Parashat Metzora-Shabbat Hagadol: Pass Over the Lashon Hara

By Michael R. Mantell, Ph.D.

SAN DIEGO — In less than one week, our approaching celebration of liberation, Passover, will be within us. This Shabbat, Shabbat Hagadol, brings with it an opportunity for even more preparation than we’ve already been doing for the holiday, a special preparation, one that is spiritual. Our Torah is called Toras Chayim, “Instructions for Life,” a manual for optimal living. This manual brings with it relevant and germane, applicable contemporary instruction for this period of preparation.

At a time when the world is looking desperately for the next self-help book, the next applicable “cool tiny habit” to grow into a better person, WE already have it, B”H! Long before diversity, inclusivity and equity became popularized we already found strength in our community’s diversity with five rabbis sitting around the Seder table, each as different from each other as can be. From Rabbis Eliezer, Joshua, Eleazar ben Azaria to Rabbis Akiva and Tarfon, we see the ability sit with each other with those who think differently from us. We learn how to debate our different perspectives with respect and humility.

As we prepare to sit around the Seder table with family and friends, many of whom we have not been with in a couple of years since COVID disrupted our Seder experience, this parasha comes to teach us how best to enjoy our time together while uplifting our lives, our wellbeing, here and now and for all time to come. Less than one week before Pesach, one week before we’ll be gathering and catching up with each other about our lives and those of others not at the Seder table, parasha Metzorah appears. In the words of our Sages, the title “metzorah” comes from the words “motzi shem ra” — “to slander a person’s good name.” What’s this have to do with our Seder? Read on.

The Medrash has a relevant story about a traveling medicine salesman who went from town-to-town shouting, “Who wants to buy the potion of life?” One sage, Rebbe Yannai, heard this and asked the man to sell him some of this potion. To the Rebbe’s surprise, the salesman told him he didn’t require it, nor did his fellow Jews, since after all, he and his people had Torah. Yet, the Rebbe pressed him until the salesman brought out a book of Psalms and shared 52:14, “Who is the man who desires life, who loves days, to see good?” He then asked the Rebbe what followed and answered himself, “Guard your tongue from evil, and your lips from speaking falsehood. Turn away from evil and do good, desire peace, and pursue it.” No need to wait for heaven to reap the reward for following this instruction for a good life, since this “medicine” the salesman shared was for the present, not for tomorrow which may never come, but for today.

What’s this have to do with Passover? Let’s read this week’s parasha very carefully and understand we are to “Pass over the lashon hara!” The Kochav MiYaakov teaches us that diving into, “Did you hear about cousin___,” “Oh my, I heard all about your friend who___,” “Can you believe what ____ did?” has the power to cause fights, hatred, animosity, all health and life harming.

The parasha tells us that a “metzora” was a person afflicted with tzaraas, a spiritual ailment that affected not only the person, but her/his clothing and home because of putting forth evil. The Medrash Tehillim and Yalkut Shimoni brought this message, HaMetzora: HaMotzi Ra, tzaraas, came to a person who spoke lashon hara, who gossiped and spoke evil about others.

What and who will you be speaking about around your Seder table next week? No one who reads this parasha needs to be further educated about the harm that negative speech can bring. Words, once spoken, can never be taken back. Verbal sensitivity is a foundation to a wonderful Seder…and a happy, optimal life. Can we leave our Seder table with a healthy sense of renewal, with a desire to build more positively engaged and creative lives in our broad community?

Perhaps you’ve heard of the story of the rabbi who was confronted by a man who was acting as a motzi shem ra throughout the shul and the community. A Shabbat table was not complete without his evil talk of others. He recognized he was causing ill will and wanted to improve. The rabbi advised him to take a feather pillow, cut it open and release the feathers from inside, all over the street. The man did as the rabbi suggested and when he returned, he asked the rabbi what to do next. The rabbi then told him to go back into the street and collect the feathers, all of them, not leaving one in the street. The man did so but was distraught over his inability to gather all the feathers. The rabbi simply replied, “Your words are like feathers. Once they leave your mouth, they never can be returned. Be careful that the words you emit are not ones you’ll want to go running after.” He then reminded the man that he has upper and lower teeth and two lips that his words must pass through before being released. What a great reminder.

We learn in the Talmud in Baba Metziah 58b, that one who shames another in public, around a Seder table for instance, is like spilling that person’s blood. One who does so has no share in the World to Come, according to our teachings. But while this is true, our rabbis were not saints either. In tractate Kiddushin 30b, Rabbi Hiyya bar Abba teaches, “even a father and son or teacher and student who study Torah at the same gate become enemies of each other; yet they do not leave from there until they come to love each other.”

We learn from the Chovos HaLevavos (Sha’ar HeK’neiah, Ch. 7), written by Rabbeinu Bachaya, of the sage who learned that someone was badmouthing him in shul one day. What did the Rav do? He sent the man a very beautiful gift and thanked him for relinquishing all his mitzvos and good deeds to him. The man was quite puzzled. You see, one who sits around and talks badly about another, spreading rumors and gossip, ironically is doing a great kindness to the person about whom he is slandering. The ba’al lashon hara’s good deeds are transferred to the person spoken ill about, and receives all that person’s sins in return.

Wouldn’t it be healthier, wiser, to simply pass the matzah around the table, instead of passing around the lashon hara? Let’s follow our Torah and the Talmud in Yerushalmi that teaches that learning Torah is the greatest of all the commandments. Corresponding to that is the teaching that the transgression of speaking ill of others is the worst of sins. As we commit to “Pass Over the Lashon Hara,” we can nourish our hunger for more hope and liberation, the foundation of this holiday of Passover. As Hashem saw not what we were but who we had the potential of becoming, we need to see that an error or blemish in another is not the whole of that person. Lashon hara makes it quite easy to rate the person globally in an entirely negative way, based on one error or failing. We speak a form of lashon hara about ourselves to ourselves, and globally rate ourselves as well. Fail a test? “I’m a failure.” Didn’t get the job you applied for? “I’ll never be a success.” We speak lashon hara about ourselves often more than we do about others. Either way, let’s commit to “Pass Over the Lashon Hara” this Passover and look beyond the outside to that which people can become. Better yet, just pass the matzah, not the lashon hara. The more spiritual our Seders and the more spirituality in the world, the Chofetz Chaim teaches, the stronger and better we will all be.

Chag Kasher V’Sameach and a Zissen Pesach

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Michael R. Mantell, Ph.D., prepares a weekly D’var Torah for Young Israel of San Diego, where he and his family are members. They are also active members of Congregation Adat Yeshurun. He may be contacted via michael.mantell@sdjewishworld.com