Spend It on Whatever You Want
- Uriel ben Avraham
- Aug 22, 2025
- 4 min read
There is a verse in this week's parsha that stopped me cold the first time I read it. I was still in conversion classes. The rabbi had assigned the portion and I was reading ahead, pen in hand, expecting prohibitions, expecting gravity.
Deuteronomy delivers plenty of both. And then, in the middle of a passage about tithes, the Torah says this:
וְנָתַתָּ֣ה הַכֶּ֡סֶף בְּכֹל֩ אֲשֶׁר־תְּאַוֶּ֨ה נַפְשְׁךָ֜ בַּבָּקָ֣ר וּבַצֹּ֗אן וּבַיַּ֙יִן֙ וּבַשֵּׁכָ֔ר וּבְכֹ֛ל אֲשֶׁ֥ר תִּֽשְׁאָלְךָ֖ נַפְשֶׁ֑ךָ וְאָכַ֣לְתָּ שָּׁ֗ם לִפְנֵי֙ יְהֹוָ֣ה אֱלֹהֶ֔יךָ וְשָׂמַחְתָּ֖ אַתָּ֥ה וּבֵיתֶֽךָ׃
and spend the money on anything you want—cattle, sheep, wine, or other intoxicant, or anything you may desire. And you shall feast there, in the presence of the ETERNAL your God, and rejoice with your household.
Anything you want. Wine. Intoxicant. Whatever your soul desires. Feast there. Rejoice.
I remember putting the pen down and thinking: this is not the religion I was told about.
The parsha is Re'eh — "See" — and it opens with a choice set before the people like a meal on a table:
רְאֵ֗ה אָנֹכִ֛י נֹתֵ֥ן לִפְנֵיכֶ֖ם הַיּ֑וֹם בְּרָכָ֖ה וּקְלָלָֽה׃
See, this day I set before you blessing and curse:
Blessing and curse. Obey and flourish, or turn away and don't.
The framing sounds binary, almost stark. But what follows is 126 verses of detailed instruction on how to build a society — where to worship, what to eat, how to mark the calendar, and, repeatedly, insistently, what to do with your money.
Re'eh is the longest parsha in Deuteronomy, and a remarkable amount of it is about generosity.
The laws of tzedakah appear here in their fullest form:
כִּֽי־פָתֹ֧חַ תִּפְתַּ֛ח אֶת־יָדְךָ֖ ל֑וֹ וְהַעֲבֵט֙ תַּעֲבִיטֶ֔נּוּ דֵּ֚י מַחְסֹר֔וֹ אֲשֶׁ֥ר יֶחְסַ֖ר לֽוֹ׃
Rather, you must open your hand and lend whatever is sufficient to meet the need.
Patoach tiftach — open, you shall open. The doubled verb in Hebrew is an intensifier.
Not "you may open your hand."
Not "consider opening your hand."
Open it.
The Torah does not suggest generosity. It insists on it. And two verses later comes the reason, stated without hedge:
נָת֤וֹן תִּתֵּן֙ ל֔וֹ וְלֹא־יֵרַ֥ע לְבָבְךָ֖ בְּתִתְּךָ֣ ל֑וֹ כִּ֞י בִּגְלַ֣ל ׀ הַדָּבָ֣ר הַזֶּ֗ה יְבָרֶכְךָ֙ יְהֹוָ֣ה אֱלֹהֶ֔יךָ בְּכׇֽל־מַעֲשֶׂ֔ךָ וּבְכֹ֖ל מִשְׁלַ֥ח יָדֶֽךָ׃
Give readily and have no regrets when you do so, for in return the ETERNAL your God will bless you in all your efforts and in all your undertakings.
Have no regrets. The commandment is not just to give but to give without the tightness in your chest that comes from watching the money leave. That tightness is human. The Torah knows it's there. And it says: let it go.
This is where Re'eh does something I didn't expect when I first studied it. The parsha holds two commandments side by side — give freely to others, and feast joyfully yourself.
Most religious traditions, at least to the meagre extent to which I'm aware of them, I'd encountered before Judaism treated those as opposites. Self-denial was holy. Enjoyment was suspect. Generosity meant sacrifice, and sacrifice meant it should hurt, at least a little, or it didn't count.
Re'eh disagrees. The same portion that says "open your hand" also says "spend it on whatever you want."
The same God who commands tzedakah commands the second tithe — money set aside specifically to be enjoyed, in community, before God.
The feasting isn't a reward for the giving. They're companions. Two sides of the same instruction: be open. Be open with what you have, and be open to what is good.
This week, Tel Aviv University announced it would award full tuition scholarships to 180 undergraduate students who served more than two hundred days in the reserves this past year.
Two hundred days. These are people who put their academic lives on hold — exams, thesis deadlines, the ordinary rhythm of a semester — and went where they were sent.
Over eight thousand TAU students were called up for reserve duty since the war began, the most of any academic institution in Israel. And since then, the university has distributed more than forty million shekels in scholarships.
I read the announcement on Wednesday morning at my desk in Atlanta, some what? three weeks back from our second trip to Israel this summer. The house is quiet again. The suitcases are unpacked. I am re-learning the shape of ordinary weeks — grocery runs on Thursday afternoon, Shabbat prep on Friday, the communal time on Saturday..
The TAU story hit differently from this distance. Not as headline, but as texture. A country where a university looks at students who gave a year of their lives and says: we see what you did, and here is our hand, open.
The phrasing in the announcement was practical — tuition coverage, academic adjustment, financial support. The substance was patoach tiftach. Open, you shall open.
Re'eh closes with the three pilgrimage festivals — Pesach, Shavuot, Sukkot — and the instruction for how to observe them. And here the Torah makes its most extraordinary demand:
שִׁבְעַ֣ת יָמִ֗ים תָּחֹג֙ לַיהֹוָ֣ה אֱלֹהֶ֔יךָ בַּמָּק֖וֹם אֲשֶׁר־יִבְחַ֣ר יְהֹוָ֑ה כִּ֣י יְבָרֶכְךָ֞ יְהֹוָ֣ה אֱלֹהֶ֗יךָ בְּכֹ֤ל תְּבוּאָֽתְךָ֙ וּבְכֹל֙ מַעֲשֵׂ֣ה יָדֶ֔יךָ וְהָיִ֖יתָ אַ֥ךְ שָׂמֵֽחַ׃
You shall hold a festival for the ETERNAL your God seven days, in the place that GOD will choose; for the ETERNAL your God will bless all your crops and all your undertakings, and you shall have nothing but joy.
V'hayita akh sameach. You shall have nothing but joy.
Not "try to be happy." Not "reflect on your blessings."
You shall be joyful. It's a mitzvah — a commandment, with the full weight of obligation behind it.
Joy as obligation is a strange idea until you live inside it for a while. Then it starts to make sense. Joy is not the absence of difficulty. It's a practice. Something you build, the way you build a sukkah — temporary, open to the sky, and sturdy enough to sit in.
The parsha that begins with "see, I set before you blessing and curse" ends with a commandment to choose joy. Open your hand. Feast with your household. Have no regrets.
The Torah doesn't ask you to choose between generosity and enjoyment. It places them on the same table and says: both. See them both. Choose them both.
A few weeks home. The spices from the shuk are in the pantry. Shabbat is coming.
Shabbat shalom.
— Uriel ben Avraham
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