The Unspeakable Sin

How much does God love a Jew? He reserves the worst type of punishment in this world for anyone who causes him harm.  

A recent speech was given by a young girl who grew up in North Korea. She talked about the deprivation in the closeted regime. There was little food. There was limited technology. There was no freedom. People would go without things that we take for granted until they became deathly ill.  

Speaking in New York, she marveled at how everyone had enough to eat and how sick people were not neglected. She shuddered at the thought that political extremists might throw all of it away. When she told her story to some college students, they said they were fighting inequality.  

She laughed. Then she said something powerful: 

“Inequality isn’t the enemy. Poverty is the enemy.” 

The Crisis in Israel 

As the Israeli Knesset reconvenes for its next session, the ceasefire in the war for judicial reform ends. The difference will be that only one side took the battlefield in March. Come May, the right has marched forward with demonstrations of its own.  

It’s essential to fight for what you believe in, such as not allowing public displays of immoral behavior, nor allowing our border security against Hezbollah and Hamas to weaken. Fighting for a Supreme Court that represents and protects all people is our right as citizens; as people of good conscience, it is our obligation.  

But as Jews, we have a higher obligation.  

Our higher obligation is to not hate other Jews, even those who oppose us, even those who call governance by a democratically elected coalition “fascism”.  

We can fight, but only for judicial reform. We can demonstrate, but only for a better Israel for all her citizens.  

Fascism isn’t the enemy. Hatred is the enemy. 

Tzara’at Today 

The Shabbat Torah portion of Tazria-Metzora tells of a person with a particular skin affliction. His body begins to turn white with rashes. It isn’t a medical condition. Rather, it’s a form of spiritual affliction from Hashem for certain sins between man and his fellow.  

It’s devastating.  

When diagnosed, you suffer exile. Instead of living in your local community in the nation of Israel, you are isolated outside the camp where nobody can talk to you.  

It’s like being in jail. Your sentence continues until you repent for your sin and improve your behavior so that you won’t commit it again.  

There is a steep financial burden. After you’ve done teshuvah, you’re brought to the Mishkan to offer animal sacrifices that cost thousands of shekels.  

Then there is further shame – you must shave your entire body. A man with payot (side locks) to his shoulders and a beard to his chest is now completely shorn. Next to his friends who have long beards and well-groomed payot, he looks naked.  

It can take months to grow a beard back. It can take even longer to regain your payot. During all this time, everybody knows that you committed a horrible sin against God and another Jew.  

Your shame inside the community stays with you for a long time. It is literally written all over your face.  

What sin can be so bad that the punishment is exile, heavy fines, and long-lasting shame? 

Love Your Neighbor as Yourself 

It’s the sin of loshon hara. The sin of telling tales, even if true, about your brothers and sisters that cause them embarrassment, shame, or loss of reputation. The underlying catalyst of loshon hara is intramural hatred. 

Loshon hara can only be committed against a fellow Jew. If you tell such stories against a non-Jew, it’s another sin – but it’s not loshon hara.  

Hashem is so repulsed by one who badmouths his brothers and sisters, that He puts the offender through living Hell until he does teshuvah.  

Every day, we are commanded to remember how Miriam was sent outside the camp for seven days for speaking critically about her brother Moshe.

We are commanded to remember the sin of the spies who spoke loshon hara about the Land of Israel. As a result of their hatred for the land, the spies and the men of that generation were condemned to die without ever setting foot on its treasured soil.  

We are commanded to remember why we are Americans, Europeans, and Russians rather than Israeli-born. In the later days of the Second Temple, we committed the unspeakable sin of intramural hatred. Consequently, the Temple was destroyed, and we were exiled from the Land of Israel for almost 2,000 years.  

The people of that time were far more righteous than we are today. The greatest Sages knew the truth of Hashem and His Torah on a level that we cannot conceive of. The Sadducees were in opposition to the Sages. The Sadducees’ quest for power strangled the Jews in Eretz Yisrael physically and spiritually. The Sages and the faithful Jews were right to oppose the Sadducees, but they did so with hatred and anger toward their brothers. As a result, even those on the side of “right” were wrong because of how they treated and spoke to their brothers. They lost. 

So did we.  

The Great Opportunity 

For the first time in 2,000 years, we find ourselves in a similar situation in Eretz Yisrael. One group is fighting for Hashem and His Torah, while a different group is fighting for immorality and secularism.  

We must oppose this movement and fight for Hashem’s Torah values. It is the highest obligation to do it for all of Israel so that everyone can benefit.  

If the elite continue to be blessed by Hashem with their large income and homes-but as Jews who recite the Shema every day, baruch Hashem! 

It’s up to us to pray for all of us every day that we all do teshuvah. Let us fight for Hashem and His Torah values, but without hatred or enmity. If we truly see the opposition as our brothers, then we are also fighting for Mr. Lapid, Mr. Lieberman, their children, and all their followers. 

Fascism isn’t the enemy. Hatred is the enemy. 

With Hashem’s help, let’s win this war together and rebuild the Temple.  

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David Ben Horin lives in Afula with his family, millions of sunflowers, and Matilda, our local camel. David‘s Israeli startup, Center Stage Marketing, is a lean marketing agency for startups and small businesses that creates and promotes SEO optimized ROI-driven to the right audience on LinkedIn to make your business the star of the show.