[Avodah] timtum halev

[Zev Sero]

rabbirichwolpoe at gmail.com wrote:
> I was taught when I was young [midrash? Chassidic story?] that if
> one dropped a coin and a poor person found it, that he gets credit
> for tzedakkah


Rashi Vayikra 5:17
Sifri ibid
Yalkut Shimoni Devarim 24:937 ("ki tiktzor")


> Apparently RET was giving the converse, that positive machshava does
> not count. This part I don't get - I would see HKBH is mitztareif
> machshavah l'maaseh, especially when there is a maaseh, albeit flawed.

It's an explicit gemara, Bava Basra 9b.  "Yirmiyah said before HKBH:
RBSO, even when they bend their inclination and seek to do tzedaka
before you, make them stumble into unworthy people, so that they will
not receive any reward."


BTW, "machshava tovah HKBH metzarfah lemaaseh" only works if there is
a machshavah-less maaseh to which He can join it!

-- 
Zev Sero                      The trouble with socialism is that you
zev at sero.name                 eventually run out of other people’s money
                                                     - Margaret Thatcher