Parashat Ki Tetze 5786, 2026: "Lashon Hara: The Miriam Moment"

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Rabbi David Etengoff
 
ה' יעזור וירחם על אחינו כל בני ישראל בארץ ישראל ובכל חלקי הארץ
 
Our parasha contains two cases in which the term, “zachor,” is used: Amalek’s attack and Miriam’s punishment for speaking lashon hara. Regarding Miriam the Torah teaches us:

Be cautious regarding the lesion of tzara’ath, to observe meticulously and you shall do according to all that the Levite priests instruct you; as I have commanded them, [so shall you] observe to do. Zachor what Hashem, your God, did to Miriam on the way, when you went out of Egypt. (Sefer Devarim 24:8-9, this and all Tanach and Rashi translations, The Judaica Press Complete Tanach)
 
Rashi (1040-1105), in his midrashically based gloss on our pasuk, suggests this interpretation:

Remember what Hashem, your God, did to Miriam: If you wish to take precautions against being stricken with tzara’ath, then do not speak lashon hara. Remember what was done to Miriam, who spoke against her brother [Moshe] and was stricken with lesions.
 
Rashi’s gloss suggests that this is a narrative passage. Consequently, “Remember what was done to Miriam” is not a mitzvah; instead, it represents Miriam’s punishment for speaking lashon hara.
 
The Rambam (1135-1204) disagrees with Rashi and maintains that Miriam did not speak lashon hara against her beloved brother. At the same time, however, he agrees with Rashi by viewing our verses as descriptive, and not prescriptive, in nature:

The Torah warns about this stating: “Take care with regard to a tzara’ath blemish.... Remember what Hashem your Lord did to Miriam.” Now, this is what the Torah is implying: Contemplate what happened to the prophetess Miriam. She spoke about her brother. She was older than he was; she had raised him; and she had endangered herself to save him from the sea. She did not speak pejoratively of him; [instead,] she merely erred in equating him with the other prophets. Moshe did not object to any of this, as [the Torah] relates: “And the man Moshe was exceedingly humble.” Nevertheless, she was immediately punished with tzara’ath. (Mishneh Torah, Sefer Taharah Hilchot Tum’at Tzara’ath 16:10, translation, Rabbi Eliyahu Touger with my underlining and emendations)
 
In his critical glosses on the Rambam’s Sefer HaMitzvot, the Ramban (1194 -1270) maintains that the phrase, “Zachor what Hashem, your God, did to Miriam,” does, indeed, constitute a mitzvah that is included in the Taryag Mitzvot. Moreover, the Ramban follows Rashi, rather than the Rambam, and maintains that Miriam did, in fact, speak lashon hara against her beloved brother:

The seventh positive commandment which we are commanded to perform, is to remember what the Holy One did to Miriam when she spoke against her brother. This must be done through oral recitations and imprinting Hashem’s action upon our minds. [We must remember that Miriam acted as she did] even though she was a prophetess and had performed overwhelming kindness by saving him [from potentially drowning in the Nile River]. The purpose of this mitzvah is to distance us from lashon hara. (Critical Notes to Maimonides’ Sefer HaMitzvot, Positive Commandments Uncounted by Maimonides, number 7, translation, brackets and markings my own)
 
The Ramban believes that the Torah’s warning against speaking lashon hara is of such singular import that it outweighs the prohibition of publicly embarrassing otherwise righteous individuals who have committed a sin: Thus, he writes in his Commentary on the Torah:
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[Just like there is a mitzvah to remember Amalek’s heinous actions,] so, too, regarding Miriam, we are commanded to make her actions known to our children, and to speak of them throughout the generations. We must do this, even though it would have been proper to hide her behavior, since it is generally proscribed to speak negatively and embarrassingly about righteous individuals. The Torah, however, commanded us to make her actions known and to reveal them, to place the warning against lashon hara in “our mouths.” [This mandate was issued,] since lashon hara is such a great sin that causes overwhelming amounts of evil in the world, nonetheless, people constantly fail [and fall prey to violating this prohibition]. (Commentary on the Torah, Sefer Devarim 25:17, translation, underlining and brackets my own)
 
We are now in Chodesh Elul, the time preeminently dedicated to introspective analysis. It is the period when we evaluate what we have accomplished and where we have fallen short. Perhaps most importantly, it is the time when we review the commitments we have made to Hashem, and those that we have unfortunately broken, so that we may rededicate ourselves to Him. As the Ramban so powerfully notes, “lashon hara is a great sin that causes overwhelming amounts of evil in the world;” therefore, beyond a shadow of a doubt, it demands our undivided attention as we approach the Yamim Noraim. Hopefully, with a deeper understanding of the underlying meaning of our pasuk, “Zachor what Hashem, your God, did to Miriam on the way, when you went out of Egypt,” we will be able to change the way we speak and stop speaking lashon hara.
 
Dovid Hamelech gave voice to these ideas in two of his best-known pasukim in Sefer Tehillim: “Who is the man who desires life, who loves days to see goodness? Guard your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking deceitfully.” (34:13-14) May our renewed recognition of Miriam’s punishment help us “guard our tongue from evil, and may we be zocheh to be inscribed in the Sefer HaChaim. V’chane yihi ratzon.
 
Shabbat Shalom
 
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