Transcript

Hamargel bechaveiro perek zayin hamargel bechaveiro

המרגל בחברו עובר בלא תעשה שנאמר לא תלך רכיל בעמך ואף על פי שאין לוקין על לאו זה עון גדול הוא וגורם להרוג נפשות רבות מישראל ולכך נסמך לו לא תעמוד על דם רעך צא ולמד מה אירע לדואג האדומי.

So this lashon of אף על פי שאין לוקין עון גדול הוא we just had it recently in פרק ו הלכה ח of

אף על פי שהמוחל מחברו אינו לוקה עון גדול הוא

and the af al pi is as follows. The Rambam has in the perush hamishnayot of Avot in perek bet, where is that?

הוי זהיר במצוה קלה כבחמורה שאין אתה יודע מתן שכרן של מצוות.

So the Rambam says that by mitzvot asei we don't really have any way of measuring for the most part what's an asei more chamur and what relatively speaking is an asei which is more kal. In contrast to mitzvot lo ta'asei where we do, because by mitzvot lo ta'asei we look to what the onesh is. By mitzvot asei so the Torah doesn't really specify what מתן שכרן של מצוות is so we have no reflection, we have no indication of what's by and large of what's an asei chamur, what's an asei kal. By contrast when it comes to mitzvot lo ta'asei so we do. We know the most chamur thing is mitat beit din. Even within mitat beit din so we know the ארבע מיתות בית דין and we know the order of סקילה שריפה הרג חנק according to the chachamim. And underneath that kareit and underneath that mita bidei shamayim and underneath that malkus and generally speaking a lo ta'asei for which there isn't even malkus is something which is kal because the chomer halav generally speaking is reflected in the onesh. And that's when the Rambam has this af al pi, the Rambam says that that system isn't, isn't applicable over here when it comes to, there are certain lavin which despite the fact that they don't even qualify for malkus but nevertheless they're issurim chamurim me'od.

אף על פי שאין לוקין על לאו זה עון גדול הוא.

As the Rambam is about to specify in halacha bet we'll see in a minute בלי נדר אם ירצה השם, the two that he's talking about here in Hilchot De'ot, the two different forms of speech that are subsumed within the lav of לא תלך רכיל בעמך are rechilut and lashon hara and we'll see, we'll see the difference בלי נדר אם ירצה השם. So what's kind of fascinating here is that the Rambam, let's say I think if we were asked to formulate a quintessential definition of לא תלך רכיל בעמך so I think somewhere in our definition we would have used the word speech, right, to speak a certain way. And the Rambam in his genius defines, gives us this initial definition of lo telech rachil without using any, any verb of speech, right, meragel bechaveiro like, like Joseph says to the brothers, meraglim atem. It means to, a meragel is someone who. means to expose what's not what's not public, what's not well known, to to expose it. That's what a spy does, he right by uncovering secrets so he's exposing he's exposing things. So lechoira the Chofetz Chaim has, I think in Klal Aleph of Chofetz Chaim he talks about that the issur Loshon Hora is b'ksav also. So it's pashut that that's the case. In other context right there's a famous correspondence between Reb Akiva Eiger and his uncle. His his uncle writes writes Reb Akiva Eiger, he writes him a mazel tov letter on on his chasana and says sorry we couldn't be there, but you should know that the in in our town we gathered together the night of the chasana and we were celebrating. And then he goes on to tell him that they were pilpuling about the shaila ksiva k'dibbur. When when you say ksiva k'dibbur dami, when when כתיבה לאו כדיבור דמי. I don't know if if during Sefira instead of counting a person will write היום תשעה ימים שהם שבוע אחד ושני ימים לעומר is is yotzei mitzvas Sefira that way. Okay and when it comes to shvua if a person instead of saying hareini nishba will will write the the the shvua. כהאי גוונא וכהאי גוונא. So when it comes to Hilchos Loshon Hora one doesn't need to to get involved in that whole diyuk because to begin with the lav is not really a function of dibbur. It's communication, right? Hamragel b'chavero. The Rambam's quintessential definition doesn't even reference speech. He doesn't even reference speech. So you don't have to say ksiva is k'dibbur. The the lav to begin with is is one of communication. It's not one of of dibbur. So lechoira what the Chofetz Chaim writes is is totally mucha'ach like that, that there's no difference between whether or not the the rechilus is orally communicated or whether it's communicated by in any other in any other form. And the Chofetz Chaim writes in that that when a person speaks rachmana litzlan speaks Loshon Hora so the more people present, the more people hearing it, so the more chomer the Loshon Hora is, and the more he's disseminating that Loshon Hora. So once upon a time when we spoke Loshon Hora, okay so we spoke Loshon Hora. Now people talk Loshon Hora in the with the social media, so so how many people how many people get get to read and and are on the receiving end of of of the Loshon Hora? So a person has to mamash mamash be nizaher that if one should be using these things at all, but im timtzei lomar that one should be using these things, one certainly has to exercise maximum caution. I don't know, I was thinking once, I don't know whether it's it's possible that that another there would be another corollary to this fact that that essentially the issur is not an issur of dibbur. As again reflected by the fact and again the Rambam, it's not the Rambam's chiddush, right? The Rambam is reflecting the the the formulation in in the Torah. The Torah, the loshon of lo selech rachil also, the Torah avoids using a loshon dibbur in in formulating the the lav for rechilus and Loshon Hora. I don't know, I was wondering once what would be the following? Let's say a person will eavesdrop in a way that that he'll become aware of I don't know something unflattering about about another person, about a fellow Jew. He'll eavesdrop, he'll snoop, whatever the person will be doing. So the the question is not is that mutar or asur. The question is obviously it's asur, but but maybe would it also be considered meragel b'chavero? Maybe meragel b'chavero means... That the person doing it, so he himself is sort of the shomeia. Like he's the shomeia in the sense that when a person speaks lashon hara, so then the meragel bechavero is that Reuven is revealing it to Shimon. And when a person will eavesdrop or snoop and thereby become aware of something which is unflattering of gnut chavero, so then he's the shomeia. He's being mashmia to himself, he's exposing it to himself. Maybe יתכן חששא דעשינו להכי that the issur is not an issur of dibbur, so then maybe maybe it could even be that the person reveals the information to himself, that he comes into possession of the information, that that should also be an issur of meragel bechavero. Even if one thinks the answer to that is no, it's not that otherwise that behavior is mutar, it's just that it wouldn't be this issur. Eizehu rochel? Halacha bet.

זה שהוא טוען דברים והולך מזה לזה ואומר כך וכך אמר פלוני כך וכך שמעתי על פלוני אף על פי שהוא אומר אמת הרי זה מחריב את העולם יש עון גדול מזה עד מאוד.

So that's extraordinary, right? Rechilut the Rambam describes as machriv et ha-olam. So you think it would be hard to top that. And if you could top that, maybe you could top it by a little bit. But the Rambam says that rechilut is machriv et ha-olam and then he says about lashon hara vis-à-vis rechilut is יש עון גדול מזה עד מאוד. Incredible.

יש עון גדול מזה עד מאוד והוא בכלל לאו זה והוא לשון הרע והוא המספר בגנות חבירו אף על פי שאומר אמת.

So it's clear from the Rambam that what distinguishes lashon hara from rechilut is that rechilut intrinsically is not negative information. It's not negative information, right? The Rambam doesn't mention the—doesn't mention anything about gnut in defining rechilut. Again, the same way a rochel is someone who is a traveling salesman, right? He goes knocking door to door to sell his wares. So too the person is carrying tales, right? She-hu toen devarim. He carries stories, he carries tales.

זה שהוא טוען דברים והולך מזה לזה ואומר כך וכך אמר פלוני כך וכך שמעתי על פלוני.

Now the Kesef Mishneh here understands that there's one crucial word which is understood in the Rambam, דהיינו כך וכך אמר פלוני עליך. So the example, let's say, would be as follows: that it's not inherently gnut. Let's say one student will in school will tell a classmate, will tell a friend that he overheard the teacher reporting his friend's behavior to the principal. So that's not gnut. Itachen that it was the type of behavior that the teacher should be reporting to the principal and that the teacher was acting entirely appropriately. But the student is going to resent it. And the student is maybe going to look to be nokem ve-noter against the teacher. So that's rechilut, right? It's not inherently, it's not intrinsically gnut the way lashon hara is. Lashon hara is when one says something which is disparaging about the other person. That it's intrinsically gnai what the person—what one is revealing about the person is דבר שהוא של גנאי. Ma she-ken rechilut is not inherently or intrinsically, but it's something that may provoke resentment ve-chulu. So the Kesef Mishneh understands that it's

כך וכך אמר פלוני עליך וכך וכך שמעתי שעשה לך פלוני.

I saw the letter of recommendation he wrote for you and it was a very lukewarm recommendation. It was a very shvacha recommendation. Okay, if that's what was honest, then there's no gnut in that. That's—if a person was asked and then the person has to—the person doesn't have to agree to give the letter of recommendation, but let's say the person was asked, so he has to say the truth. So it's not intrinsically a davar shel gnut, but it's something that benohag she-ba'olam. people people resent. Mah she'kein the lashon hara is inherently intrinsically gnus. Here if we keep this definition in mind something that there's a Rambam that is quite extraordinary if we juxtapose it to this Rambam. The Rambam at the end of Hilchos Tumas Tzara'as, the very last halacha in Hilchos Tumas Tzara'as, if you have take a look rabosai. בענין זה מזהיר בתורה ואומר השמר בנגע הצרעת. It's a long halacha. I don't know, almost the midpoint of the halacha but not quite, I don't know, 40% of the way into the halacha.

בענין זה מזהיר בתורה ואומר השמר בנגע הצרעת זכור את אשר עשה ה׳ אלהיך למרים בדרך.

Right, so we know that or we think we know that zechiras Miriam, right, Rashi says if you remember what happened to Miriam that will deter you from speaking lashon hara because look, Miriam HaTzadeikes with all her zechusos, the zechusos didn't protect her when she spoke lashon hara about Moshe Rabbeinu. So kal vachomer if Miriam HaTzadeikes with all her zechusos and v'chulu, so we certainly don't want to leave ourselves vulnerable, rachmana litzlan, to this punishment of speaking lashon hara. Hareihu omeir but listen to what the Rambam writes rabosai.

הריהו אומר התבוננו מה אירע למרים הנביאה שדברה באחיה שהיא גדולה ממנו בשנים.

So first of all, it's her kid brother. Second of all, וגדלה אותו על ברכיה, in that context she raised him. וסיכנה בעצמה להצילו מן הים, she risked life and limb to save him when he was a baby. And what's more,

והיא לא דברה בגנותו אלא טעת ששוות אותו לשאר נביאים.

Miriam erred in thinking that Moshe Rabbeinu didn't need to live a lifestyle that was different than that of other nevi'im. But notice what the Rambam says here: היא לא דברה בגנותו. And the definition of lashon hara, what's the definition the Rambam in our halacha gives of lashon hara? The definition of lashon hara is hamesaper b'gnus chaveiro. According to the Rambam something extraordinary here. Miriam, Hakadosh Baruch Hu was medakdeik im Miriam, what Miriam was not overes on issur lashon hara according to the Rambam. היא לא דברה בגנותו. What do you mean היא לא דברה בגנותו? But she falsely accused him, she depicted him as acting shelo kedin in being poresh min ha'isha. So how is that not lashon hara? Yet it's meforash when you juxtapose these two Rambams that the Rambam thinks that Miriam is a kal vachomer, Miriam who didn't talk lashon hara because it looked like lashon hara, so Hakadosh Baruch Hu was so makpid with her because it looked like lashon hara, so kal vachomer that a person shouldn't actually talk lashon hara. That's what the זכור את אשר עשה ה׳ אלהיך למרים conveys. But how is that not lashon hara? So I think we spoke about this earlier in Hilchos De'os that the Rambam understands that the issur of speaking lashon hara is a hilchos de'os-dikeh issur. De'hainu, the definition of the issur is not saying something which is objectively negative about a fellow Jew, right? That definition doesn't reference anything about Hilchos De'os. It's sort of like let's say there are certain dinim which are a function of dibbur. מוציא שם שמים לבטלה is a din in dibbur, את ה׳ אלהיך תירא so it's assur to be מוציא שם שמים לבטלה. There are certain dinim of dibbur. So we generally think of issur lashon hara as the din of dibbur. It's the dinim which govern how we're supposed to use our speech. There are things that we're mechuyav to say, we're mechuyav to learn Torah, there are things that it's assur to say, the things that it's assur to say. And hinami practically when the Rambam talks about different forms of speech he does speak of it this way, but conceptually it's not an issur dibbur, conceptually it's an issur Hilchos De'os. And there are many many reflections of that, again the most prominent one is the fact that the Rambam includes it here in Hilchos De'os. What's hilchos lashon hara doing in Hilchos De'os anyway? What's it doing in Hilchos De'os? And be'emes Bli neder, as we go through the perek, we'll review other indications of this, but the Rambam says this shtikkel Torah mefurash. If you take a look in Perek Daled of Hilchos Teshuvah, Halacha Hey. So, the Rif has a braisa about כד דברים המעכבים את התשובה and the meforshim point out that we don't have it anywhere in Shas, that we have it in the Rif, but we don't have it in Shas. So the Rambam quotes it, I don't know if the Rambam had it in Shas or the Rambam was just quoting from the Rif, but the Rambam quotes that also, chaf daled devarim, and then the Rambam organizes the chaf daled devarim into what, five different categories or something. So the Rambam says, vemehem chamisha devarim, of the twenty-four, me'akvos es hateshuvah doesn't mean prevent, it means it impedes. It makes teshuvah more difficult. Doesn't make teshuvah impossible, but it makes teshuvah more difficult.

ומהם חמישה דברים העושה אותן נמשך אחריהן תמיד וקשה לפרוש מהן.

Of the twenty-four, five of them are me'akvos es hateshuvah, five of them make teshuvah difficult because a person becomes addicted, because they're habit-forming, and the person becomes addicted, and when a person has an addiction, it's certainly possible to break and overcome the addiction, but it's not easy. It's not an easy thing. ומהם חמישה דברים העושה אותן נמשך אחריהן תמיד, he's drawn after them, vekashe lifrosh mehem. לפיכך צריך אדם להיזהר מהן שמא ידבק בהן. And therefore again, a person has to be very, very extra careful to avoid because it's going to, if a person becomes entangled, it's going to be harder to disentangle.

והן כולן דעות רעות עד מאוד ואלו הן רכילות לשון הרע

etc. So it's mefurash, right? We're not saying a shtikel Torah, the Rambam says it. That the issur of rekhilus and lashon hara is an issur of Hilchos De'os. So hashata de-asinu le-hachi, let's say a person says something, let's say a person innocently but erroneously says something negative, criticizes, as Miriam did with Moshe Rabbeinu. So if it was an issur of dibbur, of speech, okay, so then maybe her innocence, maybe her mistake, would downgrade it from meizid to shogeg. But hotch beshogeg, it would be an issur lashon hara. But if it's a Hilchos De'os-dikke issur, the Hilchos De'os-dikke issur to be medaber begnus chaveiro translates to disparage. So if a person... disparage means a certain motivation, and it reflects a certain de'ah. It doesn't just reflect whether or not what the person said was accurate and warranted. No, it reflects whether the person is saying it innocently or whether the person is saying it maliciously. Again, a person doesn't have to say it in a muchan u-mezuman to be malicious. If there's no reason for him to be saying it, the default setting is that it's, is that it's malicious. So Miriam, heyos that Miriam erred and thought there was no need for Moshe Rabbeinu to be poresh min ha'isha, and therefore she wanted to be misyayetz with Aharon as to how they could give Moshe Rabbeinu mussar for Tziporah's sake. So that's not lashon hara. That's not, that's not the de'ah ra'ah which is the core, the essence of the issur lashon hara. That's what the Rambam says, היא לא דיברה בגנות היא לא דיברה בגנותו. Miriam ha-Neviah was not guilty of lashon hara. An amazing pshat of the Rambam. And again, the reason Miriam becomes the poster, the poster neviah for, for lashon hara is with a kal vachomer, because she said something that looks, that looks on the surface, superficially looks like lashon hara, and אף על פי כן HaKadosh Baruch Hu is so makpid with her, so kal vachomer if a person would actually talk, talk lashon hara. One of... if the Rambam was grouping together rekhilus and lashon hara as de'os ra'os, which we would assume the same thing would apply to rekhilus also, you need to have a malicious intent in order for it to be de'os ra'os. So why is rekhilus not gnus in itself? And in order to really be over it, I have to have a malicious intent for it to be de'os ra'os? Again, it's not gnus because you're, because the person is not saying anything negative. Again, the, the person who was consulted, Shimon who was... Who was consulted as to whether or not Reuven is a suitable candidate, so Shimon was doing the right thing in telling the truth. He was being asked, is Reuven a suitable candidate for this position? He didn't volunteer to serve as a reference, but he was asked, is Reuven? So he's not, he... the reason the Rambam doesn't use Gnus is the point is that Rechilus is even though the person doesn't reveal something that's inherently negative, but that doesn't speak to what the De'ah ra is. No? So let's say it wasn't inherently negative. Let me just think for a minute how to explain better. What Rechilus and Lashon hara have in common is the person speaking the Rechilus or speaking the Lashon hara is doing so gratuitously. There's no need for Levi to be telling Reuven that Shimon opposed his being appointed to this job. That's gratuitous. Now what he's gratuitously sharing is not inherently negative, but it is something that Reuven's going to resent. Lashon hara is that Levi is saying something gratuitously, saying something negative, inherently negative about Shimon. That's the difference. But what they have in common is that it's being done gratuitously, which is what reflects the De'ah ra. But you wouldn't say in the first scenario, you know, Shimon opposed, he tells Reuven Shimon opposed your appointment, you wouldn't say that Levi disparaged Shimon. You'd say that Levi got Shimon into trouble, that Levi provoked resentment against Shimon. Ma she-ken when Levi says to Reuven a Devar lashon hara about Shimon, so then you would say that Levi disparaged Reuven. And that's what the Lashon dibber b'gnus is by Lashon hara, not by Rechilus. But they have in common, they have in common the De'ah ra, that it's a De'ah ra to be gratuitously either arousing resentment or gratuitously disparaging. That's what the De'ah ra is. The Gnus reflects again, the Gnus reflects not only the De'ah ra, it also reflects the fact that it's inherently negative, which is why the Rambam wouldn't and doesn't use the Lashon gnus vis-a-vis Rechilus. Okay, maybe we'll stop here and we'll continue later.