived? From the verse "Aser te'aser", from which Chazal derived the concept of a fifth. The tithe of which we speak is always from within - you take a hundred and divide by ten; you do not first add the tithe and then divide. And a fifth is derived from "Aser te'aser", meaning give a tithe twice - which results in a fifth from within, twenty percent and not twenty-five percent. This concludes the matter.
In summary: From the Gemara in Sotah we learned that one who acts out of love has his merit extended for two thousand generations, while one who acts out of fear, for one thousand. The author of the Zera Shimshon explained that the source of these thousand and two thousand generations is found in "the word He commanded for a thousand generations" - those generations that arose in thought to be created and were wiped away, and thought is considered like action; therefore, dwellings were prepared for them in Gan Eden, and the righteous person takes his portion and the portion of his fellow. The first verse taught us that one requires both positive and negative commandments, and the second verse taught us that the primary distinction is between one who serves out of love - which encompasses fear, granting him both portions - and one who serves out of fear, who receives only one portion; and one who serves half out of love and half out of fear receives only one thousand. From this it was explained: "הָאֶלֶף לְךָ שְׁלֹמֹה" ("The thousand is for you, Shlomoh") - the principal reward preserved for the World to Come from those thousand generations, "וּמָאתַיִם לְנֹטְרִים אֶת פִּרְיוֹ" ("and two hundred for those who guard its fruit") - the fifth given as fruits in this world, since they have the status of Torah scholars and it is permitted with foodstuffs, which is why Chazal precisely said, "eats their fruits in this world." Just as we have merited to complete the book Zera Shimshon on Shir HaShirim, so may we merit to learn and to teach, to safeguard, to perform, and to fulfill, and to study, bli neder and with Heavenly assistance, all the works of the author of Zera Shimshon. May he serve as an advocate of merit and pray on our behalf and for all that we ask and need, and may the Holy One, blessed be He, bestow upon us abundant blessing and fulfill all the desires of our hearts for good in the merit of the tzaddik and his promise, Amen and Amen.