How To Calculate The Tither
Three questions I received on tither (Maaser):
Question: You wrote on your blog that one should pay Maaser from his net income. However, in one of your lessons you said that Maaser is paid from the total income before tax deductions. My question is: is it paid from the income before tax deductions or from the net income after tax deductions?
My Answer: The rule states that the Maaser is 10% of one’s gross income. Otherwise, the tenth part from your taxes does not get corrected! However, beginners get a “discount” in order to get used to the Maaser and to make the calculation easier for them.
Question: My question regards the giving of Maaser. I understand the spiritual meaning of tithing 10% of your income to disseminating Kabbalah. What is unclear to me is the method in which a person must give Maaser. For example, a person earns $400 a week working at their job (which comes down to $10 per hour). Considering how time equals money, if a person volunteers 4 hours of their time disseminating, they have given $40 worth of time. Is this a valid form of giving Maaser?
My Answer: It is written that a person has to separate a tithe (10%) from all of his income.
Question: I am retired. My husband, who is not “on the path,” still works and we live on the money he earns. I participate in dissemination whereas his main interest is football. We don’t spend money on entertainment, other than going on vacation once a year. How should I calculate the Maaser?
My Answer: It is 10% of your pension. For example, you can make an arrangement with the Bnei Baruch dissemination center to buy our newspapers or books, and then hand them out or distribute them to libraries.
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Laitman.com Post: How Does One Pay Maaser?
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If we give 10% of our income is like taking away from my child and give to another.That’s weird.
If we are obliged to give 10% of our incomes what this has to do with spirituality.Didn’t you say that no action in the physical world can affect the sipiritual world.And If I have salary of 2000 euro 10% of it is 200euro.My wife will be totaly against it.And i have a child also and i cannot afford to give tithe of that big amount of money.How can not a person advance sipiritual if he has no money but has the great desire to learn?This is a discrimination by who is able to pay and who’s not.But at the end it’s all free for everybody,free books,free sources,but at some point when people are already engaged with kabbalah they’re told that they have to pay.Dind’t you say that a person has to have only a desire to engage in kabbalah.It looks like the Light wants money to be revealed to humanity.
So If i don’t pay Maaser i still will advance spiritualy but not at all
so i will leave 10% of my desires not corrected and will have to incarnate again.And If i pay Maaser to whom i have to give it?
I understand that we are to pay10% of our net/gross income as our Maaser, where do we make the contribution? Are we to do it once a month according to our monthly income or can we do it bi-weekly with our pay cycle? Are you saying that, if we (I) do not participate in the Maaser we(I) will still advance spiritually, but would we hender the whole from advancing quickly?
About “Maaser is 10% of one’s gross income. Otherwise, the tenth part from your taxes does not get corrected” – why on earth the taxes need to be corrected? According to Gemara, Talmud maaser is taken from net income, not gross.