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consequence of an incident that took place in England, which was
recently publicized. This is what happened:

A young man who worked as a clerk in a prominent English bank,
came to a lawyer’s office and said, “I am about to commit suicide be-
cause I stole a thousand pounds from the bank. The auditing will
soon be carried out and I will certainly be caught red handed. I will
be unable to show my face in public and I will also bring shame and
embarrassment upon my father, who is a member of England’s House
of Lords and upon my aristocratic family. Since I am currently pen-
niless and have no way of returning the money I stole, I have decided
to take my own life and have come to you as a last resort to seek your
advice and see whether you can find any way to cover up my misdeed
and thereby save my life.”

After giving the matter much thought, the lawyer had an idea. He
asked the clerk, “Could you perhaps steal another thousand pounds
and bring them to me?” “Yes,” answered the clerk. Shortly thereafter
the lawyer was holding a thousand pounds. The lawyer then called up
the bank manager and told him, “One of the clerks in your bank has
stolen two thousand pounds and now regrets his actions. However,
he doesn’t have the means of repaying the money and he is about to
commit suicide out of embarrassment. When his family found out
about this, they sold whatever they could but they only managed to
raise one thousand pounds. The family is willing to pay this amount
on condition that the bank foregoes the remainder of the debt and
doesn’t go public with the story. If you don’t accept these terms, they
won’t pay anything and you also won’t get a penny from the clerk,
because he is destitute and is about to commit suicide.”

The bank’s management considered the matter and decided to ac-
cept the thousand pounds on the terms offered by “the family”… and
the incident was hushed up.

The question arises, was the lawyer’s conduct in accordance with
halachah?

The lawyer seems to have acted improperly in several respects: [1]
He violated “Do not place a stumbling block before a blind man” (Va-
yikra 19) [i.e. do not cause another person to sin], by advising the clerk

374 1 Medical-Halachic Responsa of Rav Zilberstein