Everyday Judaism · Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe

00:01 - Intro (Announcement)
You're listening to Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe, director of TORCH, The Torah Outreach Resource Center of Houston. This is the Jewish Inspiration Podcast.

00:13 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Alright, welcome back everybody to the Musur Masterclass. Last week we concluded the fourth in a series of the Laws of Good Middos, the Laws of Good Character Traits. Today we're going to begin a new chapter in Halacha, which talks about the Laws of Proper Speech. There are several categories of speech that the Torah prohibits a person from speaking and if a person isn't careful it is very, very easy to fall into the trap of negative speech, which is a biblical prohibition times 31. There are 31 prohibitions in speaking negatively about another person. 31, that's a lot. That's more than almost any other commandment in the Torah not to speak negatively about your fellow. The Torah particularly says Lo selech raachil be'amecha. What's raachil Raachil is a peddler. You should not be a peddler of bad news about other people. That's how serious it is. The Torah explicitly stresses the importance of being cautious in every word that we speak, particularly when it's about another person. So if you have any plans in the near future or in the distant future to talk about other people, don't it's not a good thing.

01:52
The Torah frowns upon speaking negatively about another person, any other person, that's including yourself. I'll just share with you the Chofetz Chaim. What do we know about the Chofetz Chaim? We know so much about the Chofetz Chaim. Chofetz Chaim wrote so many books. Chofetz Chaim wrote books for soldiers who were being drafted, jewish boys who were being pulled out of Yeshivas and taken to the Russian army. So there was a big problem because these soldiers were losing their faith very, very quickly and they were disconnecting from Judaism because they were completely immersed in the Russian army. Chavitzchaim said We've got to do something about this. He wrote a book Machanah Yisrael, the Jewish camp. He saw that women were having a difficulty reaching a mikvah for their own ritual purity. So what did he do? He wrote a book. He saw that people didn't know basic Jewish law. So he wrote a book, the Mishnah Brureh. He saw that people and if you look, olam Chesed. He wrote so many books, 24 different titles, 24 different titles, but yet his name wasn't the Mishnah Brureh, his name wasn't the Sheim Olam, his name wasn't the, you know, netsach Yisrael. His name was Chofetz Chaim.

03:12
Because, although he was a very, very, very talkative person, Chofetz Chaim was a socialite. He loved schmoozing. He never talked about other people. You can talk about the entire world. You can talk about cars. You can talk about airplanes. You can talk about motorcycles. You can talk about hobbies. You can talk about sports. You can talk about a lot of things. Don't talk about other people, says the Chofetz Chaim. It's such an important halacha, it's such an important mitzvah that we're going to dig in a little bit with Rep Shulchan O'Ruch and we're going to see what the halacha tells us.

04:00
So in Leviticus, as we mentioned, it says you shall not be a tailbeer, literally a peddler, among your people. E'ezahu-rachil, who is a tailbeer, of whom the Torah speaks, ze shatoyin dvorav, this is one who carries words around as a peddler, carries merchandise and goes from one to another and says so-and-so, said this about you and I've heard such-and-such about so-and-so. Even though that which the speaker reports is true and is also not derogatory, this person has violated the negative commandment that prohibits Rakhil's tailbeering. Even if what they're saying is true, what? What's the problem? I've heard many times people say that's not Lushanhara. It's true. Well, that's when it's Lushanhara. Lushanhara is when it's true, it's Motsi-sheimra. When it's not true, which is another biblical prohibition. So, yes, it's only when it's true. When it's false, it is not even Lushanhara, it's much worse than Lushanhara, v'huavon-godol. It is a great sin, v'gorom la'rig ne fosheshmi isorol and one. This is a sin that causes the death of the Jewish people. For this reason, the following prohibition is written adjacent to the prohibition against tailbeering, and that is you shall not stand idly by while your fellow's blood is shed. Losamod aldam reyachah Tsay ulemad.

05:38
Consider and learn from that which resulted from the tailbeering of Doeg the Edomite, who told Saul that Achimelach had given David provisions and a sword, even though in that case, the matter that was reported was true and also did not constitute derogatory information about Achimelach, as Achimelach had not committed any crime with his actions. For even if Saul himself would have asked Achimelach about his actions, he would have openly told him what he did. He wasn't hiding anything. He would have openly told him what he did because he did not intend to commit a crime against Saul. Despite all of this, the rechilus of Doeg caused many kohanim to be killed Because Saul found out about this. He was told someone else told him about someone else. Doeg told him about Achimelach. You heard about that. He sent in troops to kill Achimelach. And that was it A bunch of kohanim leaders of the Jewish people were put to death because of this.

06:51
Say just tell us. This is a story that's written in the prophets, just as a sidebar. Here we had thousands and thousands of prophets, but we only have 24 books of the Tanakh. We only have 11 prophets and 9 books of the chronicles, five books of the Torah. That's it 24 books, the whole Tanakh. What happened to the thousands and thousands of prophecies? Well, only the prophecies that were relevant for us to learn lessons from them for all of eternity are the ones that were procured as part of our Torah.

07:39
This story is there for us to learn not to talk about other people. You know something about another person, keep it to yourself and nobody needs to know anything. People like to chat and to discuss other people and discuss other things going on. I don't know the deep psychology as to why people have such a thrill with talking so much about other people, but this is the reality. This is the reality of the world we're living in, and the Torah warns us of this grave sin that one who talks about other people is going to cause tremendous damage. Someone told me yesterday. Someone called me and said I made a big mistake Because I told somebody who I thought was completely innocent and innocuous, someone who was like a third party and nothing to do with anything, from a different city.

08:42
I told him a story that happened five minutes later. That person told another person, who told another person, another person. He gets a phone call. Someone says you're spreading rumors about me, you're saying things. He says I'm not spreading rumors, I'm saying what you did. But he called me. He's like what do I do now? I shared with someone the truth of what I've seen happen and now they're all angry at me.

09:16
And you know, I said why did you need to open your mouth? Why do we talk about other people? Why do we need to talk? Why do we feel the urge, the necessity to talk about other people when the Hallukah tells us it's a prohibition to talk about another person? Now we've mentioned this is my own, my own understanding, my own personal clarification that I've gotten about this topic, and that is imagine you meet somebody, any person.

09:53
Okay, I met Susan for the first time. So she looks like a fine lady, she looks like she's honest, she looks like she's truthful, she looks like she's civil. So I give her a thousand human credits in my mind. Now, if I were to turn around a minute later and someone goes over to me and says you see, Susan, watch yourself. Dangerous personality, careful, watch your back. What would happen? So suddenly that thousand human credits tanked. But what happens? If someone says positive things, they say, ooh, susan, what a privilege you met her. She's such a nice person, she's so kind, she's so loving, she's so friendly, she's so caring. Suddenly, where did that thousand credits go? It went up. Her value went up in my eyes.

10:54
We have the ability, with our words, to elevate people or to diminish people. And that is the challenge that if we talk about other people, more likely than not we'll have the urge to diminish others. And this is what our sages are warning us, this is what the Torah warns us not to be a peddler of information about other people. You know what you saw, something Nobody else needs to know about it.

11:27
You know, in the religious community, people date. It's not such an open thing. It's because they date privately. They have a matchmaker who puts them together and they go on a date and they'll go to a lounge and they'll talk, because there's no physical contact till they get married. So it's just having conversations, spending time, in different situations, different scenarios, and you know. So they'll go to a park and they'll go to the botanical gardens and they'll go to the zoo and they'll go to all these places and what's if they meet someone from the community there. We see them on this date with this young lady.

12:01
Most kids between the ages of 13 and 50 who are single are not just hanging around with other women. Okay, especially if they're in that between 10 and 30 range. They're not going to be schmoozing, they're just casually, unless it's for a purpose of dating and meeting and hopefully getting married. So there was someone I know who was dating a young girl and there was rumors about them, about this guy. Oh yeah, everybody knows that he's dating so and so why? Because one person saw them on a date. And now everybody needs to know about it. Where's the privacy? If they want these people to know about it, they would tell the whole world. But they don't, right? If they get engaged, great. If they don't get engaged, why does everybody need to know? But people like to yenta and people like to schmooze, and it's not fear, it's not fear for people to do that, particularly if people don't want their information shared. Oh, I didn't know, so then you surely have no business sharing other people's information.

13:20
It's very important for us to be cognizant of the laws of the Torah. The Torah says don't be a peddler of information about other people, period. It doesn't say good or bad. Don't be a peddler of information about other people. People ask you about someone else. I'm sorry, I don't talk about other people. If it's pertinent information, you want to know if to go into a business deal with someone or they trust worthy, that's a different story. You want to know if to marry into a certain family, you need pertinent information. It's a different story. You need to know if to recommend someone to someone else, that's a different story. But 99.8% of all conversation about people have nothing to do with things of merit. They just have to do with I'm bored and I need someone to be my victim and I want to talk about somebody and I want to peddle information, and this is what the halacha warns us about.

14:22
There is a much greater sin than this, which is also included in the negative commandment of this verse, and that is LaShonhara. That's evil speech, and this sin is violated when one speaks negatively about his fellow, despite the fact that he is saying the truth, like we mentioned previously. However, if one says negative things about his fellow that are not truthful, that are lies, such a person is called a slanderer. He is slandering his fellow and this is another biblical commandment, a biblical prohibition. However, for an occasional lapse of speaking LaShonhara, one is not yet called a Baal LaShonhara. There is a master of LaShonhara, again, a master's degree in LaShonhara.

15:22
If someone is a regular in speaking about other people, and that our sages tell us to be very, very careful from becoming a Baal LaShonhara. The master of LaShonhara, this is a person who regularly and habitually fills this conversation by saying kach v'kach a saploni so and so did this, and that Kach v'kach ha yu avosav, his ancestors were such and such, kach v'kach shamati alav and I heard this about him and I heard that about him. The Omer Dwaram Shalgnai is saying derogatory information about the subject of his conversation, al ze omarakosu. Regarding such behavior, the verse states in Psalms Yahreis ha shem kol, sif sechalokos, lo shon, midaberis, gedolos Ha shem mea, shem kad off all who possess lips of smooth talk and tongues that speak grievously about others. So it's not only the person who speaks LaShonhara who's doing a terrible sin. It's also the person who accepts the LaShonhara and listens to it, who g'arruay yosemina omru. Such a person who accepts is worse than the person who speaks LaShonhara.

16:44
The decree against our forefathers in the wilderness that they would not enter the land of Israel was not sealed because of their previous sins. They had many other sins. They had the sin of the Golden Calf, they had the sins of the sin of the rebellion, they had sin of the complainers. They had many, many things that they did wrong. You know what sealed the deal when they heard LaShonhara and they accepted it, about the land of Israel. From the spies, our sages tell us only after the sin of LaShonhara, of accepting LaShonhara, was their fate sealed, that that generation was not going to enter into the land of Israel. And indeed till 40 years later, after they all died out, all of those who left Egypt died out, and it was the next generation only they married it to enter into the land of Israel. You know why? Because when you accept LaShonhara, you're encouraging the speaker of LaShonhara to continue doing his thing.

17:43
Imagine I come in here tonight and I say guys, I got to tell you something, and I open up my big fat mouth about somebody and I say you know so and so did this. I have verified evidence, it's conclusive and I announce the derogatory. The shame about another person and everyone's like oh wow, unbelievable, I can't believe it. Whoa Right. So what everyone is doing by doing that is they are encouraging me to go to the next group of people and share that information again. But imagine someone stopped and says whoa, the Torah says you're not allowed to talk like that and stops me. What's the likelihood? I'm going to try to find another group of people to talk to. I'm not going to because I don't want to get that defeat again. I don't want to get that feeling. It's like it's a. It's not a good feeling when someone just stops you from. I don't want to talk about other people. I don't want to hear it. Right, close your ears, I don't want to hear it.

19:01
Our sages warn us not to be among those who accept LaShana Ra and encourage the speaker to continue to speak negatively. That is a very, very grave sin because, according to our sages, it's worse than the person who speaks, because now you're multiplying his efforts. It's not LaShana Ra if you give your opinion about a matter. They spoke, lashana Ra, about the land, the land that Hashem promised was going to be. You know how big every grape was. They needed two people to carry a single grape. You know what that means, david, david. You know what that means.

19:41
Each grape was like the size of an enlarged wine bottle. Imagine that. Imagine you bought a grape for Shabbos Kiddish. You just put a little spout in there and you're able to just like shh and get all that. That was your wine. One grape, one grape. You need two people to carry it. You understand the blessing of the land.

20:08
God promises us this land. He says this is going to be for your descendants. He promises this to Abraham, to Isaac, to Jacob, to the tribes, to Moses, to the Jewish people in the desert when they were in Egypt, when they fought Amalek. You see, time and again and again, hashem reminds us I'm going to take you to your land. Then you send spies in and they bring back a negative report about the land and the Jewish people start crying. By the way, you know what happens on that day that they cry falsely for no reason. Hashem says oh, you cried. Today I'm going to make it a sad day. That's the day of Tishabab. The day of Tishabab. The day of Tishabab was forever to become a day of morning. Because the Jewish people cried in vain. They accepted the words of the Lashon Harah about the land of Israel. Imagine if it was about a human being. Much worse, but the fact that they were able and willing to accept Lashon Harah.

21:18
Think of it like this Imagine you remember those walkmans. You remember those walkmans. You'd go do exercise with the. You know you'd have put the little headphones on and you'd have the wire. And you'd have the wire, you'd plug it into your walkman. You ever saw a walkman that was open, broken open and had a bunch of wires everywhere blue wire, red wire, green wire, yellow wire.

21:49
Now imagine you opened up your brand new walkman. You're so excited. You got it for your, for your Chanukah gift, and you're so excited, as a little child. You open it up and you're like, hey, that yellow wire, there's no need for that, I'm going to take it out. And you cut the yellow wire, is your? You put it back together. Is your walkman going to work? Why not? It's just an extra wire. Because it's not an extra wire.

22:15
The engineers at Sony don't just put extra wires into walkmans. Imagine you open up the hood of your car and you see, this is crazy. You have pipes everywhere. We could take one out. I'm sure it's just extra, it's random, there's no need for it, right? You can imagine, if you did, that, something's not going to your alternator's not going to work, your carburetor's not going to work, your engine's not going to work, something is not going to work.

22:43
Say, just tell us every single human being that God put into this earth he wants on this earth. There's nobody extra. And by speaking negatively about one of God's creation, what we're saying is that God is a bad engineer and that he doesn't know who needs to be here. And I can guarantee you, god is a better engineer than Sony and better than Elon Musk and better than GMC. There is nothing extra in God's world. Everything that God created has a purpose and God loves it.

23:26
Therefore, it's crucial for us to understand that speaking LaShonharah against the creation of Hashem is far worse than just saying something negative about Joe Shmo. It's not about Joe Shmo alone. It's about Hashem's creation that you're devaluing. You're, in essence, saying Hashem doesn't know what he's doing, which is why the Talmud says tractate Sotah 42A, I believe, where the Talmud says that there are four categories of people that don't see the presence of God.

24:03
They don't reside near the Shchina of the Almighty. And one of them is those who speak slander about others, why Hashem doesn't create anything for no reason. Hashem creates them for a purpose and you mocking it is mocking the Almighty. And therefore the Hallukhah tells us here we need to be so careful about speaking negatively about another creation, about another person, and we learn from our ancestors who suffered in the desert another 40 years, not to either hear negative about the land of Israel. It says, and we know this from the Torah, we know this from the prophets, we know this from the writings and we know it from the Talmud and we know it from the Mishnah and we know it from the Midrash and we know it from the Kabbalah and we know it from everything else in Torah the nations of the world do not have permission to touch the Jewish people without Hashem allowing it. Meaning, if Hashem doesn't say that the Jews deserve a certain slap upside the head, we will not get that slap upside the head. It's only after Hashem says a decree that the nations of the world have the right to choose that.

25:22
They'll do it Now. They're going to be punished, you say. In that case, what do they do wrong? They didn't do anything wrong by killing six million. God decreed it. That's not true. Although God decreed it, god didn't do it. It could have come by a plague, it could have come a different way. They said no, no, no, we want to do it. We want to do it, we want to be the ones to murder the Jews, and that's why they're going to be punished, and they'll be severely punished because of it. Sadly, there are many, many millions of examples of persecutors of the Jewish people. There's no shortage, unfortunately, of people who tried to maim, to persecute, to expel, to annihilate and to holocaust away the Jews. It's tragic, but that's the reality of our world. God only uses the nations of the world as a potch to wake us up, and I think we had a very strong wake-up call and I think we answered that call pretty solidly with the unbelievable growth of Torah.

26:29
Since then, you have the greatest Torah centers in the history of the Jewish people today. Today, in Israel, there's no street corner, there's no block in the entire country that doesn't have a synagogue, that doesn't have a Yeshiva, that doesn't have an institution of higher learning for Torah. So well, you've got to be very careful about saying, giving a negative report about an institution, an establishment, a business, because, yeah, you can hurt their business, because it'll look like this. Okay, if the owner were to ask you, what did you think? You're obligated to tell him. If you didn't have a good experience, you need to tell him so that he can improve.

27:12
Even then, criticism what do we know? The rule of criticism, tractate Yivamot 65b. What does the Talmud tell us? Talmud tells us there is a mitzvah to reprove one who will accept your reprove. Talmud says, just like there's a mitzvah to reprove someone who will listen to you, there's a mitzvah not to reprove someone, not to rebuke them if they won't. So how do I know if they will or if they won't? You have to know. It's not a simple thing. You have to know who the person is. It's all about the presentation. Over the years, they've asked me to do some research from people, and I've asked people and I always told them with this introduction that they've asked me to do research for them. So, please, you're not saying Lashon Harah by sharing with me your thoughts. They really genuinely, sincerely want to do the best job for the community and they will lovingly accept the critique that you have. And therefore, because I value your critique and your opinion, I would like you to share with me the genuine experience you had and go through a whole slew of questions.

28:39
But the idea here is that in such a case, you know, but just talking and putting out slander about a new store, a new restaurant, a doctor, oh, he's such a cheat, he's not honest, he's oh, you know, people can say things. We have no idea why they're saying things, what their motive is. We don't know how their mourning was. Maybe they just had a bad mourning and everything is rotten for them. You never know. But by saying that, you're opening up the door for negativity, that the Almighty doesn't want us to live in a world that is negative, right, but also not to just knock others, not to knock, not to knock and not to talk negatively about others. So to what extent does the prohibition of LaShonara apply.

29:36
If a person asks his fellow where can I find fire? Where can I find fire? Anybody have a fire. It's not like today everyone's got a gas stove or some way to ignite fire, where can I find fire? So he says to him that house they're always eating, meaning they're obese or they're not healthy. Oh, they're always eating. You can go there, they'll have fire. You can say it in a way that's not derogatory. You can say it in a way and the halacha says right, where else can you find fire other than in that house, the house of so-and-so? Why? Because they're always cooking there. This too is a type of LaShonara, even though I'm not really saying anything. I didn't say that they were unhealthy, I didn't say I just I'm saying, yeah, that they're always eating there. So, in fact, the Chavitzchayim tells us that even the motion of an eye, even a little wink, so someone walks in and then you wink to someone, like you give a little nod, that too is LaShonara. I didn't say a word. I didn't say a word. Still, consider LaShonara. We have to be very careful of that.

30:49
Halacha number four, the Yezh Dvorim Shehina Vaak LaShonara. There's something called the dust of LaShonara. What's the dust of LaShonara? So what's an example? One who says do not talk about so-and-so, because I don't want to tell you what happened and what became of that situation. Let's just not talk about Jo Shmo, let's not talk about them, okay? The Kajyotsvah Dvoramailin, things of this type. The Chayna Masapah Betovashchah.

31:21
Also, one who speaks in praise of his fellow in the presence of his enemies. So if you go to a restaurant tour and you tell him that his competition is such a nice guy and you tell him it's such a pleasant place to go, you know what you're doing Inside, you're building up his hatred towards his competition. Nobody likes to hear about the competition, by the way, and that's in every trade. It also includes doctors, it includes lawyers, it includes dietitians, it includes chefs, it includes educators, it includes I've seen people from every profession. They tell them about another lawyer. They're like look, you know he's. Okay, you want to lose money? Okay, do what you want. But if you would have hired me, I would have done an excellent job and I would have gotten you out of this ticket or whatever. It is right. You wouldn't have had to pay that fee and you would have had to pay that. Fine. You would have asked me, but it's very difficult for people to.

32:29
What we call in Yiddish fargin, is to be graceful about someone else's accomplishments, to be kind and endearing of someone else's accomplishments, friends is also part of Avaklashanara, that's correct One who speaks in praise of his fellow in the presence of his enemies. This is Avaklashanara. She's a gorum lamb, she's a sabrubignous, since this will cause them to speak derogatorily about him. About this situation, king Solomon says Mevorich re'eyu bekol godol babokar hashkeim, if one blesses his friend loudly from early in the morning, it will be considered a curse for him because as a result of speaking his praise, the conversation comes around to speaking ill of him as well. So now that we said the good stuff about this individual, now it's time to address the elephant in the room. Let's talk about what's not good about the person right, and that will lead the conversation into a whole negative spin, and this is why the Torah recommends don't talk about other humans, don't talk about them.

33:44
The chain also included in Avaklashanara is relating to a joke in a jokin and lighthearted manner, like comedy, late night shows, where they can talk Lashanara, they can talk slander, they can talk rechilus, they can talk moti-sheyemra. Truthful, untruthful about someone else. Do you know what they said about you? Peddlers, peddlers of negative speech. Like as one who is not speaking out of hatred, I'm just joking, it's just a joke. It's not a big deal. What are you getting so uptight? We were just kidding around. This is what King Solomon, in his great wisdom, shared with us. Like someone who weirs himself out throwing firebrands, arrows and lethal objects, always a man who deceives his fellow and says surely I was joking. You shoot them with a gun. You say I was just kidding, just kidding. Stab them with a knife and say it's just a joke. That's what's speaking.

35:08
Lashanara is Lashanara, even if it's positive, will turn it to negative. You got to be so careful because it will see soon that the halacha, the Torah, tells us we mentioned this recently losonu ish asamizecha there's a commandment in the Torah of the parasha, three weeks ago says losonu ish asamizecha, you shall not speak in a way that will cause pain to your fellow. What does that include? Of course it includes not speaking Lashanara. What does it mean? Losonu ish asamizecha, you shall not speak. You should not cause pain to your fellow. That also means, by the way, if there's no one else there, it's about time you showed up. Nobody else is there. I'm not embarrassing you in front of others. You caused someone pain. You caused someone pain. That is a biblical prohibition. You're not allowed to cause your fellow pain.

36:16
Also included in Avak Lashanara Avak is the dust of Lashanara is one who relates Lashanara in a deceiving manner. That is, he pretends that he is speaking innocently and that he does not know that he is saying something that is Lashanara. And when people remonstrate that with him for speaking Lashanara, he says oh, I had no idea that that was Lashanara, or I did not know that what I was describing were actions of so-and-so. I had no idea. I wasn't thinking it was that person, I just thought it was somebody right, and everyone knows who you're talking about. Such a thing would also be the category of Avak Lashanara. Now, why is it Avak? Why is it dust Lashanara? Because you're not explicitly saying so-and-so did this. You're not saying that, you're just saying well, someone did it. Everybody knows who you're referring to. So I'll give you an example. I'll give you an example Hashem, please forgive me If I was to talk about a Pansi scheme.

37:27
Everyone knows exactly what I'm talking about. I didn't even say a word. Everybody knows who I'm talking about. That would be Avak Lashanara, because I didn't even have to say a word about who. Maybe I'm talking about Mr Pansi himself, who this Pansi scheme is named after, but somehow, when you just hear the word Pansi scheme, you think that it's referring to a specific individual, and that would be a perfect example of Avak Lashanara. I didn't say Mr So-and-so, I didn't say that it's an unbelievable challenge that we all face. So it's a very difficult question. It's a very difficult question talking about institutions.

38:20
You're not supposed to talk about groups of people, as we'll see later. You're not supposed to talk about groups of people either, because talking about groups of people, inevitably you're talking about people. You're not supposed to be talking about other people. You're not supposed to put Hashem's creations down. That's the bottom line. That's really what it's all about Don't put Hashem's creations down. So there are many, many different elements to Hashanah.

38:51
I highly recommend that everyone gets the lesson a day on the Chavach Chayim written by my rabbi, rabbi Yitzhak Brokowitz and Rabbi Shimon Finkelman, and they write a beautiful, beautiful book. One is the halacha. One is practical application, a story, a parable to bring it to life. And it's important for us to know what Lashonara is and to be very, very cautious not to allow Lashonara to creep into our lives, because before we know it, we're talking about everybody and everything goes Well.

39:33
Don't you think he stole so much money from so many people? Don't you think I have a right to tell people about it? And I know someone, I know someone. I'm not going to say Lashonara about that person now, but I know someone who lost a fortune of money with Bernie Madoff A fortune of money. And he came to me and he was so mad, so angry that he was, you know, hurt. He has no right to say that Now. The only right I would have to listen to it is if this would diffuse his anger and now he won't continue to say it. And if I can explain, not to speak Lashonara is a tremendous virtue in the Torah. Not to speak Lashonara, but if I'm listening to it and that encourages him to continue getting more ears listening, that's a terrible thing, because now I'm the encourager of Lashonara, so we'll do one more halacha now. Halacha number five.

40:45
Number one relates to Lashonara in the presence of his fellow, the subject of the Lashonara. So you say, listen, I'm saying it right in front of his face. He can deny it and he can tell me otherwise. Oh Shalom of Honor. Or if one relates it not in his presence, or one who relates information which could result, if the information is passed from one person to another, in damage to his fellow, whether his physical person or his property, or even to distress or to frighten him.

41:19
Ha'ra'z al-Lashonara, all of these are classified as Lashonara and are forbidden. Ve'im kvarnam rubad advarim bifne shlotcha. And if the things were said in front of three people misdama kvarnas, pashim adavra it can be assumed that the information was already made public and were one of those three that heard it to relate this information another time, it would not be prohibited as Lashonara. However, this only applies if he did not intend to spread the word or to reveal the information more than it is already known. So what happens is if you share information in front of three people, which is not a lupo, it's still a Lashonara, it's still a biblical prohibition with 31 transgressions, but because it's public already, it was said in front of three people, it's not the same prohibition. It can be assumed that this information has already been made public and it's inbo mishum Lashonara, vehul shlotcha vein lahavirakol, if he did not intend to spread the word. It will be like a loso yoseir and to reveal the information more than it is already known. Ma takanoso shlodom.

42:47
So what is the remedy for such a person who speaks Lashonara? What can protect a person from the transgression of Lashonara and thus able to study Torah? He should engage himself in Torah study. You remember previously we discussed that if someone is overcome with desire temptation, what do you do? Learn Torah. If that doesn't help, run to the study hall and learn Torah there. And if that doesn't help, recite the Shema, if that doesn't help remember the day of death. That ought to put the shock into our consciousness and remove that desire and temptation.

43:45
No, you're allowed to have opinions. You're just not supposed to talk about other people. You can have an opinion on every person on planet earth. Yes, because he's a Rasha, he's an evil person. You're allowed to on evil people. Yes, on evil people. You're allowed to say that. But you can be as opinionated as you want. There's nothing wrong with doing that. There's nothing wrong with being opinionated. However, there is something wrong in sharing your opinion about other people. Now, if you're sitting in your own home and you're talking to yourself and you're talking about someone else to yourself. Go right ahead if you want to talk to yourself, but if you want to talk to other people and share that negativity about others, that's problematic.

44:34
So if he's a Torah scholar, study Torah, and the Torah will protect you from speaking negatively about others. But if one is an ignoramus and therefore unable to study Torah, he should adopt a more humble comportment. He should be very careful to become humble and to realize that everything is from Hashem and that everyone has challenges and everyone has weaknesses and I do too by recognizing and being humble, recognizing that we also have our imperfections. You see, the thing is that every just ask my wife every single person has qualities and virtues and flaws, every single person. And how can we love someone ever? Because we know that the person we love has flaws too. It's because we choose to focus on their virtues, on their qualities. So this person that you're talking about, whoever it may be, also has virtues, but you're deciding to focus on the negative ones and therefore it's very, very important and crucial for us to be cognizant of this every day of our lives, to ensure that we're not allowing negativity into our lives.

45:51
So I want to end. Thank you very much. I want to end with the following story. Like you said, Rebbetzin, about not speaking negatively about your own self, there's a story told about the Chofetz Chaim. The Chofetz Chaim was going on a train. He would go to travel from one city to the other selling his books and talking about Lashan Harah. But he was a very humble man, the Chofetz Chaim very humble.

46:14
Most people did not know who he was even Because he walked around like he was just a nothing, a nothing-burger. And he got on a train once and he sees another Jew sitting on the train and the Chofetz Chaim was sitting there innocently. This Jew sees another Jew he doesn't know it's the Chofetz Chaim. He sees another Jew, he says seat available. Next he says yeah, sure no problem Sit down.

46:43
So this man is sitting next to the Chofetz Chaim, not knowing that he's sitting next to the Chofetz Chaim, and he says oh, where are you heading? He says I'm sitting to this in this town. He says, oh, I heard the Chofetz Chaim is going there. He says, eh, the Chofetz Chaim, who's the Chofetz Chaim? So the person gets up and gives the Chofetz Chaim a patch. He says oh dear, you talk like that about the Chofetz Chaim. So you can imagine. Then the guy gets up and storms away from the Chofetz Chaim. Someone's talking so negatively about the Chofetz Chaim. So when they get to the destination they were actually getting off at the same stop and this person gets off in the front of the cart and the Chofetz Chaim gets off at the back of the cart and he sees there's hundreds of people waiting to greet the Chofetz Chaim. Now he's like what's the whole emotion here? What are you guys waiting for? They said, what do you mean? This is the Chofetz Chaim. He says, no, no, how can that be? He didn't know what to do with himself. The next day the Chofetz Chaim sent someone to find this person and to invite him to where he was staying and he set up a big feast and this person comes in in total trepidation. He can't imagine how he did such a thing to the Chofetz Chaim, not realizing who he was. Chofetz Chaim goes out and welcomes him and brings him in and hugs him and says I want to thank you. He makes a whole kid-ish and a la chayim, with this individual thanking him for teaching him a halacha. He said I didn't realize that you're not either allowed to speak LaShon HaRam about yourself, but you taught me that halacha and therefore it's like you're my Rebbe. And he thanked him and they made a la chayim together. Imagine the feeling this person must have felt having done this to the Chofetz Chaim.

48:35
But the Chofetz Chaim was such a humble man. All he wanted to know was another way to be closer to God. Don't put yourself down. God loves you. Hashem loves you. Don't say, oh, I'm not worthy, oh I'm such a terrible person. No, you're an amazing person. You're not an ignoramus. You're sitting here learning Torah Not the first time. Today, by the way, sitting and learning Torah here at the Torch Center, I may witness myself. Hashem wants us to feel close to him. We cannot feel close to Hashem if we don't know how much Hashem loves us. We have to have a consciousness of that love every minute of our day and when we realize that Hashem loves us so much, we won't want that love to go away from us.

49:29
I think it's the Ramband who says that if we only knew to what extent God loves us, we would go crazy, literally crazy. We would imagine you're dancing on the rooftop of your building and you're dancing, and dancing, and dancing. People are like what's going on with this guy and they finally come up. They're like is everything okay? Should we take you to a doctor? Like no, what do you mean?

50:00
Hashem loves me. I'm the luckiest person in the world. Then you continue dancing this guy's crazy. That's what it is. Yeah, till the world says you're crazy. That's how crazy you'll go when you were able to recognize how much Hashem loves you. It's addictive, it's healing and it's refreshing to know that Hashem always loves us. Hashem wants us to always be in a positive relationship with Him. When we speak negatively about another person, we're going into negative territory. Hashem should protect us all. Hashem should guide us in the way of wisdom, in the way of connection and in the way of closeness with Him every single day, and we should only merit to feel His love every day of our lives. Amen.