Group None

(17) And sometimes there is yet another negative commandment which is found to be transgressed (in our many sins) — speaking lashon hara against someone in anger, and, at the same time, cursing him — sometimes even by the Name (even if in the vernacular). In doing so, one transgresses an absolute negative commandment viz. (Vayikra 19:14): "Do not curse a deaf man" (the meaning being "even" a deaf man — how much more so, one who is not deaf, as explained in Choshen Mishpat 27:1). We have hereby enumerated seventeen negative commandments which are often attendant upon lashon hara and rechiluth — even if he speaks only to a Jew. (For if he slanders a Jew to a non-Jew, the issur is greater and graver, sometimes entering into the category of massur [informing], as we shall explain, G–d willing, in Hilchoth Lashon Hara, Principle VIII). And (transgression of) many of the aforementioned negative commandments are subject to death at the hands of Heaven — such as demeaning a widow or an orphan or profaning the Name. And many of them have implications for the world to come, such as "whitening" the face of one's friend in public or honoring oneself in the shame of his friend. This, in the instance of one who habituates himself to this grave transgression of lashon hara and rechiluth, all of which will be explained below, God willing.