Standing In Your Friends Shoes

this week's Torah portion it mentions the Commandment do not oppress the G don't oppress the convert act nicely towards the convert why because you yourselves were a stranger in a land that wasn't yours now why over here does a Torah have to mention a reason because you were strangers what happened to the Commandment of love your neighbor like you love yourself why do we need an added commandment and I believe the answer is based on the following study there's a man named Alex and he dresses up like a homeless man and he goes into a restaurant he goes over to a table somebody eating a full course meal Alex goes over and he says excuse me sir I haven't eaten in a couple of days can you spear something for me and the man looks at Alex he says I'm sorry sir I'm sorry Alex goes over to another table goes goes over to a woman and Alex says the same thing Alex says I'm sorry I haven't eaten in a couple days can you please spare something for me the woman looks at Alex and she says I'm sorry I can't give you anything Alex goes over to a third table and the same exact thing happens he walks off with nothing now Alex's friend Boris goes over to a real homeless man and he gives him a sandwich and the homeless man bites into that sandwich like it's the first thing he's eating in a couple of days now Alex approaches that homeless man and he goes over to the homeless man and he says sir I haven't eaten in a couple of days can you please spear some of that sandwich for me and a remarkable thing happens the homeless man rips off half of a sandwich and gives it to Alex and that happened again with another homeless man and what's amazing is the people in the restaurant it's not that they didn't care about Alex of course they cared about Alex they just couldn't understand what Alex was going through because they were never homeless themselves it's only a homeless man that understands the pain of what hunger is he understand exactly what it is to not eat in a couple of days and therefore it's simple to him to rip off half his sandwich and give it to another homeless man that's exactly what the Torah is teaching us the Jewish people we've been impressed we've been enslaved we've been tortured it's us that understands the pain of other human beings we've been through it all the Torah says over here besides the Commandment of love your neighbor like you love yourself you have an added responsibility to help another person that's going through a painful situation this convert he's a stranger in a land that's not his to a people that's not his you were a stranger in a land that's not yours you understand him you help him you make sure he feels safe this commandment applies to each and every one of us whenever we go through a painful situation we have to use that experience to understand another human being that's in a similar situation and help him out give me advice where we failed we now know what it's like help him out transfer your pain to somebody else's gain