“When you come into the land of Canaan, which I am giving you as a possession, and I put the plague of leprosy in a house of the land of your possession,” (Vayikra 14:34).
At first glance, there does not appear to be any connection between this week’s Torah portions (Tazria-Metzora) and Independence Day (Yom Ha’Atzmaut). These Torah portions deal extensively with tzara’at. A person guilty of lashon hara (insulting, derogatory or divisive speech) was punished with tzaraat—a condition of skin discoloration and hair loss that could, ultimately, infect clothes and houses, too. The sinful individual had to undergo a period of isolation until the necessary lesson had been learned, tzara’at disappeared and a return to human society was granted.
Yet if we look at history, we will discover that the culture of speech is intimately associated with our independent existence on this land. Lashon hara, gossip, curses, baseless hatred—all of these resulted in exile from the land of Israel. It began as early as the garden of Eden. Our commentators explain that the serpent spoke lashon hara about God. Adam and Eve believed the serpent and, therefore, sinned and were punished with expulsion from the garden of Eden. Later, Yosef spoke lashon hara about his brothers. He would bring slanderous stories about them to Yaakov. The result? Descent into Egyptian exile for many long years. After we finally left Egypt, the spies spoke lashon hara about the land of Israel. Instead of choosing positive and optimistic words regarding the promised land, they nearly succeeded in persuading the people to cease their journey towards it. The result? Forty years of wandering in the desert.
There are many such stories and all of them happened before the era of social media networks and the abysmal language that they produce. From the standpoint of lashon hara, the content of political discussions and media presentations is sinful. It doesn’t matter what your opinion happens to be about a certain individual, the very act of expressing a divisive opinion is likely to endanger our existence here together. So, perhaps, the Torah portion that we will read on Shabbat should serve as a warning sign: if we want to celebrate many more Independence Days, we must remember that a society without a culture of refined speech—where people curse, slander, gossip and shame others—will not survive. It’s up to us.
In fact, the correct use of speech is our entry code into the land of Israel. Rabbi Tzvi Yehuda Kook said that after the long 2,000 year exile, we needed to return to the land of Israel and correct our way of speaking. Therefore, in the generation prior to our return and the ingathering of exiles, God sent us the Chafetz Chayim to instill in us the awareness of not speaking lashon hara and the importance of correct speech. Perfect historical timing! Just before we returned to the land of Israel, we were given the tools to speak correctly and be worthy of returning.
Sivan Rahav-Meir is the World Mizrachi Scholar-in-Residence and an Israeli journalist and lecturer. She is a member of the Mizrachi Speakers Bureau (www.mizrachi.org/speakers).
