Lashon Hara Just a Click Away 25

The tongue is compared to an arrow. Why? Because if a person draws a sword to kill his fellow man, the intended victim can beg mercy and the attacker can change his mind and return the sword to its sheath. But an arrow, once it has been shot and begun its journey, even if the shooter wants to stop it, he cannot.”

The Internet has no error-correcting code for lashon hara. The only brakes we can place on lashon hara and rechilut traveling through the Internet is by halting it at the one source we can control: ourselves. The private meditation of Mar ben Ravina recounted in Berakhot 17a serves us well here with a slight update for the 21% century: Elohai, n’tzor I’shoni mei’rau’s fa tay mi-dabeir mirmah“O Lord, guard my tongue from evil, my lips from speaking guile, and my fingertips from disseminating lashon hara.”

APPENDIX: Moses Maimonides , Mishneh Torah, Hilkhot Deot, chapter 7

1. A person who collects gossip about a colleague violates a prohibition as[Leviticus 19:16] states:“Do not go around gossiping among your people.” Even though this transgression is not punished by lashes, it is a severe sin and can cause the death of many Jews . Therefore,[the warning]:“Do not stand still over your neighbor’s blood” is placed next to it in the Torah (ibid.). See what happened [because of] Doeg , the Edomite.

2. Who is a gossiper? One who collects information and[then] goes from person to person, saying:“This is what so and so said,”“This is what I heard about so and so.” Even if the statements are true, they bring about the destruction of the world. There is a much more serious sin than[gossip], which is also included in this prohibition: lashon hara, i.e., relating deprecating facts about a colleague, even if they are true.[Lashon hara does not refer to the invention of lies;] that