Shemiras
HaLoshon is in today.
The words,
Shemiras HaLoshon, that is. What those
words are meant to represent can be quite another story.
Did you ever
notice that there are several halachas listed in Sefer Chofetz Chaim that tend
to be generally ignored, as if by prior agreement, with the majority of Klal
Yisroel in on the conspiracy?
Who has not
witnessed, at least once in his life, not to mention the more likely scenario
of dozens of times, if not more, the trashing of a people of impeccable
character, including great rabbis who were universally considered to be great
tzaddikim with usually only the speaker’s camp, group, sect, or whatever, opting
out of the adulation?
And speaker
wise, (re: the baali loshon hora), we’re not talking pygmies here. Many of them are great men in their own
right, and the information that they are giving over they in turn heard from
the lips of other great men.
So what gives
here anyway?
Most, if not all
of it that’s not actually out right slander (motzi shem ra) is spoken under the
rubric of toellis (speech that is necessary for a specific purpose). One avails himself of this heter, as per the
guidelines laid out in Sefer Chofetz Chaim, so as to make known something that
would be important for the listener to hear, such as negative information
concerning a shidduch or perhaps a potential business partnership.
The truth is
that one man’s tzaddik can be another’s apikoris, so given the elasticity of
the heter of toellis where the line between objective and subjective necessity
of one’s words tends to get subconsciously blurred, it would be more productive
to shift our focus elsewhere.
We said above
that many of them are great men in their own right, and the information that
they are giving over they in turn heard from the lips of other great men. While everyone and his uncle who has a
negative comment to make about someone will do their best to morph their words
into pristine examples of speech bursting forth with positive purpose, if what
they are saying they in turn heard from the lips of others then they
have a serious problem.
Where exactly is
the heter that would permit one to believe this stuff?
It may be all
fine and dandy to either actually sanitize one’s negative comments under the
ultra-violet exception of toellis or to fool oneself into thinking that he did,
but neither scenario is going to fly in the realm of being mekabel (accepting)
someone else’s words because what most of us forgot, or maybe never knew, or better yet don’t want to know, is that there is no mention anyplace in Sefer Chofetz Chaim
of any kind of heter to be mekabel loshon hora l’toellis.
What this means
in English is that you can’t believe anything you are told about anyone for any
reason whatsoever, and if doesn’t concern you in some way you can’t even listen
to it.
Unlike the
speaking of loshon hora, there’s no wiggle room here on the mekabel end within
which to drey. So how is it that so many
of us seem to be running on what amounts to permanent chutzpah cruise control in the realm of believing loshon hora that more often than not we shouldn't even be listening to in the first place ?
When we said that
you can’t believe anything you are told about anyone for any reason whatsoever,
we omitted to mention that there two exceptions to this no, nada, nicht, never
rule of being mekabel loshon hora, which is that if a person is an established
apikoris or a rasha then you are allowed to believe what’s said about him.
And these are
the only exceptions, so we ask again in reference to those who are mekabel
loshon hora about our great rabbis and other upstanding people:
Where’s the heter?
Could it be that the taiva to speak loshon hora is so great that they have to morph tzaddikim, with which they have disagreements that amount to no more than chaluki deos (differences of opinion), into apikorsim just to be able to speak about them?
How can one posit such a possibility?
Great rabbis or just plain fine upstanding Jews are exactly that. What you see is what you get. It isn’t likely that one would find any of them doubling as apikorsim or reshoim on their night job. And it’s just as unlikely that you’ll ever encounter an exception to the rule that forbids you to be mekabel loshon hora from someone.
What we are looking at here is simply gross ignorance of the Halacha that is unfortunately not limited to the ignorant.
There are a
number of exceptions to many of the rules laid down in Sefer Chofetz Chaim, and
many of those exceptions have to run a gauntlet of five or sometimes even seven
conditions.
This isn’t one
of them.
The Halacha of
not believing loshon hora that’s told to you is about as clear as things get
vis á vis the laws of loshon hora.
You can’t
believe a word of it.
