When we reflect we can see that most of the sins of a person are caused by a person being hungry for money. These sins include theft, robbery, mispricing, forced-sale, false oaths, falsehood, false measures and weights, moving property boundaries, disputes, jealousy, hatred, competition, forbidden foods, profaning Shabbos and Yom Tov etc. Most of the sins which a person commits are caused by the lust for money, and on top of them is the sin of profaning the Name of Hashem. In the same way, one whose money is very dear to him will end up not performing the commandments, prayers and blessings, and especially not learning the Torah (which is considered like all of the other sins). Even when he performs them, they are not done properly because of haste, and his heart is not in it, for because of his lust for money he will do everything possible to get money, and he will ignore charity, and many other similar evils are caused, so that the verse which says “there is wealth which is kept to cause evil to its owners”, applies to him, for through his wealth he inherits Gehinnom and descends to a desolate pit.

Chazal said truly that “a person can be recognized by his wallet”. This is especially true in our generation which is a generation of money, for a person drawn after money more than after any other pleasure or sin, and a person’s money is very precious to him, for some people more than their body and for others more even than their souls. However, the responsibility of a person in this world is that he should be a warrior who conquers his evil inclination, and open his eyes and understand the real truth, that it would be better for a person to die of hunger rather than be a wicked person in the eyes of Hashem and antagonize his Creator, Heaven forbid.