Loshon Hora

Idle gossip, which may be true enough, but which has no concern for the wider good of the party being discussed, is rightly warned against by Torah-observant Jews. They call it Loshon Hora. That the ancient rabbis derived the prohibition from Lev. 19:16, a passage which directly precedes the love command - 'Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself' - of Lev. 19:18 makes it doubly interesting. I have little doubt that the love command was taken by ancient Jews - and early Christians - to lie in a significant way in the avoidance of Loshon Hora. St. Paul's excursus on love in 1 Cor. 13 is surely informed by his own awareness of this link: indeed, the following verses seem a pointed recognition of it...

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. (1. Cor. 13:4-7).

The good Christian knows that Loshon Hora is unacceptable. He may learn from his Jewish friends to give it its name, to espy opposition to it being worked out in his scriptures - written as they were by Jews - and to acknowledge the point of overlap between the two traditions, both of which seek to uphold the command to love which both regard as the highpoint of the law. Avoidance of unnecessarily speaking evil about others is essential to the keeping of the commandment to love. Jews and Christians agree on this point.