Parsha Review Podcast · Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe

You're listening to Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe of Torch in Houston, Texas. This is the Parsha Review Podcast .

Good morning, everybody. It is so wonderful to be here. Welcome back to the Parsha Review Podcast. We have some debt to pay We are a few weeks behind because we had Pesach. We had the time off with our family. Baruch Hashem It was so beautiful. It's so wonderful to be back though with my Torch family right here at the Torch Center
We are gonna go back to Parsha's Tarzira Mitzorah, which was a combined Parsha. What is Tarzira Mitzorah focusing on? It's focusing on an individual who if by mistake Spoke negatively about another person. He would have something called leprosy. Leprosy would show physically but really it was a spiritual ailment. It was a Spiritual disease. This doesn't have it wasn't something that can be It wasn't something that could be Contaminated by others or or received by others, but rather it was on the individual themselves
So what would happen and it would seem that since they're as we'll see They were removed from the camp that you'd think that there was this was contagious. This is a non-contagious disease Chapter 13 verse number 45 in the book of Leviticus Now we know the book of Leviticus is dedicated to the holiness of the Jewish people The first book of the Torah Genesis is about the family of Israel. The second book Exodus is about the
Nation of Israel the third book by Yikra Leviticus is about the holiness of Israel Everything the theme we see all along the book of a Yikra is about being holy What it what it means to live a holy life. We have the laws of kosher. We have the laws of permitted and forbidden Relationships we have the laws of how to treat one another as we'll see in the coming portions the laws of a haftal or a haka mocha loving your fellow as yourself all of the
Major commandments of how to live a holy life is in the book of Leviticus Then we have by Midbar the book of numbers Which is the journeys of the people of Israel and then we have Devarim Which is the parting words the last 36 days of Moses's life where he guides the Jewish people so to speak like his his Final will and testament where he tells the Jewish people so shall you continue to observe your life?
So that you're able to maintain your relationship with God and that's a review of the whole Torah. That's why it's called it's called a the Midrash calls it the the book of Devarim as the the Mishnah Torah the review of the whole Torah So what is verse number 45 here in chapter 13 say in Leviticus the atzeruah shebo hanegah and The person with tsaras that there is in him the affliction. He has this affliction of tsaras We call it leprosy, but it's similar to leprosy
Begot of you perumim his garments shall be rent He should tear his clothes veroshia perua and his hair on his head shall be growing growing long Ve al safam yate and over his lips. He shall cloak himself He's like walking around with a mask like we had during kovat V'tamei tamei yikra and he shall Announce I am contaminated. I am contaminated kol yimei asher hanegah bo Yitma tamei hu badod yeshev michutz l'maachin hamoshavah all the days that he has this affliction He shall remain contaminated
Contaminated he is in Isolation shall he dwell outside the camp shall be his dwelling place. Okay. So now what's going on here? someone got this leprosy and They have to make it known to everyone just by the way, I'm contaminated here with this leprosy with this tsaras Don't come close to me. Don't talk to me. I'm gonna cover my mouth What what's really happening here what's going on? When do we even see that someone sins and we announce it?
Not only that the person himself announced imagine someone standing at the street corner with the sign saying I'm a sinner or saying I wasn't faithful in my relationship or standing there with the street sign saying I ate non-kosher or I mean Who does such a thing and yet the Torah says this person needs to announce Tommy Tommy, I'm contaminated Stay away from me. I'm contaminated. He covers his mouth. He lets his hair grow long What in the world is going on here? He tears his clothes
Why are we calling attention to this It's something which is so odd. It's something which is so uncommon for us to find in The Jewish faith where we publicly Disclose our sin. We know I mentioned this many times here that we don't go and confess in front of a Rabbi, I once had a woman in the class. She says rabbi. I need to confess. I'm like wrong religion
We don't do that in Judaism. We don't confess our sins in front of any other human being we talk directly to God We have a direct relationship. We don't need a conduit. We don't need a messenger We don't need anybody to be our intermediary Here this guy goes and what does he do? He declares to everybody Tommy Tommy. I am Contaminated I am contaminated. So what does Rashi say Rashi says something really incredible here
But I'm a rabbi Sena our sages of blessed memory said money stunning me shards ma'am We see other people who are Impure they don't have to separate themselves from the camp They don't have to leave the camp of where the Jewish people are leave the community doesn't have to do that Here this guy he has to leave the community why? How ill do who he deal Belush and horror bane ishla ishto?
Oh bane ishla ray a you because he separated man from his wife. He separated man from his fellow Of who he Bodell just because just like he separated people from one another So too he should separate himself from other people Okay, so what's what's what's going on here is we see as as is very common for us to see in the Torah There is an eye for an eye type of retribution. You did something like this you get something like that
You separated between man and his fellow man and his wife Now you have to separate yourself from your fellow man, so we need to ask the following question And we need to always Investigate when we see things like this in the Torah ask the question What is going on the Torah is meant for us to understand for us to learn for us to grow? Why in the world is this seemingly? out of Sync with the entire Torah where you have to declare this What is Lashon Hara?
What is Lashon Hara? Our sages tell us Lashon Hara is And this is an example we've given here before Lashon Hara is putting someone else down So that I can elevate myself. I'm putting someone else down so that I can elevate myself What does that mean? That means if a person doesn't feel so good about themselves We confuse our thinking and Assume that if I put someone else down, I'll be elevated. It's like a seesaw if I knock them down I go up and That's not true
The Torah teaches us that's not true We we talked about about when we discussed Lashon Hara many times before we discussed imagine if you had Human credits, you know, you meet another human being you just meet a person right outside the Torah Center here So imagine that person I don't know them. I've never met them before they seem like a decent human being They seem like they don't You know harm anyone they don't beat people up they don't rape and pillage they don't destroy things
They're not they're not harmful people. They seem decent So I give them a certain amount of human credits Human credits like you have any in the bank before you you get a credit card. They have to see are you are you credit-worthy? So I'll give you a little credit credit limit then they see that you pay back on time So they up that credit limit and they keep on upping it same thing
But they give you a little bit of credit. So imagine we give another human being we meet the first time We give them a thousand human credits What happens if someone now comes over to you and they say hey Bruce? You know that guy that you're befriending Watch your pockets I'm not saying I'm not saying anything. I'm just I just want you to know, you know what happened now with those thousand human credits Verified unverified it lowers it
You know what happens the next time they meet they meet someone else and they say oh you're friends with that guy Just be careful. Just be careful. I'm just don't you I'm not gonna say anything I don't want to say anything, but just know be careful What's gonna happen now the human credits go down a little bit more What happens if you say something positive about another person? The human credits go up Their value in your eyes goes up
Shem does not like when we put other people down, you know, why? because Hashem loves his creations and As the creator of heaven and earth the creator of all mankind What you're doing by putting down another person is you're saying Hashem doesn't know what value is I know what value is Hashem created this person. Yeah, they're worthless So it's a contradiction to Hashem's creation when we speak Lashon Hara about another person but even more than that the verse in
King David tells us my eat in law. My Yosef law Lashon Ramiya What is the benefit to a person who speaks negatively? Slanderously about another person. What's the benefit? What do you get from it? nothing We're we trick ourselves to thinking I'm gonna feel better I'll get a dopamine rush when I speak negatively about that person eyes my competitor. He's awful. He cheats. He lies. He steals verified unverified Anonymous sources We sometimes feel like that's going to elevate us the the Talmud says that the snake
Attacks and Doesn't eat his his attack his prey He attacks because he attacks and the Talmud says that what's gonna happen at the end of days The lion's gonna come and say me I attacked but I ate it. That's my that's my lunch. That's my dinner the tiger says I Attacked I ate my prey But that's my dinner Snake what did you do? What are you doing? You're just killing you're just attacking for no reason. What's your benefit? You don't even eat it
So, you know what the snake is gonna say says the Talmud Snake is gonna say what's the difference between me and mankind? Look at mankind they speak lashon hara, they bite and They don't benefit. I'm just like the human being who speaks lashon hara They also bite and they don't eat they don't benefit from it There's no benefit to a person who speaks lashon hara about another person We gain absolutely nothing Lashon hara is a devastating devastating act
Speaking negatively about another person and it cannot elevate one by speaking poorly about another It doesn't help No one goes up by pushing other people down if they are worse of a player Is that gonna make me a better player? No, the only way to elevate yourself is practice more become better as a Servant of Hashem. The only way to become better is not by pushing another person down Is by elevating ourselves being more focused on our traits
Being more conscientious being more truthful meaning being more honest being more kind Is the only way to do it? No one else can take away our virtues and we're not going to be able to push away someone else's virtues By illuminating their flaws There's a famous Teaching that when someone speaks lashon hara what they're doing is they're swapping the mitzvahs and the sins With the other person they're speaking negatively about They're swapping It's it's it's a little extreme
What do you mean if I speak negatively about another person they get my mitzvahs and I get their sins Our sages teach us that what you're trying to do is you're trying to put that seesaw push them down and you elevate That's never gonna happen What's gonna happen is they're going to continue to grow and you're gonna continue to fall Because that's not the way we grow therefore This mitzorah, you know what he needs to do He needs to go out of the community
He needs to distance himself He needs to cover his mouth. He needs to rent his clothes. He needs to announce to everybody. Look at my shame Look at my mistake don't learn from me Don't reside next to me Don't push other people down thinking you're gonna be elevated You know what the result I need to leave town. I need to realize my lowness I need to realize that my state was not elevated It's a really bad habit for a person to speak about other people at all
How it's time says to do everything we can to avoid speaking about another person in Any way we can Stay away from it. I don't talk about other people. I don't talk about other people. I don't talk about other people But I think this is something that we need to address particularly today today being April 2026 I Think it's something that's really necessitating a conversation here and That is The press the media social media all of the different avenues that we have today of
Communicating and I think the biggest in this sin are the people who write articles in the media about other people and I know that people who are in the public whether they be Rabbis Whether they be presidents whether they be mayors or governors or senators or congressmen or women they're in the public eye and people feel like they have the right and the privilege to go and Publicly speak negatively about another person
What our sages teach us is that we have no right to put another person down We have to find a way And I'm not saying this to you. I'm saying this to me. We have to find a way To correct someone as we're going to see in our next parasha discussion For the parasha of Aharon Moshe Kadoshim. We have to find a way to reprimand Someone in a way that's uplifting and what's even worse is when people do things
So let's say someone did something terrible you announce it for the whole world to know It doesn't say that other people announce for the Mitzorah. The Mitzorah himself announces it. I sinned. I made this mistake. We don't see the Kohen going out. Hey, by the way I wanted to clear that this and this person. No, that doesn't happen person themselves Because that will teach them for the future. I made a mistake I need to repair my mistake and I need to not do this again and
When a person has such a painful experience, they hopefully won't do it again. But what happens in our world today? It's celebrated in the media they write an article and Unverified sources anonymous sources and even if they do have sources These are biblical prohibitions to speak negatively about another person Imagine what our world would look like if the media Changed instead of speaking negative spoke positive If it bleeds it leads, right?
That's what they say in the news if it bleeds if it's painful if it's bad only bad news You don't see good news very at the end of their segment They'll say and now a good story and we're gonna share how someone Volunteered at a hospital and they you know, they they share this nice warm and fuzzy story. Oh so beautiful. Okay, move on back to real life Back to the negative to the bleeds it leads
This is not a good habit for society. It's not a good habit for our culture. It's not a good habit for humanity because God invested in each and every one of us God wants us God believes in us as A fellow human being we need to do the same for one another we need to see the goodness of one another we need to see the bright side of another human being This is our calling today. It's not something. Well Oh today. We don't bring an offering today
We don't go outside of the camp. We don't move out. We don't have the leprosy today. We don't have this. So we're fine No, no, no, we're even worse. Who knows if the entire kovat of us symbolically wearing those masks wasn't for us to learn Then in this generation, we need to be more careful about how we speak Maybe that was a sign a sham saying, you know, it's a new world with a new Avenue of communication Where we can hide behind our screen and just write whatever we want
Maybe we have to be a little bit more careful about this Perhaps this is the lesson we can learn from in our parsha where we talk about the mitzorah We talk about this the person with leprosy These signs are for us to learn today Today 2026 for us to learn what it means to be cautious about speaking about another person. No one likes when their name gets defiled in public No one likes when they're called out in public. No one likes when people are
Calling us out calling us to the carpet. You did this you did that in front of other people we could do that privately There's no need for a person you have an issue with someone as we will see next week's Torah portion We will see how this is done properly Because in next week's Torah portion we have the mitzvah of okay. I have to hear it. I'm Itacha to give Proper I Don't want to call it. I would say encouragement more than I would say giving criticism
There's a right way to do it There's there's a way that this needs to be done that doesn't tear people apart that doesn't break relationships Between husband and wife between man and his fellow as Rashi says here Because when a person speaks negatively what happens when the wife hears what was spoken about her husband She thinks in the back of her mind. Maybe my husband is not so good and then she distances herself a friend Might distance himself from his fellow. What happens if it's true? They're weary. They're concerned
We have to be so careful with the words that we use my dear friends have a magnificent Shabbos So that's a very good question an important question. What happens if you know that someone is a swindler and I'm just repeating your question. So and now, you know someone might invest with him and might be cheated Might be robbed of their money of their hard-earned money Do you have to inform them? The answer is yes, but there is a proper way to inform them without
Damaging that person meaning you can say listen this happens by the way, this is very common when it comes to the world of mating of she dog him when a boy and girl are dating you do In in the religious community in the Torah observant community, they do a lot of research a lot of research is done and you call and you ask tell me about this girl and My son is ski was she was this idea was suggested to my son. What should I do?
What what should I know about this girl? Oh, she's magnificent. She's so amazing She has such great this such great that that that that they tell you everything And what happens if there's a major flaw that needs to be known? What do you say? You have to say You have to say So here's what you need to say. This is the proper thing. How logically of what one should say. I Would not approach this idea Not they're bad. I wouldn't
I'm not disclosing the details. Why not? I wouldn't that's enough anybody with eyes Would know would understand anybody with ears with a mind With intelligence would understand exactly what's going on. So you can go to your fellow man and you can say you to your friend. I Know this is unsolicited advice. I'm just telling you I would not invest with this person. Well, why not? I Can't disclose my information. I don't want to disclose my information
I don't want to speak negatively about another person, but I love you very dearly and I know that you'd be Heartbroken if I didn't tell you and You were affected affected never negatively. So now you're not going into the details of what this person did or did not do You're giving your own personal. I would not approach this and That's legitimate because that's protecting your fellow All right.

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