One businessman decided to outwit the moneylender and told him:
- Honorable! You increase your wealth by lending money, but are content with a tiny monthly profit of two and a half tangas per hundred. But I found a business that will give a monthly profit of one hundred per hundred. If you agree to participate in this matter, you must entrust it to me. I, receiving such a profit from your money, will give you half of it.
“Even a quarter is enough for you, and if you give me three quarters, then perhaps I’ll agree!”
“Well, okay, for the first time I will limit myself to small things, but in the future you will make me a partner in the profits along with you,” said the businessman.
The moneylender accepted the businessman’s condition and gave him one hundred pieces of silver.
A month later, he delighted the moneylender by bringing him one hundred and seventy-five pieces of silver.
A few days later, the businessman again came to the moneylender and for the “common benefit” took two hundred tanga from him. A month later, the moneylender received three hundred and fifty pieces of silver.
So, taking money from the moneylender several times, the businessman spent five hundred pieces of silver of his personal money. One day he ran to the moneylender very excited.
“An unusually profitable business comes up, which within a month will yield a thousand in profit for a thousand pieces of silver.” Donate money quickly so you don't let this matter slip through your fingers!
Without any further discussion, the moneylender gave out two thousand in cash.
Two months passed, but there was no word or word about the businessman or the money.
The moneylender almost burst with frustration and began to look for his accomplice. A few days later he ran into him on the street and demanded money - both his own and his profit.
The businessman said:
“I sold everything I bought with your money last time at a loss, and lost a thousand pieces of silver on this tribute.” I was ashamed to come to you at a loss, and I got another thousand elsewhere and again made a purchase for two thousand. But again he suffered a loss - he lost a thousand. In short, on your two thousand I suffered a three thousand loss. Now you must return the lost thousand to me.
The moneylender was indignant. A big quarrel broke out. Both went to the judge. After listening to them, the judge said to the moneylender:
“If at one time you enjoyed his profit, then today you must share the loss with him.”
So the businessman managed to outwit the moneylender, from whom, by the way, the judge collected another five hundred pieces of silver in legal costs.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru