Never Take Advantage of Another’s Misfortune

You shall not pervert justice due the stranger or the fatherless, nor take a widow’s garment as a pledge. Deuteronomy 24:17, NKJV.

God’s word sanctions no policy that will enrich one class by the oppression and suffering of another. In all our business transactions it teaches us to put ourselves in the place of those with whom we are dealing, to look not only on our own things, but also on the things of others. Those who would take advantage of another’s misfortunes in order to benefit themselves, or who seek to profit themselves through another’s weakness or incompetence, are transgressors both of the principles and of the precepts of the Word of God.

“Thou shalt not pervert the judgment of the stranger, nor of the fatherless; nor take a widow’s raiment to pledge” (Deuteronomy 24:17). “When thou dost lend thy brother any thing, thou shalt not go into his house to fetch his pledge.

Thou shalt stand abroad, and the man to whom thou dost lend shall bring out the pledge abroad unto thee. And if the man be poor, thou shalt not sleep with his pledge” (Verses 10-12). “If thou at all take thy neighbour’s raiment to pledge, thou shalt deliver it unto him by that the sun goeth down: for that is his covering only ...: wherein shall he sleep? and it shall come to pass, when he crieth unto me, that I will hear; for I am gracious” (Exodus 22:26, 27). “If thou sell aught unto thy neighbour, or buyest aught of thy neighbour’s hand, ye shall not oppress one another” (Leviticus 25:14).

“Ye shall do no unrighteousness in judgment, in measures of length, of weight, or of quantity” (Leviticus 19:35, ARV). “Thou shalt not have in thy bag diverse weights, a great and a small. Thou shalt not have in thy house diverse measures, a great and a small” (Deuteronomy 25:13, 14, ARV). “Just balances, just weights, a just ephah, and a just hin, shall ye have” (Leviticus 19:36, ARV).

“Give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of thee turn not thou away” (Matthew 5:42). “The wicked borroweth, and payeth not again: but the righteous sheweth mercy, and giveth”
(Psalm 37:21)....

The plan of life that God gave to Israel was intended as an object lesson for all humankind. If these principles were carried out today, what a different place this world would be!—The Ministry of Healing, 187, 188.