{"id":1097,"date":"2008-11-19T06:59:23","date_gmt":"2008-11-19T14:59:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/simonburrow.com\/\/?p=1097"},"modified":"2008-11-20T16:37:50","modified_gmt":"2008-11-21T00:37:50","slug":"charity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/simonburrow.com\/?p=1097","title":{"rendered":"Charity"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In their Bibles the Jews and the Christians are exhorted that when harvesting their crops they should &#8220;leave some grain in the corners of the field&#8221;\u00a0 This was so that the poor could glean and survive without begging.\u00a0 Glean is a somewhat archaic word meaning  &#8220;to gather (grain or the like) after the reapers or regular gatherers.&#8221;\u00a0 Since most of us are no longer farmers how can we fulfill this biblical injunction today?\u00a0 I propose that we think of coins we get as change in markets and restaurants as the &#8220;grain in the corner of the field&#8221; and following the biblical injunction we should leave it where people poorer than us can find it.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>In a fast food restaurant leave the change on the counter.<\/li>\n<li>When you get change at the post office leave it on the retaining wall outside.<\/li>\n<li>At the clothing store throw the coins you get as change in the bushes outside the store.<\/li>\n<li>When there is a tip jar always put at least the coins you get as change in it.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Leaving something for the gleaners is direct charity.\u00a0 It doesn&#8217;t involve middlemen, administrative expenses or thank you notes.\u00a0 The finder is blessed but not obligated.\u00a0 According to<a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Tzedakah\" target=\"_blank\"> Maimonides Eight Levels of Charity<\/a> giving anonymously to an unknown recipient is this the second highest level of charity. By leaving your change you can be charitable everyday.<\/p>\n<p>Other benefits that will accrue to you and society are:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>You will move faster through your day if you are not fussing with change.<\/li>\n<li>The poor will be slightly less dependent on government programs.<\/li>\n<li>You will have the nice feeling that comes from having done a good deed.<\/li>\n<li>Your purse, and your heart will be lighter, saving energy and increasing happiness.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Some math:\u00a0 100 million people make transactions each day that generate about 30 cents of change.\u00a0 If half of this were left for the poor it would be $15 million dollars a day.\u00a0 About 5 billion dollars a year.<\/p>\n<p>Make a change.\u00a0 Leave your change.\u00a0 Its the new gleaning.<\/p>\n<p>Resolve to start today and see how it feels.<\/p>\n<p>This is one of my <a href=\"http:\/\/simonburrow.com\/\/archives\/simon-says\/faith\" target=\"_self\"><strong>Faith<\/strong><\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/simonburrow.com\/\/archives\/simon-says\/hope\" target=\"_self\"><strong>Hope<\/strong><\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/simonburrow.com\/\/archives\/business-success\/charity\"><strong>Charity<\/strong><\/a> series.\u00a0 Read them all.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In their Bibles the Jews and the Christians are exhorted that when harvesting their crops they should &#8220;leave some grain in the corners of the field&#8221;\u00a0 This was so that the poor could glean and survive without begging.\u00a0 Glean is a somewhat archaic word meaning &#8220;to gather (grain or the like) after the reapers or [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1097","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-business-success"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/s99jGb-charity","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/simonburrow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1097","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/simonburrow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/simonburrow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/simonburrow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/simonburrow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1097"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/simonburrow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1097\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1112,"href":"https:\/\/simonburrow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1097\/revisions\/1112"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/simonburrow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1097"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/simonburrow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1097"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/simonburrow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1097"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}