Question:
last week a story came to light of a non-Jewish gas station worker who was telling frum yidden that one of them had cheated him, said that he needed gas and then after said he couldn’t pay because he didn’t have his wallet with him, however, he would come back and pay, but he didn’t. kind hearted frum yidden willing to remove this chilul Hashem were giving him money, finally erev Shabbos it came out that it was a scam. The non-jew knew that frum yidden would help each other out and therefore he took advantage.
After repeating this story at our Shabbos tish pointing out mi kamcha yisroel, a few people said they never would’ve given the money and another few said they would’ve to avoid a possible chilul Hashem.
What is the answer?
Answer:
This is a beautiful story, and mi kamcha Yisroel! I think that the people that gave the money to the worker did correctly by giving him the money, because they wanted to avert a chillul Hashem, and even though that the worker was a scam, the Kiddush Hashem is still there intact, because each person that gave him money was declaring in public that it is very important, and worth money to him that Hashem’s name shouldn’t be desecrated. In fact the mere fact that the worker would think of doing something like this is a Kiddush Hashem.
On the other hand, there isn’t a need to give him the total amount that he claims was stolen from him, and by giving him some of the money would have be sufficient.
