When the Basic Obligation Is Ignored
When the innkeeper realized that the guest he had mistreated was the Beis HaLevi, he begged for mechilah. But the Beis HaLevi taught him that once a person ignores the basic dignity owed to every Yid, he is responsible even for the greatness he did not recognize.
Harav Dovid Soloveitchik zt”l related the following story about the Beis HaLevi, Harav Yosef Dov Soloveitchik zt”l.
The Beis HaLevi was once traveling and stopped at an inn. He was not recognized, and to the innkeeper he appeared to be a simple traveler.
Instead of welcoming him properly and treating him with dignity, the innkeeper was disrespectful. He did not know that the guest standing before him was the Beis HaLevi — but he also did not treat him the way any Yid deserves to be treated.
Later, a distinguished Rav came to the inn and recognized the guest. The innkeeper suddenly realized who had been in his inn. This was not a simple traveler. This was the Beis HaLevi, one of the gedolei hador.
The innkeeper was shaken. He hurried over to the Beis HaLevi and begged him for mechilah.
The Beis HaLevi answered him with a powerful lesson.
“If your only mistake was that you did not know I was the Beis HaLevi,” he said, “that would be one thing. But you did not even treat me the way one must treat a regular Yid.”
The Beis HaLevi explained this from the pasuk in Parshas Vayishlach. After Shechem acted wickedly toward Dinah, the Torah says:
“כִּי נְבָלָה עָשָׂה בְיִשְׂרָאֵל לִשְׁכַּב אֶת בַּת יַעֲקֹב וְכֵן לֹא יֵעָשֶׂה”
“He committed a disgraceful act in Yisrael, to lie with the daughter of Yaakov, and such a thing may not be done.”
Shechem might have tried to excuse himself. Perhaps he could have said, “I did not know who she was. I did not know she was the daughter of Yaakov Avinu. I did not realize the full severity of what I was doing.”
But the Torah answers: “וְכֵן לֹא יֵעָשֶׂה” — such a thing may not be done.
Even if she had not been the daughter of Yaakov, his action would still have been completely wrong. Since he failed in the basic obligation of how a person may treat another human being, he was held responsible even for the greater severity that he did not know — that he had disgraced bas Yaakov.
That was the Beis HaLevi’s message to the innkeeper.
A person cannot say, “I did not know he was a gadol,” when he did not even treat him like a regular Yid. Once the basic obligation was ignored, he is responsible for the full weight of what he did — even the part he did not realize.
We do not treat people with dignity only after we find out who they are. We do not wait to discover that someone is a talmid chacham, a respected Rav, a wealthy person, or someone important.
Every Yid deserves to be treated properly simply because he is a Yid.
That is the lesson of “וְכֵן לֹא יֵעָשֶׂה”: when the basic standard of human dignity is violated, ignorance of the person’s greatness is no excuse.