Yesterday we quoted the Orchot Sadikim, who told us that if you want to love your friend, act in ways of love, by taking care of him, doing for him, etc.
In his sefer Michtav M’Eliyahu, the famous Baal Mussar Rav Eliyahu Dessler writes that love comes from giving. A person loves himself, and he loves his own handwork. As the Gemarah says, a person would rather have one apple that he grew, than nine that he gets from somebody else.
A person’s essence is in whatever he does, and therefore, when you put your efforts into something, you love that thing.
He says that it’s a mistake to think that you love people, and therefore, you give to them. Actually, you love them because you give to them. When you give to them, and put into them, they are you.
That is why this is the way to loving people.
Rav Dessler writes that he saw this in action. He lived through World War II, and witnessed a family get separated, with the two-year-old child going off with the father while the mother remained alone. For six years, the father raised the child, without the mother. The mother missed her child and had tremendous yearning for him. When the war ended and peace returned, the family reunited.
Rav Dessler writes, “Behold, there was a wonder. They could not fix the years that passed. The love that the father had for the son was much deeper than the love of the mother.”
She had left him as a little boy and here he was a big boy. He was a stranger to her. Although he was her child, she still yearned for that little baby.
This was because the father put so much into the child whereas the mother missed out on that.. The rule, he says, is that when you give to somebody else, you aren’t losing. You are spreading out. You become a part of that person, and that is why you love them. A great philanthropist who shares his money with the Jewish people doesn’t lose his money. Rather, he becomes spread out into more areas. He is in more places, and he loves more people.
This is a very important principle. Loving isn’t giving, and giving isn’t loving.
Rather, you love somebody that you give to, and that is why this is a way to strengthen our Veahavta LeRe’echa Kamocha.