Good morning again. Torah Tuesday continues with our weekly session at 11.45 on Tuesdays, where we're speaking about proper speech. “Guard your tongue” is a famous expression. It's based on the classic of classics, Sefer Chafetz Chaim. There are certain assumptions people make that give them a permissive attitude toward improper speech, Lashon Hara. Some feel, “Of course I can't speak about a rabbi. Okay, I understand, as tempting as it is, I can't speak about the boss or teacher. But children? Children are children. And children have a lot of negatives going on that must be corrected.” So if a person speaks in a derogatory fashion about children, they may think it's okay, when in fact it's asur, it's forbidden.
Now, you may be right in saying, “Look, everybody understands, and I say this, that the kid can't sit in his seat, or the kid is very annoying, or he's sloppy, or whatever I want to say about him. Everybody's going to assume, ‘Well, kids are kids, so what's the big deal?’” The fact of the matter is, it shouldn't be said, and it certainly should not be taken as fact. Like any other Lashon Hara, the first thing you have to do when you hear something negative about another person is verify or deny. You cannot accept it. Very important: verify or deny. Don't accept it. You investigate. You have to find out if what's being said is true, if it's accurate, if it's not exaggerated, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, before you're allowed to even consider it as a fact. So the Chafetz Chaim stresses that you can't say something derogatory about a child, but you certainly can't say something that's also harmful.
The example brought is someone mentioning something negative about a child in the presence of a foster parent. The information may not be derogatory. It may describe a common behavior or condition among children, but it may make somebody in charge of bringing up someone else's child, someone else's offspring, maybe a little less willing, maybe even not willing at all. The Chafetz Chaim notes that sometimes children can be punished excessively by parents. And that's because when they get this—“You know what your child did?”—they react by accepting it, believing it, and saying, “How dare you?” And you say, “Man, that didn't mean true.” And maybe it is true, because you caused harm to the child by relating the information. So everyone should exercise caution before relating any information, even about children.
Now, regarding parents and teachers, they should be careful not to discipline children based on negative reports without following the basic rule of Lashon Hara: verify, investigate. You can't accept it. The parent, the teacher, the principal, anybody in charge of the care and growth of this child, must investigate. Only then, and only after verification, can any action be taken, because you're not allowed to accept Lashon Hara.
Rav Avraham Pam, zichrono livracha (may his memory be a blessing), told a story about a child. This actually happened once in Ahiezer, my school in Brooklyn, New York, on Avenue X and Ocean Parkway. This actually happened two or three years ago, maybe a little more. The story was about a young child who was punished when somebody else's property was found in his knapsack. A fellow classmate was missing it, and when they searched, they found it with him. So the apparent culprit insisted, “I didn't steal, I didn't take, I don't know how it got there. Believe me, I had nothing to do with it. I never saw it before in my life.” The teacher refused to believe the denials and punished the child in whose backpack this property was found. And he put a sign—maybe today's teachers would not be allowed to do this—like those signs you wear, which go over your shoulders from front to back. It said, “I am a thief”—mean, not right, hurtful—but the basis was that they believed the Lashon Hara.
It was a while later, not immediately, that another child, feeling guilty, went and admitted that he had taken the property. He didn't know how to give it back because that would prove the guilt he was subjected to because of the theft or the borrowing without permission, and so he put it in somebody else's knapsack, thinking it would be found. And somebody announced, “What's this doing in my knapsack?” Yet it didn't work out that way, and the child who had taken it felt guilty about the treatment the other child was getting, so he came and admitted it. So, bottom line, an innocent child was humiliated publicly because the teacher accepted the Lashon Hara, wrongly accepted the evidence, and denied the protest—just as wrong, if not worse. Now, it seemed very convincing, but it wasn't true.
Now there's another category of person that the Chafetz Chaim lists as someone you shouldn't speak negatively about. The Chafetz Chaim says it's terrible to speak Lashon Hara about a Torah scholar, a Talmid Chacham (Torah scholar). Now, yes, we have to give kibud, we have to give honor, we have to respect. And speaking Lashon Hara is certainly not affording honor to somebody. But there's something even more serious at stake. When one speaks Lashon Hara about a Talmid Chacham, the message is: “He's not as great as you think he is; he's not as smart as you think he is; he's not a posek (halachic decisor) of quality that you should go to for questions and answers. He doesn't get his facts right, so you can't learn from him. He doesn't explain things well, so you're going to walk away confused.” Whatever it is, you've undermined the effectiveness of this Talmid Chacham, who worked his life to learn and teach. And all you said was, “I don't know if you can go to him; maybe you have to figure out things by yourself.” The Yetzer Hara (evil inclination) is in charge of all of this. How does he get a person? How does he entice a person to speak Lashon Hara about a Talmid Chacham?
The famous, famous line—if you come to this class, you've heard it before—is, “But it's true, but it's true.” That means: “Yes, my friends, I know it's negative, but it's true, and if it's true, I can say it.” Not true. If it's true, you still can't say it, because truth is not an excuse. Lashon Hara.
So we have to understand that false claims about children, about Talmidei Chachamim, all have a harmful effect. And as we've explained so many times, Lashon Hara is speech that causes harm. It's speech that damages the subject or the victim. It may affect a shidduch (match), Chas V'shalom (God forbid). It may affect the job or Parnassah (job), lo aleinu (may it not befall us). But it's speech that might hurt a reputation. Speech that has a negative impact is Lashon Hara, whether or not it's true. And what we learn today is that it doesn't matter who you're speaking about. There's no heter (permission) to hurt a child, and there's no heter to undermine a Talmid Chacham; the same applies to a principal, a teacher, a worker, or a licensed practitioner. Keep it to yourself unless you can fulfill the seven conditions—count them: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven—when you have speech for to'elet, for constructive purpose. If you can fulfill all seven requirements before you speak, then you'll be allowed to advise somebody limitlessly, limited way, to watch themselves. There may be a problem here. But otherwise, Lashon Hara about these subjects, these people, is asur. We'll be back speaking about Hanukkah.