The Chofetz Chaim’s Twofer

GuardYourSpeak

(In June 2012 we launched GuardYourSpeak which, as its name implies, was dedicated to focusing on all aspects of Shmiras HaLoshon.  In short order it became burdensome to maintain both sites, so in recognition of the fact that the material posted on GuardYourSpeak was a natural fit for EmunahSpeak, it was decided to discontinue GuardYourSpeak and repost all of those pieces on EmunahSpeak over the course of the next few months.)

In GuardYourSpeak: Don’t Even Think About It, we mentioned that in the introduction to Sefer Chofetz Chaim the Chofetz Chaim lists 17 Laveen (negative mitzvos) and 14 Aseen (positive mitzvos) that one might potentially violate by either speaking or believing loshon hora.  While most of these mitzvos are not about loshon hora per se in their essence, the Chofetz Chaim tells us that when one crosses the line on loshon hora he may also be violating one or more of these Aseen or Laveen.

Then in GuardYourSpeak: Duck!, we tightened the noose around the vagueness by jettisoning the word potentially, and then noted that when you decided to create even the faintest of sound waves that tilted toward Loshon Hora you empowered the Satan to charge you with violating an absolute minimum of 6 out of the 17 Laveen and 5 of the 14 Aseen that the Chofetz Chaim listed in the introduction to his sefer.  And for good measure, you also brought two of the three curses down upon your head.

For those without calculators, this works out to a minimum of 11Torah violations for every comment that crosses the line from what is permitted to what is not, with two curses thrown in for good measure. 

And one of them is Do not go tale-bearing about another Jew.

You told Reuven what Shimon said about him?

Mazel tov!  The Chofetz Chaim specifically mentions you by name in his sefer.  Not the one your parents gave you when they named you for your great uncle, but the one that names you for yourself, because the act of placing into Reuven’s ears what came out of Shimon’s mouth stamped you as a talebearer, for the Chofetz Chaim asks rhetorically who is a talebearer, and then answers: The one who learns about things and then goes from place-to-place saying “This is what he said about you,” or “This is what I heard he did to you.”

And Mr. Talebearer, if you could fold your cards at this point and slip away quietly into the night things would be bad enough because the Chofetz Chaim adds that even if the Rechilus that you spoke is true, your type of language destroys the world.

But the truth is that your situation isn’t bad enough as is.  It’s actually much worse than that by a long shot because, ironically enough, the Chofetz Chaim’s very severe indictment of your loose lips is, comparatively speaking, the good news.

After informing us in very severe terms that your type of language destroys the world, the Chofetz Chaim then tells us that every verbal foray into the nether world of Rechilus brings even a greater sin in its train which is included in the of Lav of Do not go tale-bearing about another Jew.

You told Reuven what Shimon said about him? 

Mazel tov again!  You have double dipped!  Your remarks degraded a fellow Jew thereby qualifying them as Loshon Hora, even if they were truthful.

Duck!

GuardYourSpeak

(In June 2012 we launched GuardYourSpeak which, as its name implies, was dedicated to focusing on all aspects of Shmiras HaLoshon.  In short order it became burdensome to maintain both sites, so in recognition of the fact that the material posted on GuardYourSpeak was a natural fit for EmunahSpeak, it was decided to discontinue GuardYourSpeak and repost all of those pieces on EmunahSpeak over the course of the next few months.)



In GuardYourSpeak: Keep Your Lip Halakhically Zipped, we said that The Beis Din shel Maala….doesn’t give your sins the time of day UNLESS the Satan, in his role as the prosecuting attorney, brings an accusation against you, because without an accusation there can be no court case.  And Loshon Hora is the only thing that can point the Satan’s accusative finger in your direction.

Hashem, in classic mida keneged mida mode, gave the Satan the power to condemn you based on your condemnation of other Jews.

That’s already the good news, because if you thought to assuage either your conscience, your fear of punishment or both by comforting yourself with the thought that the itzy bitzy shtickel of Loshon Hora that you said over after davening would be pareve enough to qualify for the Shemiras HaLoshon version of White Collar criminal treatment, you thought wrong.

As we said in GuardYourSpeak: Don’t Even Think About It, in the introduction to Sefer Chofetz Chaim the Chofetz Chaim lists 17 Laveen (negative mitzvos) and 14 Aseen (positive mitzvos) that one might potentially violate by either speaking or believing loshon hora.  While most of these mitzvos are not about loshon hora per se in their essence, the Chofetz Chaim tells us that when ones crosses the line on loshon hora he may also be violating one or more of these Aseen or Laveen.

And if that doesn’t sufficiently lay a mine field through which those who are loose of tongue must thread their way, the Chofetz Chaim adds 3 Curses from the Torah.

You opened your mouth and let loose with a word or two that touched the third rail of Loshon Hora?

Even if what you said was only one tenth of a percent Loshon Hora of the most pareve variety you’re out of luck because when it comes to Loshon Hora, there ain’t no such thing as pareve.

In the Satan’s hands, the impact of he may also be violating one or more of these Aseen or Laveen in reference to that itzy bitzy shtickel of Loshon Hora that you said over after davening, coalesces into one heck of a serious indictment because it appears that the holy Chofetz Chaim was actually understating the case when he wrote that he may also be violating one or more of these Aseen or Laveen.

The emes is that there's also no such thing as may also be violating, because the Satan doesn’t walk into court on the strength of maybes.

When you decided to create even the faintest of sound waves that tilted toward Loshon Hora you empowered the Satan to charge you with violating an absolute minimum of 6 out of the 17 Laveen and 5 of the 14 Aseen that the Chofetz Chaim listed in the introduction to his sefer.  And for good measure, you also brought two of the three curses down upon your head.

And that's just the Satan's default position.

A good lawyer would tell you to duck because they’re gonna throw the book at you. 

You Don’t Need It!

And why don’t you need it?  Because you can’t have it.

In case you were wondering, this seemingly nonsensical banter comes to us courtesy of Rabbi Zecharia Wallerstein and it’s all about the theory of absolute which posits that if you know you can’t have it (something), you don’t need it.

Say what?

He gives us the example of someone who is, nebach, an addicted smoker and he’s also a very religious Shomer Shabbos Jew.  This Jew doesn’t spend Shabbos looking at his watch every fifteen minutes in anticipation of lighting up ten seconds after Havdalah because he knows with an absolute certainty that he can’t smoke during this time, and because he can’t smoke during this time it doesn’t exist for him and he most definitely doesn’t need what doesn’t exist.

That was an easy one and likewise for the various things that we are forbidden to eat (kashrus) and actions that are proscribed (idolatry, certain relationships etc.).

They are easy because we have fixed them in our mind as rock solid absolutes, but there are other things that are no less toxic, but for which we have a soft spot because and only because we have not internalized the idea that we can’t have it or do it.

And does not Loshon Hora immediately come to mind?

It does, but it’s not flying solo because there are many such things in your life that are not good for you and you can even be cognizant of them, but unless you come to view them as absolutely not good for you you’ll continue to play peek-a-boo with them much to your detriment.

The theory of absolute which establishes your non need for a given thing or activity is a full 180 from the burning need that we spoke about in EmunahSpeak: A Burning Need but the intensity is the same, for to the extent that you need something or need to do something in one case that’s how much you’re striving not to need something in the other. 

Or maybe it’s actually two sides of the same coin.

In EmunahSpeak: A Burning Need we said that If you go through life merely wanting to do, nothing will ever get done.  But if, with a soul on fire, you take that journey needing to do, nothing will ever get in your way.

You should have a burning need to view what’s not good for you as being absolutely not good for you so that it won’t exist for you and you won’t need it ever again.

Talk To Hashem First

In EmunahSpeak: So Who are You Relying on…, we said:

“The avodah of bitochon is to train oneself to rely only on Hashem. 

“Not Hashem plus your accountant or your expertise.  Hashem knows if you have bitochon in Him or if you are relying on the doctor also or your own hishtadlus.  Hishtadlus doesn’t make you a partner with Hashem.  Think of it as the password to the game of life.  It's the equivalent of saying "swordfish" to gain admittance.  Once you have given the password Hashem takes care of 100% of the problem, not the 95% you supposedly left over for Him after you did your 5%.  That Hashem’s 100% might work out to be zilch, zero, and nada of what we have set our minds on in any given situation is of no consequence because bitochon is not results oriented and therefore makes no promises.  It defines how we think not what we get.”

That’s pretty much it as far as hishtadlus goes, but it only relates to what we view as every day plain vanilla normative hishtadlus where we do something, and having done it we think it’s a big deal and that we have actually accomplished something when in reality we have done nothing more, as we said above, then say the password that will bring Hashem onto the field so to speak.

The truth is that if a person does his hishtadlus thing, be it work, business, school, going to the doctor, or anything else that the world would perceive as naturally leading to whatever goal he has targeted, and no matter how hard he works at it he never loses sight of the fact that he is essentially spinning his wheels, then he has reached a very high madreiga indeed.

But not quite high enough to get a nose bleed because something is still missing.

A close relative has been diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor.  You immediately put yourself into hishtadlus mode and call Echo, Shuky Berman, Benny Fisher, and Meilech Firer, and anyone else who may have the knowledge necessary to point you in the direction of the right doctor, and all of them within two minutes.  And after one or two hundred phone calls, emails, and text messages back and forth you have finally secured what you hope is the best brain surgeon on the planet to set things straight.

With the doctor on board and the date for the surgery set, you then give tzeddakah in the name of the sick relative, go to some big rebbes for brochos, and then finally with all that done, you say Tehillim and daven for a refuah for him. 

Worthy activities all, but the first thing you should have done was to talk to Hashem, not the last because when you talk to Hashem first you are leveraging all of your Teva based hishtadlus by putting it in its proper context. 

And when you talk to Hashem first you’re not throwing Him a crumb as an afterthought after having milked out of Teva whatever you thought it had to offer.  You are going straight to the heart of the matter and with your priorities in place you can then play Teva like a violin while Hashem does the heavy lifting.

Plan D

In EmunahSpeak: PLAN B, we asked: So what are you doing tomorrow anyway?

And we answered:  Be it learning, work, chesed, taking care of the family or any combination thereof, if you are evenly moderately organized you most probably have your day worked out in advance, as you do every other day.

And then come the speed bumps: flat tires, your child comes home sick from school, emergency trips to the doctor and dentist for stitches and toothaches, a crisis at the office which keeps you there till all hours, your chavrusa doesn’t show up, your car doesn’t start, it snowed 23 inches, and a myriad of other unanticipated horrors guaranteed to trash your plans.

Our self-absorption notwithstanding, the truth is that this is a theocentric world, which requires us to understand that what we propose to do is actually Plan B.  All that other stuff: the flats, the medical emergencies etc. is in reality Plan A, because it obviously reflects the Yad Hashem which is manifesting itself in our lives.

It’s all a matter of focus.

It’s all about looking at life’s curve balls as the real Plan A rather the ruination of what we thought was Plan A.

All well and good to be sure, but what about Plan D?

Plan D?

In contradistinction to Plan A, which we should accept with a smile even though it presents itself as somewhat of a stick that seemingly runs us around a track that we don’t want to be on, there’s Plan D which comes disguised as a carrot for which we all too readily put our plans (Plan B) on the back burner.

You had planned to go to sleep at 11:00 P.M., but just when you were about shut down your computer at 10:45 P. M. to say Shema it occurred to you check out a review of the camera you were thinking about buying, or to maybe to read up on one of the places you were considering moving to when you make Aliyah fifteen years from now.  Or perhaps you sat down to learn at your regular time and you felt the urge to first look through the mail that was just delivered.

Welcome to Plan D (as in distraction) which is not a plan at all but rather a scam brought your way courtesy of your Yetzer Hora.

And if you have ever been internally induced to shift your focus from a purposeful activity in which you were engaged to something else then you have tasted of it.

Irrespective of how successful the Yetzer Hora is with someone in relation to the BIG things, however they may be defined vis á vis any individual, when it comes to the small stuff of life, Plan D invariably rolls up the score by nickel and diming us with every sort of permissible distraction and just like one of Pavlov’s dogs we more often than not react reflexively.

The very same activity that would be squeaky clean if planned by you in advance morphs into a stumbling block when performed at the behest of the Yetzer Hora while you were otherwise productively engaged.

And I should know what I am talking about because in the course of writing this I let my guard down twice so far and went for the bait being dangled in front of me. 

Oops!  Make that three times.

I just went into the kitchen to get a cup of coffee and on the way back a little voice inside said: Hey, you haven’t looked at you’re seforim in ages so why not now? 

Without the slightest hesitation or reflection I detoured toward the living room and began to scan the various shelves.  Had I not been writing this piece at the time I would have wasted at least five minutes on a senseless activity that I hadn’t even thought about, much less planned.

But given that I was in the midst of trying to work through this problem (hopefully to everyone’s benefit) I was able to catch myself in about fifteen seconds.

The Yetzer Hora never ever plays a losing hand because it eschews frontal attacks (except against weaklings) in favor of operating laterally.  

And while it is true that some of us are able to resist its inducements in a given situation, the majority gets taken to the cleaners time and time again because Plan D is a sleight of hand so smooth that we don’t even notice because it spontaneously takes us to places where we want to go.  And because we want to go there and (in a general sense) it is permissible to be there we’re not even cognizant that we are AWOL (absent without leave) from where we should really be.

Keep Your Lip Halakhically Zipped

GuardYourSpeak

(In June 2012 we launched GuardYourSpeak which, as its name implies, was dedicated to focusing on all aspects of Shmiras HaLoshon.  In short order it became burdensome to maintain both sites, so in recognition of the fact that the material posted on GuardYourSpeak was a natural fit for EmunahSpeak, it was decided to discontinue GuardYourSpeak and repost all of those pieces on EmunahSpeak over the course of the next few months.)

Most of us are well aware that the bottom line of Loshon Hora is that the Torah forbids us even to speak the truth about someone if it is denigrating or will cause him damage.

But what if you kept your lip halakhically zipped? Then we are told that the Satan will not have reshus to speak the truth about you. 

Say what?

Rabbi Mendel Kessin does yeoman’s service by laying out for us the mechanics of how Loshon Hora impacts procedurally on the Beis Din shel Maala.

Din (judgment), he says, is a cause and effect concept.  A person does A and gets B in return.  And except for special occasions, Hashem stays out of the picture and lets the Beis Din shel Maala judge us.

The fact is that a Jew can commit multiple sins in the course of a week or even a day, and the Beis Din doesn’t even so much as throw a glance in his direction.

Why not?

It’s not as hefker as it appears because the truth is that this would be considered normal procedure in any criminal court in the United States. After all, what court is going to concern itself with the various crimes that abound within its jurisdiction unless and until they are brought to its attention by the prosecuting attorney representing the governmental authority?

The Beis Din shel Maala works pretty much the same way, and that’s why it doesn’t give your sins the time of day UNLESS the Satan, in his role as the prosecuting attorney, brings an accusation against you, because without an accusation there can be no court case.  And Loshon Hora is the only thing that can point the Satan’s accusative finger in your direction.

Moreover, Rabbi Kessin explains that the entire nature of the prosecution is built solely on Loshon Hora because the Satan is doing nothing less than speaking Loshon Hora about you.  Hashem, in classic mida keneged mida mode, gave the Satan the power to condemn you based on your condemnation of other Jews.

Interestingly, there are also privacy laws in Shomayim but when you speak Loshon Hora they're suspended, and the Satan is given access to what heretofore was legally out of his reach, and as a consequence your file of sins is directly laid before him, and he can now immediately prosecute you.  It’s as if you wrote your own indictment with your tongue for the Satan to sign.  It therefore follows that if you don’t speak Loshon Hora then the Satan can’t speak Loshon Hora about you.

Rabbi Kessin tells us that even if you discipline your tongue you’ll still be judged, however, for whatever it was that you either shouldn’t have done or neglected to do, but the Beis Din shel Maala won’t be able to touch you because if your tongue is squeaky clean Hashem Himself will judge you.  He will give you time to do Teshuva, and even if you mess that up He will spread out, over a long period of time, whatever punishment is coming your way.

And when you’re one with Hashem there are no rules because He’s all Rachamim and can do whatever He wants.

So it all comes down to this.  In relation to the Beis Din shel Maala, you are nothing more than a ventriloquist because the Satan can’t open his mouth unless you first open yours, and give him what to say.  And if you don’t, you stroll out of court past a mute Satan who sits there like a dummy.

And once you’re out of there it’s only between you and Hashem.

Someone Who Wants To Be Purified

GuardYourSpeak

(In June 2012 we launched GuardYourSpeak which, as its name implies, was dedicated to focusing on all aspects of Shmiras HaLoshon.  In short order it became burdensome to maintain both sites, so in recognition of the fact that the material posted on GuardYourSpeak was a natural fit for EmunahSpeak, it was decided to discontinue GuardYourSpeak and repost all of those pieces on EmunahSpeak over the course of the next few months.)

The Gemara (Arachin) teaches us that everyone who speaks Loshon Hora amplifies their sins and enlarges them until they reach Shomayim.  Moreover, as we learn in the Tanna De’Vei Eliyahu, the (actual) Loshon Hora spoken by a person ascends to the Heavens, to Hashem’s Holy Throne of Glory.

In his Preface to Sefer Chofetz Chaim, Rabbi Yisrael Meir Kagan, who is universally known as the Chofetz Chaim after his sefer, opens our eyes in regard to the atmospheric fallout engendered by the speaking of Loshon Hora.

For starters, he tells us that the reason that the Torah was so strict with the sin of Loshon Hora is because the very speaking of Loshon Hora causes the Satan, who is the Prosecutor against Klal Yisroel, to gain strength and grow in power against us all.  He then brings the Zohar HaKodesh to let us know that there is a force in the world that is nourished by those who speak Loshon Hora.  Its name is Sachsuchah and with the impure power that is his by virtue of all of the Loshon Hora that is spoken, he ascends to the Heavens and spreads death, war, and catastrophe throughout the world.

And that’s only his warm up act.

The Chofetz Chaim goes on to tell us that Loshon Hora triggers the attribute of mida keneged mida (measure for measure) which is one of the modes by which Hashem brings justice to the world.  He once again cites the Zohar HaKodesh to point out that from this impure power/evil spirit that we referenced above evolves other forces of strict unmerciful justice.

You sent a pekel of some serious Loshon Hora in Hashem’s direction?! 

That’s really unfortunate because the bad news is that in the same way that man defiles his speech with language that is forbidden, he also prevents all of his subsequent words of holiness (all of his Torah learning and mitzvahs) from ascending to Heaven.  The conclusion of the Zohar is that all of the good things you have done are suspended in mid-air.

They do not ascend, period.

The Chofetz Chaim then impresses upon us the seriousness of this state of affairs by asking:

How will we merit the coming of Moshiach?

The good news, however is that the Chofetz Chaim has an answer.

At the end of the Preface, after an exhaustive explanation of both the destructiveness of Loshon Hora and the merits of learning his sefer in order to uproot this great sin from our midst, the Chofetz Chaim states that if people study these laws carefully, the Yetzer Hora will not have such great power to control society into committing this sin.  Automatically, if one backs away from this sin, even a little bit, then as time goes by he will wash his hands completely of it because this sin is so caught up in the routine of our everyday lives.  The implication being that if we get a running start vis á vis the sin of Loshon Hora, in due time we’ll be able to flip the switch on the cruise control.

The Chofetz Chaim then hits the high note as he concludes the Preface by letting us hear that someone who wants to be purified of this sin will have Siyata D’Shemaya (Divine Assistance), and in the merit of both learning these laws and not speaking Loshon Hora, Moshiach will come soon, speedily in our days.

She Taught Us

The fact is that Golda Litwen of blessed memory taught very many people a lot of things by either example or persuasion or a combination thereof.

We are speaking here, however, about a particular case in which the power of her personality carried the day in the most unlikely of circumstances, which resulted in a very great Kiddush Hashem.

The day after her recent passing, the administrator of the adult home in which she resided received a phone call from one of the people who used to transport Golda to and from the hospital where she underwent dialysis three times a week. 

Shlepping sick people back and forth to their various treatments day after day can desensitize one to the fact that they are dealing with human beings as opposed to goods that need to be moved from one place to another.  And in such a situation a person can say and do things that he would otherwise forgo if a real person was before him.

And so it was with Golda.

There were many times when the two people that transported her to dialysis would argue on the way.  These were proste mentchen that didn’t have much of an understanding of how to speak to one another or how to accord each other even a modicum of respect.

This is pretty much the story that was told to the administrator of the home.  And then the person on the phone added:

We would like to send flowers and come to pay our respects to her daughters because she taught us how to speak to each other and how to give.

Anyone who knew Golda well wouldn’t be surprised by any of this because when faced with such situations she would always take them firmly in hand by admonishing anyone who had crossed, what was in her eyes to be viewed as, the line of basic decent behavior.

 

She also taught them to have a sense of appreciation, one for the other and she taught it by example.  It seems that in the course of regaining his sensitivity to those around him one of these workers began to empathize with Golda’s condition and he remarked that it was a pity that she had to undergo dialysis three times a week.

“It’s not a pity at all,” she said.  “Dialysis is keeping me alive.”

And they understood that Golda was keeping them alive in a certain sense, so when she died they took matters into their own hands and resolved to keep on living.  In the memory of all she taught them they took upon themselves to always work on getting along.