Is Money Everything?

A friend called me up in the early evening of Saturday telling me that he was at his friend's apartment which was in the same building as mine and asked me if I wanted to drop by to say hello.  I went over with a bottle of wine and chatted for a little while with this man I had never met.  He turned out to be a very wealthy Jewish man, probably in his fifties or so, who owned a lot of real property that he inherited.  He also did not drink alcohol but he was happy to receive the bottle of wine I brought.  Realizing that nobody was having wine that evening, I suggested that we go up to the roof to check out the view.

I do not recall how the conversation started but it was there that I said money was not that important to me. [1]  After hearing that, the rich Jewish man, looking down at his feet, replied, "Money," then paused, for many more seconds longer than I had expected (I was hoping to hear him expound on his philosophy of money), then raised his voice ever so slightly for emphasis and dramatic effect and continued, "is e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g."

I was stunned by his reply.  At that moment I could only think about God and nothing else.  I was frozen in place and in thought and went silent.  Then in my mind's child-like voice, I asked, "What about God?"  The friend who invited me to visit broke the silence by pointing to a door and asking if that was the way back down.  Oh, was I glad.  It was getting chilly up on the roof and the topic was forgotten.  I said good-bye and returned to my apartment.

It is difficult for me to imagine that anyone actually believes that money is everything.  How is that possible?  God in Heaven has everything anyone would ever want and no money can buy that.  So money cannot be everything.  It may buy comfort and power in this world of flesh and sin but in the spiritual realm, it is worthless.

We were spirits before incarnation and will become spirits again beyond our flesh.  Is that difficult to accept?

For those who believe that money is everything, then after they die and become spirits again, they will have nothing, and eternal nothingness is a part of Hell [2].  For those who believe that beyond having earthly faith in currencies and temporal ownership of tangible goods is the Truth of God, they ought to be able to find God, in this life and after, in Heaven, where eternal fulfillment awaits.



[1] In a conversation with rich people, the topic of money is almost never omitted or even tangential.
[2] Another part of Hell is eternal craving, in addition to eternal suffering, eternal regret and so on.