An Introduction to Relationship Marketing –
An Endless Source of Leads
Part 2

By Rabbi Dave Felsenthal
www.RabbiDave.com

One of my favorite stories is about the lesson in the Bible to “Love your friend as you love yourself!” Notice, I did not say neighbor (no I don’t mean the joke about good fences making good neighbors), I said friend. The rest of the sentence finishes with I am the Lord your G-d. Why does the sentence finish that way?

Well, the story goes that once upon a time a son comes home from school and says, Dad I have 100 friends. His father says that’s great but not so enthusiastically. The son asks his dad, how many friends do you have? To which his dad replies, I have a half a friend. The son is dismayed and asks, dad, you are the most popular person I know, how can you only have a half a friend? The father says, son, I want you to conduct an experiment. Take a bag and fill it with rocks. For the next two weeks go to each of your friends and say that you were in a bar and got into a fight. You defended yourself and killed the other person by accident. The body is in this bag. Will you help me bury the body?

The son did so and went to each friend and told them the story of the bar, fight, body, bag will you help me bury? After two weeks told his father that not even one of his 100 friends would help. He asked his dad, what would your half a friend do? His father said, why don’t you go and ask him. So he went to the half a friend and said bar, fight, body, bag will you help me bury? The half a friend said yes, took him to the back yard and helped him bury the bag. Afterwards he told him to send regards to his dad but not to come back so as not to arouse anyone’s suspicions.

He ran back to his father full of excitement and told him that the half a friend helped! But why do you call him a half a friend he asked. What did my half a friend say to you? Well he did say not to come back again but to call him a half a friend seems harsh as he is the only one that helped me. Dad, what do you call a whole friend?

The dad said, let me tell you a story that happened during the Roman Empire. There were two boys who were best friends. As they were growing up the Roman empire split into two parts and one of the boys moved with his family to the other part. Even though they lived apart they stayed best friends and when they got older with families of their own they still traded goods and services with each other from one side of the empire to the other and saw each other frequently.

One time when one friend was visiting the other, he was accused of being a spy and was brought to the emperor of that area. He explained that he was only visiting to trade goods and services and was not a spy. The emperor said, so you say you are not a spy and I should let you go, I don’t believe you. The friend said, I understand your highness. Please let me return home so I can settle my accounts, give the money to my family, say goodbye and then return here so you can kill me. The emperor said, let me get this straight, you want me to let you go home and settle your affairs and then you will return so I can execute you? That’s ridiculous! The friend said, I have a friend and he will stay in jail in my place and if I don’t come back he will let you kill him instead. The emperor did not believe him so they called in the friend and asked if he would go to jail in his friend’s place and if the friend did not return be executed in his place as well and the friend said yes. The emperor was intrigued and said well, there have not been any good wars lately and I’m curious to see how this plays out. You have three weeks to go and come back or I will execute your friend instead.

So, the friend sailed home, settled his accounts, kissed his family good bye and set sail back for his execution. However, the winds did not come as expected and he arrived a little bit late on the day scheduled for the execution. He ran into the arena, saw his friend about to be executed, pushed him out of the way, put himself in place and said I’m accused of being the spy execute me. The friend said no way, I took your place, you are late, execute me. The executioner thought about killing both of them but decided that he better ask the emperor.

The emperor said let me get this straight. I accused you of being a spy and you said you are innocent and I did not believe you. You asked to be allowed to return home to settle your accounts and then come back and I said no way. You said you have a friend who would take your place and be executed if you did not return and I still did not believe you but when your friend agreed I decide to see what happens. Now, you’ve returned to be executed but your friend says that you are late and he should be executed. You each are saying kill me and let my friend live. Do I have that, right? They said, yes your highness. Wow, I will make you each a deal. I won’t kill either of you if you agree to make me a third friend.

This is what it means to have a whole friend. To care more about someone else then you do yourself. When you do that, you create friendships that last forever. We always say that people don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care. How do you do that?

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Rabbi Dave’s passion is to help people break through their barriers so they can achieve their best. He lives in his dream home in Israel and loves traveling the world with his wife Cheryl to spend quality time with each of their six kids and their families! He has his dream job as the Chief Innovation Officer for a nonprofit based in NY that helps thousands of kids per year (and helped him when he was younger) and doesn’t have to worry about making enough money because of the dream income from his “part-time” business.

His “extra” six figure income has given him the ability to be debt free and pay the bills, own multiple homes, pay full tuition and has sent them on an all-expense paid cruises and trips to the most luxurious resorts all around the world. Now that they have the dream family and the dream income they’re on a mission to help others reach their dreams too!