Instead of judging the less fortunate, help them

Martin Zagnoev, Johannesburg

Scans show that part of the brain lights up when we do a kind act. We often experience a sense of euphoria when doing so. Shortly before his final stroke, the Lubavitcher Rebbe was asked by CNN what his message to the world was. He said people should increase acts of goodness and kindness.

All the world’s religions are united in emphasising the importance and spiritual power of being charitable. The Kabalah (Jewish mysticism) tells us that every time we do a kind act, a beautiful angel is created. If we could (in this world) see how beautiful it is, we would want to spend all our time doing good things.

Unfortunately, when we experience hardships we might become hardened and lose our capacity to empathise with people. Not only does this make us unhappy, it also reduces our interest in helping others, resulting in our avoiding our Divine mission of improving the world. Fortunately, others gain an enhanced ability to empathise as a result of suffering.

In this country there are extremely high levels of poverty and unemployment. Some have resorted to crime to fill their stomachs.

Others, who are unwilling to steal, wash windows at robots. Before condemning these poor souls, remember that they are attempting to offer a service. It cannot be easy to stand all day, in all weather conditions, while dodging vehicles in an attempt to eke out a living.

They also need to be fairly skilled to quickly clean the windows before the lights change.

Unfortunately, some of them are so fed up that they have become rude, but most are pleasant, especially when we are not hostile to them.

Even though they are wrong to invade our space, do we have the grace not to get worked up? Let us rather rise to the challenge and help sometimes.