Hunger and the Hidden Good

Someone You Have Surely Met You have surely met a person like this. In his years of struggle he was hard, sharp, and so competitive that it hurt. Then he made it. He got rich, and he got the recognition he had been chasing. Suddenly he became someone else: softer, easier to be with, more open. Our first instinct is to judge him: “Look at that. Now that he has money, he can afford to be nice. Before, he showed his true face.” But wait. Maybe the opposite is true. Maybe now he is showing his true face. The Hunger Is a Garment, Not the Person In the first chapter of the Tanya, the classic book of Hasidic thought, Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi, its author, teaches that the animal soul is a real, living force inside every Jew. But this force, like every force, has a hunger. It hungers for recognition, for respect, for security. When a hunger is not satisfied, it turns a person into a defensive animal. He has to win every argument. He has to push others down to feel tall. He has to fight for every inch of standing. Inside, he is simply hungry. That hardness is not him. It is his hunger. Bruria, the learned wife of Rabbi Meir, read a verse as “Let sins come to an end, not sinners.” She was not saying that people are perfectly righteous. She was saying: turn your eye to the sin, not to the sinner. In our words: turn your eye to the hunger, not to the hungry person. A New Reading of “A Person Is Known by His Pocket” Our Sages say in the Talmud: “A person is known by his pocket.” The simple meaning is that money is a test. It is a trial that shows what a person is really like. But there is another, deeper way to read these words. The word for “known” here also means “revealed.” It is what becomes seen, what comes out into the open. When the “pocket” fills up, the deep hunger calms down. Only then, for the first time, does the fruit appear from under the shell. A shell always covers the fruit and draws its life from the fruit, but it is not the fruit itself. The hunger is the same. It is a covering, not the content. It is the shell, not the fruit. Filling the “pocket” is not a test that exposes the bad. It is a satisfaction that reveals the good that was always there. Serving Hashem: Know What You Are Hungry For My dear friend, this is not only about other people. When you feel irritable, competitive or begrudging toward others, do not start by asking, “What is wrong with me?” First ask: “What am I hungry for right now?” In chapter 32 of the Tanya, Rabbi Schneur Zalman writes that quarrels, jealousy and the need for self-importance all come from putting the “I” into the body and its “pocket.” This is not a fate you cannot change. It is how the hungry animal soul reacts. Once you recognize the force of a hunger, you can steer it. A hunger for honor can be filled with honoring Hashem. A hunger for security can be filled with trust in Hashem. This is the difference between subduing the dark side and transforming it. We do not only push the hunger down. We fill it, with holiness. Be a Full Pocket for Someone Else So there is a practical call here. When you meet someone who seems hard, competitive or closed off, ask before you judge: “What is he hungry for?” Then give it to him. Give him a feeling that he matters. Give him appreciation. Give him recognition. Looking at a friend with a kind eye is not weakness. It “feeds” his hunger. It removes the shell and reveals the good that was waiting there all along. As King Solomon wrote: “Love covers over all wrongs.” Love does not ignore the wrongs. It covers them by revealing what lies underneath.