Jewish Inspiration Podcast · Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe

You're listening to Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe of TORCH in Houston, Texas. This is the Jewish Inspiration Podcast.

And now we conclude today with the sixth dimension of those who speak Lashon Hara. We're in page 772 in the Treasure for Life edition of the Yorh HaTzadikim in the Gate of Slander, day number 139. And now we're talking about the sixth dimension of those who speak Lashon Hara. HaMasaper Lashon Hara al-gabai etzdokah, shehem k'sherim, someone who speaks
slanderously about those who collect charity. V'govim be'emunah, who are upright and honest in the collection of charity and also in its distribution to God-fearing people. V'gam mechalkim be'emunah lo sesli yirei shamayim. HaMasaper Lashon Hara alayim, someone who speaks Lashon Hara about such people. Shehem gonvim me'atzdokah, oh they're siphoning off money, they're not being truthful and honest. V'nosim panim, v'nosim l'mi shehim rotzim, umar bim l'krovehem, they have their favorites, they have their, they pick and choose who they give to, they're not being truthful and honest.
Zehul Lashon Hara she'ein aroch la'an shod, such a Lashon Hara is so devastating and the punishment is so severe for one who speaks falsely about such people. Ki gorem she'osam gaboyem ak'sherem yistalku, vi'yitmanu akherem ro'im bimkomam, because what's going to happen? They're going to chase out somebody who's honest and dignified and wholesome and truthful and who's going to take their place? Someone who is not. V'nim t'shomunah tov min anoslim t'sdokah ve'gozel ha'aniyim hatovim. We see that such a person is now going to
deny other people from giving charity because they don't, I don't know if I can trust them anymore. I don't know. I don't know who I can trust. So the people are not going to give t'sdokah and the poor people are not going to be receiving because nobody's given to the community treasury. Ki osam akherem aroyem lo'yachmelu al'a'aniyim hatovim, because those who want to give are going to think twice before they give to genuine,
genuinely poor people. V'nim t'so shezeh bitel avodas ha'kadosh boruchu and this person, by speaking L'shon Hara, has now harmed the will of Hashem. U'bi yesh avdei ha'kadosh boruchu u'vneim u'kroveyim, ki tachas ha'shar hoyah lo l'chabdom lo da'i lo sh'lo kibdom elagam her olayim. Not only that these people should be honored and should be glorified for their honesty of going out and raising funds for the poor people, instead you went out and you mocked them. You went out and said slanderous things about them.
I want to tell you that my grandfather, during the Holocaust, was receiving an enormous amount of money from the Agudah, from the Jewish agency in New York. It was going to Sweden, where my grandfather was residing at the time, and my grandfather was going and buying buying visas for Jews. Thousands of people that he was saving their lives. This money was coming, he was attaining these visas and getting them saved.
They were able to go to various different places because my grandfather secured those visas for them. My grandfather kept the ledger of every single penny. Every single penny that he received. My grandfather, during that time, didn't have food, didn't have a penny for food, didn't have a penny for his own sustenance, and yet every single penny was accounted for. And that ledger, we have that ledger that my grandfather kept meticulously, for every single dollar that he received from
the sources in New York, for all of those visas. Every single dollar. It's such an important thing. I know, I do this for a rabbi in Israel. I help him out, I send him through charity that comes in into a special fund, and I send it to Israel. And after, at the end of every year, I sent him the full spreadsheet. I said, I want you to go over it, and I want you to see every single dime that came in.
Here's the exact ledger, and here's the money that was sent to you, dollar for dollar, penny for penny. I don't want to be, I don't want there to even be a doubt that it was 100% accurate. And I think that it every every executive of every organization should make sure that there's an internal audit, just so that no one can ever say that, heaven forbid, there wasn't 100% accountability for every penny that was given. And I
consider it an honor and torch, being at the helm of torch for now over 20 years, that we're so cautious that we don't, we consider the contributions of the community to be holy, and to be something which is of tremendous, tremendous holiness and value, and we can't just like, oh, it's okay, it's not a big deal, it's a, no, it's considered mamon hegedesh, it's mamon of the temple. You don't waste that money, you don't just squander it.
Every single dollar needs to be accounted for, and it's not something which should ever be taken lightly. So, the the sixth dimension, I'm a sapolosh and hara gabeit stokos, we said, someone who speaks negatively about the, about the person who collects the stokos, the way it used to be, is that the person, there would be one person who was in charge, the gabei for the community, to raise funds, and then when poor people would come to the town, he would disperse money accordingly. If you're questioning their
scrupulousness, if you're questioning their, their their trustworthiness, it's a big problem. Lama na'aseh dover she'achshidu osanu, kashen nechshidu plonio plonio yirei shamayim. He says, why would anybody take that job? We know that guy is righteous, and look what they did to him. Right? It's almost like what happens in politics. Right? It's, it's incredible. It's like, nobody can be clean in politics anymore, because they, you know, they come in, they, they hardly
have a dollar in their, in their personal account. They, three years later, they have millions of dollars in their bank account. Nobody knows how. Nobody knows how it happens. It's, it's like, and it's becoming this, this trend. If you fail in everything else, become a, become a state representative, become a congressman, become a senator, because they all become very wealthy very quickly. It's a really, it's a, it's really a big, big shame.
Ve'omra b'sineh zachon levrocha. Our sages of blessed memory said, lo shon hora ho rege shlosha b'nei yodam. Lo shon hora kills three people. Ho omro, the person who speaks. Ve'ha mekablo, the person who is the recipient of the Lashon Hara. Ve'oso shenem mar olav, and the person, the subject, who was spoken about. Three people die. Ve'ha mekabel nenesh mi yoseh mi misha omra, and the person who is the recipient is more accountable than everyone else.
Ba'ale Lashon Hara oso lo debu shechun osam. You're not allowed to live near people who speak Lashon Hara. Ve'kol shekein lei shevi mar ve'leshmo hadevrem. Certainly not to sit with them, and to chummy chummy with them, and to be, drink a beer with them, or to hang out with them. What are they doing? They're just speaking slanderously about other people. Ve'lo nechtam gzardin al avoseinu ba midbar, ela al Lashon Hara bil vad. What was the greatest punishment the Jewish people received in the desert?
The Lashon Hara that they accepted of the spies. Odeh yishro balashon hara. By the way, we're not allowed to speak slanderously about the Land of Israel. You know that? Dibas ha'aretz, speaking negatively about the Land of Israel, comes with a great punishment. Even complaining about the weather in Israel, it's considered dibas ha'aretz, speaking Lashon Hara about the Land of Israel. You know who spoke Lashon Hara about the Land of Israel? The spies. What was the punishment?
40 years you guys are gonna suffer in the desert, and guess what? You're not going into the Land of Israel. Your children, they'll go in, but you're all gonna die in the desert. Why? Because you accepted Lashon Hara from the spies. Ki ha'mesaper Lashon Hara haveru, az hu mizgoa ve'yireh atzmo tzadik be'enov. Ki yah'shov ploni oso kakh ve'kakh, v'ani lo'asisi. When someone speaks Lashon Hara, what are they doing? They're trying to elevate themselves while pushing their friend down.
I'm talking about Joe, and now I'm putting Joe down, elevating myself. He did a terrible thing. Me? I didn't. I'm a good guy. Nim tzash hu mizgoa u'mach tziktov atzmo. You're feeling good about yourself by putting someone else down. Ve'ilu yah'sem mizgoa ve'hekhtzik tov le'atzmo hoyor ra'be'od. If a person performed a mitzvah and imputed virtue to himself, it would be very bad. But how much worse is it? V'kol shekein. Kol shekein v'kol shekein she'osa haveru gdol bloshon haru ma'akhtzik tov le'atzmo. He thinks good of himself.
That's one problem. But thinking good of yourself on the back of someone else, that's worse. Ve'im o'dum yisaper Lashon Hara al yisomi. If someone speaks Lashon Hara on orphans, ve'al almonos, and on widows, oz onsho od yose. Then his punishment is even greater. Ki b'lav hochihem etztarim. Because they're already in so much sorrow, in so much pain, in so much suffering, and now you're adding Lashon Hara to that. V'hu mitza'er osam yoser. They're feeling terrible, devastating pain.
Mishomel haveru heichon yesh esh. The Mishnah says that in certain situations you're allowed to lie. If one says to his neighbor, where is a fire to be found? As in which house? As in the house of such-and-such, where meat and fish are always to be found. Who's always cooking? Who always has good food? Deshchi ahbe basar v'dagim. Aphilu zeh Lashon Hara. This itself is also Lashon Hara. Why? Bo re'eh. Eich tzarech o'dum lizar be'dvara. A person has to be so careful. You're not saying something negative.
Right, but you know what's gonna happen now? People are gonna storm his house just to eat his good food. He's not gonna have any more money left. He's gonna be out. He's not gonna have, yeah, it's a nice thing that you're saying. Talmud says you have to be very, very careful about saying this because you can put the guy out of business. Not out of business, but you can take away his entire livelihood.
Ki aphilu zeh shalom maleh o'dum b'libo shezeh u'lashon hara, aphilu hochi niker Lashon Hara, ve'yei shavak Lashon Hara. So now he's saying, a person has to consider the words he's saying. They may be Lashon Hara, even if he doesn't know that they're Lashon Hara. Okay, that's one thing. But then there's something called Lashon Hara powder. What does it mean? It's just the, it's just the remnants of Lashon Hara, ki g'on she'omer shitku miploni You say about someone
Do not talk about such-and-such. Don't talk about him. Eini rotsa lehodia ma shani yodea mimeno. I don't want to talk about what I know about him. Did he say anything? Did he say anything? No, but he's insinuating I've got some scoop on this guy. Don't get me started about so-and-so. Did he say anything? Nope, didn't say anything, but everyone already gets the idea of what's going on here. V'chein kol k'yotze b'sen, all these types of speech-like activities that cause someone's value to be brought down in your eyes.
V'od amora b'seinu z'chonol avrocha, al yisaper odim b'tovah so she'chavero, she mitog tovah so ba lidei ra'as so. Because don't speak even the good about another person. Don't talk about another person is what our Seder is telling us. We have no business talking about other people because even if you talk about the good of another person, oh, we can talk about his good. Wait till we start talking about his no good, about the things that he doesn't do right.
Perush, al t'saper tovah so b'fnei son o. It's a very important thing the halacha says. Never talk good about someone's competition to them. So you have a bookstore. I go to you and say, Mark, you know that guy down the block, his bookstore? He's such a nice guy. All right, you know what you just did? You stuck a dagger in his heart. He's my competition. You don't know. Let me just tell you something about him. You say he's such a nice guy.
Let me tell you. And then they start, you just, you just started their fire. You talk about their competitor. You just said the worst thing about him. I only said nice. I only said good things. Now you started a whole conversation that is going to lead to not a good place. Perush, im t'saper tovah so b'fnei son o, o t'su yoshiv eich t'shabchei hu v'hu oseh kakh v'kakh. Do you know what he did to me? Do you know that
he stole my pallet of books? I got them and they, by mistake, delivered it to him. And he denied that he ever received it. He's a total thief, right? Just by, you start saying the nice things, it's always terrible. It's always terrible. I've experienced this myself. Ve'al zeh nema mevorich re'eyu b'kol godo ba'boker, ha'shkeim k'lo lo t'i'choshiv lo. You tell someone a praise about his enemy or his competitor at night, in the morning you wake up to hatred.
Avol b'fnei ohav av mutor, but if they love the person, then you can say it. Kidet'nan chamisha tamidim hoyu lo l'Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai, v'hu hayamon neshibchon. We know that we said about Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai, the Mishnah states that he had five disciples whose virtues he would enumerate. He loved them. So he would say great things about them. That's different. V'chein ha'masaper l'shon hora der ha'schok v'derech kal usrosh. If someone were to speak l'shon hora in in a mocking way, you know, it's just, you know, we're just
we're just making fun. We're just having light, light conversation. Kolomer she'ein ha'midabar b'sin ha'mam. I don't hate the guy. Hu she'shlomo omer b'chokmah. So this is what King Salman says. Ki mishalalehah hayoreh zikim chitzim v'moves k'in ish rimo esriyehu v'omer ha'lo m'sachek oni. As a madman who casts firebrands, arrows, and death, so is the man who deceives his friend and says, am I not joking? V'chein ha'masaper l'shon hora derech ramos. So to one who speaks slander deceitfully,
v'hu she'masaper le'tumo, ki ilu einu yodeh sheh ha'dover zeh l'shon hora hu. He says, I'm speaking at it. I'm just saying innocently. I have no idea this l'shon hora. I'm like, I would never speak l'shon hora. I'm just, I'm just saying, saying a story, you know, innocently. Ela ki sheh mo'chichim baho omer, einu yodeh sheh elu ma'asav sheh ploni. Or then when people rebuke me, says, I didn't even know that these are the acts of so-and-so. I just saw someone do it. I didn't know who it was.
Oh, sheh zehu l'shon hora. Or if he says, I didn't even know that it was even l'shon hora. It's a terrible thing. A person needs to know. It's a very important principle that we mentioned previously, and we'll repeat it just once again here to close off tonight. Every human being has value. We have to respect the value of every human being, of every individual, because when we speak negatively about a person, we're either elevating them or diminishing them. And if we're putting them down,
Hashem gets very, very upset about this. If we elevate them, we have to be careful where it is that we elevate them. In front of people who love them, great. In front of people who don't love them, like their competitor, that's never going to end up positive. And that we have to be very careful of. My dear friends, thank you so much. Have a terrific evening. Don't forget, drive safely, be careful. Laila Tov, have a great evening.

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