be
a talebearer, Means don't go around spreading rumors about another.
It also comes from the word drugstore, man, and perfume. There
is a good smell and an evil smell. Don't walk around with an
evil smell while you are with people. If I walk around saying,
"This one did this, this one did that" I am really
contaminating the air. It only takes one person to contaminate
a whole city. When someone is spreading a lie, that is another
transgression, but here we are talking about the truth. Even
if a tale is true, spreading it could still be destroying the
world.
If someone says bad things about someone else he transgresses
this mitzvah. It is a very grate sin, which could kill a lot
of people. You can tell people so much evil about a person
that they will literally kill him.
There is truth, and there is the truth of the truth. One
Sabbath Rabbi Kuk hailed a cab and got in. That's all you
need for a good rumor. Rabbi Kuk, the Chief Rabbi of Israel
traveling in a cab on Sabbath. What was the real story, the
truth of the truth? The English had caught somebody they said
was a spy. At one o'clock Rabbi Kuk heard that they were going
to shoot him at two o'clock. There is no question that he
should take a cab to the police station to tell them not to
shoot him
There are three levels of tale bearing. Imagine someone says,
"Kim told me he doesn't like you." It is a lie,
but it is possible. That is not so horrible yet, because he
only quoted what I said. Imagine he would tell you, "You
know, Kim is rotten to the core." That is not reporting
what I said, but what he thinks of me. That is worse, even
if it is true. The lowest level is if it is not true. It is
possible that what he said really struck something inside
you, so if it is true it is not so terrible. If he made it
up, that means he is really at the bottom of evil. How does
he even come to think of such a thing? These are the three
levels. The first level is to report what a person said. If
it is true, it is bad; if it is not true, it is very low.
The second level is to spread rumors not about what he said,
but about what he is. If it is true it is very bad,but if
it is a lie, that is the third level, the lowest a person
can go.
The Maimonides says something strong. There are some people
who don't want to say (lashen harah), evil speech, so they
say something good, like "he's such a great scholar,
and the way he knows Talmud is great." Someone else says,
"What? Ben knows the whole Talmud?" The man made
somebody else say it, and then he says, "I didn't know
I thought he does." He wants someone to say something
bad about Ben, but he is so holy he doesn't want it to be
him. He says something good, and the other says something
bad. Maimonides says not to kid yourself. God knows what you
are doing.
The Talmud says that people who speak evil cannot behold
the face of God, cannot have a revelation of God. God cannot
reveal Himself to them. This is a deep rabbinic question.
The Talmud says that God says about anyone who speaks evil,
"he and I cannot live together." Maimonides says
you have to move out of the neighborhood, and he quotes a
Talmud which says that even God doesn't want to live in an
evil-speaker's neighborhood. So to speak, God has to move
out; God can't stand it. That means one person can destroy
the whole city.
What are you supposed to do if, God forbid, you already spoke
lashon harah? The first thing is, you have to cleanse your
tongue, have a little deodorizing of the tongue. The best
cleansing is to use it for good things, so you should study
Torah day and night, uttering holy words. You have to learn
to control your tongue, and another way to do it is to refrain
from saying something you want to say, even if it is not evil.
The Vorker Hassidim would often decide that for half an hour
a day, or even five minutes, they wouldn't speak. Keep your
tongue quiet, but don't start with a whole day, because we
are not on that level. Get to know where you are. For ten
minutes, twenty minutes, half an hour, really say only the
most important things. Become the master of your tongue.
Why does a person talk evil about somebody else? What is
his sickness? In what part of his being is sick? According
to the Holy Maharal, what is sick is that he can't keep a
secret. He sees someone do something wrong, and he can't keep
it to himself. A person who has no vessels to keep a secret
is not a whole human being. What is the holiness of a human
being? The holiness is that a human has a body which shows
and a soul which is secret. Life depends on the secret of
the soul being in the body. That is the essence of human life.
What is the essence of the world? God, who is not showing.
Someone who can't keep a secret cuts himself off from his
soul, cuts himself off from God
be
a talebearer, Means don't go around spreading rumors about another.
It also comes from the word drugstore, man, and perfume. There
is a good smell and an evil smell. Don't walk around with an
evil smell while you are with people. If I walk around saying,
"This one did this, this one did that" I am really
contaminating the air. It only takes one person to contaminate
a whole city. When someone is spreading a lie, that is another
transgression, but here we are talking about the truth. Even
if a tale is true, spreading it could still be destroying the
world.
