class: ethics of speech
My morning class at the NHC institute was "Jewish ethics of what
we say and how we say it" (sh'mirat ha-lashon henceforth, for short),
taught by Rabbi Regina Sandler-Phillips. This is a topic that
interests me and I had heard a good review of this teacher from
last year. I was not disappointed. :-)
(Let me note in passing how challenging it is to write a post on this specific topic. Any mistake demonstrates something I failed to learn, y'know? But onwards...)
On the first day, the instructor asked us to share our reasons for taking the class. Lots of things got written on the whiteboard. My contributions were that this is a personal struggle -- with our societal norms that support negative speech it's hard to avoid (and the Chofetz Chayim's dictate to avoid such people just doesn't work), and for my own part I'm looking for useful ways to contain such urges or vent them appropriately -- striving to "do no harm". Others brought issues about professional responsibilities, peer pressure, handling positive speech, and providing support to family and friends.
We then proceeded to study, in chevruta (pairs), Leviticus 19:14-18 (smack out of the middle of the part often called the "holiness code"). Many of us had the (newer) JPS translation, and she tried to distribute the people who had others as widely as possible. Comparing translations turned out to be fascinating, most especially for verse 16, where a key word is "rachil" -- "peddler" in modern Hebrew, and probably best translated as gossip-monger, one who not only spreads gossip but profits by it. (That's my interpretation; please don't blame my teacher if you disagree.)
We spent a while discussing these verses, and some related talmud, in detail. I'm not going to repeat all that; you'll have to take the class. :-) The rabbi later shared her own translation of these five verses; I found it interesting but don't know if we have permission to share it.
In the second class we talked first about the principle of ona'at d'varim, which is the case where you speak negatively directly to someone (criticism, insult, etc). We talked about the case where this is done privately; one might think this is better than doing it out in the open, but it occurred to me that there is one way in which it is worse: at least if you do it out in the open, other people see what kind of person you are. This was a tangent that we didn't explore.
In this vein we also talked about rebuke, where (according to the Rambam) there are cases where you are required to have these kinds of conversations. Obviously there are better and worse ways to approach it, but the mere fact that the person you're speaking to will be unhappy does not control whether speech is appropriate. We talked about some of the challenges around that. (We studied several pages of Rambam's Mishneh Torah on this topic.)
Moving away from private conversation or rebuke, the Rambam identifies three categories of problematic speech: rechilut, which is true but causes animosity; lashon hara, which is negative (but still perceived to be true by the speaker?); and motzi shem ra, which is known to be false by the speaker (and used in a defamatory way). The first class, rechilut, is a problem if the listener perceives a negative intent; the speaker's intentions are irreleant here. An example used in class, which to me makes this seem near-impossible to control, is "I had such a good time at Ploni's party" -- wherein the listener finds out that his friend Ploni had a party to which he wasn't invited. I mean, it's great to aspire to not cause that kind of hurt to others, but how do you do that? (The last class was subtitled "yes, but..." because of questions like this.) I take from this that we will probably never get things completely right, but we can try to pay attention and maybe get things less wrong than we would have.
(Jotted down in passing: "avek lashon hara", the "dust of lashon hara", is about what you don't say -- "how was your visit?" "I don't want to talk about it".)
We studied some texts from Chofetz Chayim: A Lesson a Day. As the name implies, these are bite-sized bits (many of which I'd seen before). It's a good source for starting conversations, but will be less helpful for individual study, I think.
There are cases where it is not only permitted but required to speak what would otherwise be considered lashon hara. (The word for this is "toelet", which I understand to be "just cause".) The Chofetz Chayim enumerates the conditions, which boil down to "this is the least-damaging way to right a wrong, and you've taken precautions". The third class session was spent discussing some specific cases -- prominent people who had had nasty allegations levelled against them, and the people who spoke up to prevent more victims, and the consequences for all involved. This was a difficult class -- the material is challenging to be sure, but we also had in class someone who had been the victim of the kinds of abuse covered in the cases, and she could neither talk about the issue more generally nor refrain from detailing her own story. I felt like an unwilling participant in someone else's group therapy. The rabbi tried to bring things back on topic a few times, but she was also trying to be kind to this student (or so I infer), and that turned out not to be a kindness to the other students. It's a difficult situation and I'm not sure what would have been correct; I guess a part of me hoped for a clean demonstration (from the rabbi) of turning negative conversations around, but it would have been a tall order. On the other hand, it highlighted for me that the rabbi and I draw the line differently between the speaker and the group; I am more likely to try to redirect a student who is taking over the class. I'm not sure where that line should be.
In the last class we started to talk about practicalities (what can we actually do in this space?). I wish there'd been more time for this. (In my course evalaution I suggested reducing the third session to make room.) One approach, when in a group setting, is to use "I" language -- "I'm uncomfortable; can we change the subject?", or just changing it if you can do so. The rabbi suggested that lashon hara has a lot in common with addiction, and thinking about it that way might help. (If you can't go 24 hours without alcohol or lashon hara, maybe you have a problem...) She also suggested the motto "progress, not perfection", and this analogy: if you're going to speed, go 60MPH rather than 100MPH -- you do less damage when you crash.
(Noted in passing: perhaps what I should be trying to learn more about is middot, or character values (roughly).)
The rabbi brought a page from The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People illustrating the ideas of one's circle of concern versus circle of influence. Essentially, there are lots of things we care about, and we can do something about a subset of them -- so focus there. This came up, in particular, when we talked about talking about public figures, and how politics is sometimes just a spectator sport, or worse yet a proliferation of words that gives people the impression that they've done something when they haven't.
I don't feel like I've really captured the class in this entry, but I'm also not sure I could. It was a good class with good conversational seeds; this area really requires an ongoing conversation, not a one-week class, and I'm not sure how to pursue that. I would recommend the class (though maybe skipping day three :-) ) if it's offered again.
Every class began and ended with a song -- usually the same one, with on-theme words (psalms 34:13-15). (Nice melody; wish I'd retained it.) This seemed effective in "grounding" the class, in establishing a boundary between "out there" and "in here". It's a teaching technique I should remember.
(Let me note in passing how challenging it is to write a post on this specific topic. Any mistake demonstrates something I failed to learn, y'know? But onwards...)
On the first day, the instructor asked us to share our reasons for taking the class. Lots of things got written on the whiteboard. My contributions were that this is a personal struggle -- with our societal norms that support negative speech it's hard to avoid (and the Chofetz Chayim's dictate to avoid such people just doesn't work), and for my own part I'm looking for useful ways to contain such urges or vent them appropriately -- striving to "do no harm". Others brought issues about professional responsibilities, peer pressure, handling positive speech, and providing support to family and friends.
We then proceeded to study, in chevruta (pairs), Leviticus 19:14-18 (smack out of the middle of the part often called the "holiness code"). Many of us had the (newer) JPS translation, and she tried to distribute the people who had others as widely as possible. Comparing translations turned out to be fascinating, most especially for verse 16, where a key word is "rachil" -- "peddler" in modern Hebrew, and probably best translated as gossip-monger, one who not only spreads gossip but profits by it. (That's my interpretation; please don't blame my teacher if you disagree.)
We spent a while discussing these verses, and some related talmud, in detail. I'm not going to repeat all that; you'll have to take the class. :-) The rabbi later shared her own translation of these five verses; I found it interesting but don't know if we have permission to share it.
In the second class we talked first about the principle of ona'at d'varim, which is the case where you speak negatively directly to someone (criticism, insult, etc). We talked about the case where this is done privately; one might think this is better than doing it out in the open, but it occurred to me that there is one way in which it is worse: at least if you do it out in the open, other people see what kind of person you are. This was a tangent that we didn't explore.
In this vein we also talked about rebuke, where (according to the Rambam) there are cases where you are required to have these kinds of conversations. Obviously there are better and worse ways to approach it, but the mere fact that the person you're speaking to will be unhappy does not control whether speech is appropriate. We talked about some of the challenges around that. (We studied several pages of Rambam's Mishneh Torah on this topic.)
Moving away from private conversation or rebuke, the Rambam identifies three categories of problematic speech: rechilut, which is true but causes animosity; lashon hara, which is negative (but still perceived to be true by the speaker?); and motzi shem ra, which is known to be false by the speaker (and used in a defamatory way). The first class, rechilut, is a problem if the listener perceives a negative intent; the speaker's intentions are irreleant here. An example used in class, which to me makes this seem near-impossible to control, is "I had such a good time at Ploni's party" -- wherein the listener finds out that his friend Ploni had a party to which he wasn't invited. I mean, it's great to aspire to not cause that kind of hurt to others, but how do you do that? (The last class was subtitled "yes, but..." because of questions like this.) I take from this that we will probably never get things completely right, but we can try to pay attention and maybe get things less wrong than we would have.
(Jotted down in passing: "avek lashon hara", the "dust of lashon hara", is about what you don't say -- "how was your visit?" "I don't want to talk about it".)
We studied some texts from Chofetz Chayim: A Lesson a Day. As the name implies, these are bite-sized bits (many of which I'd seen before). It's a good source for starting conversations, but will be less helpful for individual study, I think.
There are cases where it is not only permitted but required to speak what would otherwise be considered lashon hara. (The word for this is "toelet", which I understand to be "just cause".) The Chofetz Chayim enumerates the conditions, which boil down to "this is the least-damaging way to right a wrong, and you've taken precautions". The third class session was spent discussing some specific cases -- prominent people who had had nasty allegations levelled against them, and the people who spoke up to prevent more victims, and the consequences for all involved. This was a difficult class -- the material is challenging to be sure, but we also had in class someone who had been the victim of the kinds of abuse covered in the cases, and she could neither talk about the issue more generally nor refrain from detailing her own story. I felt like an unwilling participant in someone else's group therapy. The rabbi tried to bring things back on topic a few times, but she was also trying to be kind to this student (or so I infer), and that turned out not to be a kindness to the other students. It's a difficult situation and I'm not sure what would have been correct; I guess a part of me hoped for a clean demonstration (from the rabbi) of turning negative conversations around, but it would have been a tall order. On the other hand, it highlighted for me that the rabbi and I draw the line differently between the speaker and the group; I am more likely to try to redirect a student who is taking over the class. I'm not sure where that line should be.
In the last class we started to talk about practicalities (what can we actually do in this space?). I wish there'd been more time for this. (In my course evalaution I suggested reducing the third session to make room.) One approach, when in a group setting, is to use "I" language -- "I'm uncomfortable; can we change the subject?", or just changing it if you can do so. The rabbi suggested that lashon hara has a lot in common with addiction, and thinking about it that way might help. (If you can't go 24 hours without alcohol or lashon hara, maybe you have a problem...) She also suggested the motto "progress, not perfection", and this analogy: if you're going to speed, go 60MPH rather than 100MPH -- you do less damage when you crash.
(Noted in passing: perhaps what I should be trying to learn more about is middot, or character values (roughly).)
The rabbi brought a page from The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People illustrating the ideas of one's circle of concern versus circle of influence. Essentially, there are lots of things we care about, and we can do something about a subset of them -- so focus there. This came up, in particular, when we talked about talking about public figures, and how politics is sometimes just a spectator sport, or worse yet a proliferation of words that gives people the impression that they've done something when they haven't.
I don't feel like I've really captured the class in this entry, but I'm also not sure I could. It was a good class with good conversational seeds; this area really requires an ongoing conversation, not a one-week class, and I'm not sure how to pursue that. I would recommend the class (though maybe skipping day three :-) ) if it's offered again.
Every class began and ended with a song -- usually the same one, with on-theme words (psalms 34:13-15). (Nice melody; wish I'd retained it.) This seemed effective in "grounding" the class, in establishing a boundary between "out there" and "in here". It's a teaching technique I should remember.