A certain man used to teach his son every day the words of Ecclesiastes (11:1): “Cast your bread upon the waters, for you shall find it after many days.” In due course the man died, and the young man remembered his father’s words. He used to take bread every day and fling it into the sea.
On one occasion Elijah, whom it is good to mention, met him in the form of an old man and asked him what he was doing. He answered: “My father ordered me to cast my bread into the water.” “Yet surely you have learned,” said Elijah, “when you cast your bread upon the water, that bread is like salt. Just as bread cannot be eaten without salt, so the world cannot exist without bread.” So from that time on he used to take only a piece of bread every day and went to the river and threw it into the water.
There was a certain fish at that place which used to eat the bread, and it did so every day until it grew very big and distressed the other fishes in that place. At last all the fish in the sea gathered and went to Leviathan and said to him: “Your majesty, there is a certain fish which has grown very big so that we cannot live together with him, and he is so strong that he eats twenty or more of us every day.” When he heard this, Leviathan sent for him, saying: “These live out at sea and have not grown so much, yet you have grown so large at the sea’s edge. How is that?” “Indeed,” answered the fish, “it is because a certain man fetches me a piece of bread every day and I eat it morning and noon; and in the morning I eat twenty fish and in the evening thirty.”
“Why do you eat your companions?” asked Leviathan, and he answered: “Because they come to me and I consume them; and the words of the Prophet Isaiah (58:7) apply to them: ‘And do not disregard your own flesh.’ ” “Go,” said Leviathan, “and fetch that man to me.” And he said, “Tomorrow. (Exodus 8:10).
He went at once and dug beneath the spot where the young man used to come, and he made a tunnel there, and placed his mouth in that tunnel. Next day the young man came as usual and wished to stand in that spot, but fell into the water. The fish opened its mouth and swallowed him up and carried him away through the sea to Leviathan, who said: “Spit him out.” He spat him out of his mouth, and the man fell into the mouth of Leviathan, who said to him: “My son, why have you cast your bread into the water?” and he answered: “Because my father taught me from childhood that I should cast my bread upon the waters.”
And what did Leviathan do then? He released him from his mouth, kissed him and taught him seventy languages and the whole Torah, and flung him a distance of three hundred leagues onto the dry land. He fell in a spot where no human foot had ever walked. Lying there exhausted, he raised his eyes and saw two ravens flying above him. One of them said to the other: “My father, is that man is alive or dead.” The father replied: “My son, I do not know.” “I shall go down,” said the son, “and eat his eyes because I enjoy picking out the eyes of human beings.” But his father said: “My son, do not go down in case he is alive and listened to his father.” The son insisted: “I shall go down and pick out his eyes,” and down he flew.
This man understood what they had been saying to one another, and when the raven settled on his forehead he seized him by the legs. At once the raven cawed to his father: “Father, father, the L-rd has delivered me into his hands and I cannot rise.” When his father heard this, he croaked and wept and said: “Alas for my son he listened not to my counsel and forgot my teaching: ” The eye that mocks a father and scorns to obey a mother will be pecked out by the ravens. (Proverbs 30:17). The father raven cried: “You, human being, let my son go! May it be His will that you understand my language! Rise and dig down where you are standing, and you will find treasures of Solomon, king of Israel.”
He let the raven go at once and dug down and found treasures of Solomon, with many jewels and pearls, so that he and his sons after him remained wealthy. It was of him that King Solomon the Wise said: “Those who are generous are blessed, for they share their bread with the poor.” (Proverbs 22:9)
May the lessons we learn each day and the counsel of the tales we share bring peace and understanding to our children and our children’s children and to all of the children.
May all your tales end with Shalom (peace)
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Tell it to your children, and let your children tell it to their children, and their children to the next generation. (Joel 1:3)
