In the beginning of Parashat Emor, it says in the Midrash Rabbah, Vayikra Rabbah in the beginning of פרשה כו, on the פסוק אמור אל הכהנים, speak to the Kohanim, so the Midrash quotes the pasuk in תהלים קאפיטל יב פסוק ז, אמרות ה׳ אמרות טהורות, which means the sayings of Hashem are pure sayings. And the Midrash explains, what does the pasuk mean? אמרות בשר ודם אינן אמרות טהורות, the sayings of a human being are not pure sayings. And he explains why, because בנוהג שבעולם, the custom of the world is that מלך בשר ודם נכנס למדינה, a human being, a king, comes into a country, כל בני המדינה מקלסין אותו, so all the people of the country praise him, וערב לו קילוסן, and he likes their praise. So therefore אמר להם, he says to them, למחר אני בונה לכם וכולי, tomorrow I will build you, because he likes the praise, he promises them certain promises. But if ישן לו ולא עמד, if he goes to sleep and doesn't get up, היכן הוא והיכן אמרותיו? Where is he and where are his sayings? Where are his promises? אבל הקדוש ברוך הוא אינו כן, ה׳ is not like that, אלא but, ה׳ אלוקים אמת, ה׳ אלוקים is true, למה הוא אמת? Why is he true? אמר רבי אבין, so Rabbi Avin said, שהוא אלוקים חיים ומלך עולם, because he is the live God and the King forever. The pasuk says, ה׳ אלוקים אמת הוא אלוקים חיים, so the Midrash here explains that the peshat is why is ה׳ אמת, because he is ה׳ חי, he lives forever. And therefore Hashem's promises will always come true, because he lives forever. A king when he promises, it won't necessarily come true, because maybe he'll die and won't be able to fulfill his promises. And therefore his sayings are not necessarily אמרות טהורות, they're not necessarily pure sayings, meaning that it will actually come into being. But Hashem who lives forever, therefore his sayings are emet, they definitely will become true, because he lives forever. Being that the Midrash says this concerning Hashem, and the Midrash gives the reason because Hashem is חיים, therefore what he says are emet, so we must say that the same thing also applies to Yidden. Because the Yidden are also called חיים, as it says in Avot deRabbi Natan the end of פרק לד, based on the pasuk where it says in ואתחנן קאפיטל ד פסוק ד, ואתם הדבקים בה׳ אלוקיכם חיים כולכם היום, you are connected to Hashem your God, so all of you live today. And from here we learn out that the Yidden are considered chayim, that Yidden live, because they are connected to Hashem who is chayim. So from that we understand that just like by Hashem we say that being that he is chayim, so therefore his sayings are טהורות, his sayings are pure, and his sayings come true, so too concerning Yidden, that their sayings must be a type of sayings that comes true. Especially when the Midrash says in Bereishit Rabbah פרשה סז ח, and in Esther Rabbah פרשה ו ב, and in Rut Rabbah פרשה ד ג, and in other places, that צדיקים דומים לבוראם, that צדיקים are similar to their Creator. So whatever we find concerning Hashem, so k'vayachol we have to find something similar by the Yidden. Even though it says it concerning צדיקים, but we know what the pasuk says, ועמך כולם צדיקים, that your nation, they're all צדיקים, umimeila this refers to all Yidden. Umimeila it comes out that just like we say by Hashem that his אמרות, his sayings, are אמרות טהורות, are pure sayings, which means they come true, that they will actually come into maaseh, not like by a human being as his sayings might never come into action, but Hashem's sayings come into action, so too it must be concerning the Yidden that there is a kind of saying by Yidden, kind of אמירה, that definitely become into action. And more than that, by Hashem it's not only that there are two inyanim, two things: his saying, and then you have the action, and we know that when he says something later on he will definitely bring it into action, but it's more than that. Concerning Hashem we know that his saying itself effected and made an action. As it says, בדבר ה׳ שמים נעשו, with the words of Hashem the heaven were made, which means the world was created with the saying of Hashem, so it's not a peshat that his saying later on came into action, but the saying itself had an effect. As it says in פרקי אבות, בעשרה מאמרות נברא העולם, that the world was created with ten sayings. So the sayings themselves were a maaseh. It's not only, as we think in pashut peshat, that Hashem keeps his word, that's what we mean that when he says something he will later on do it, but the word itself is a maaseh, the word itself is an action. And since we compare the Yidden to ה׳, so therefore we must find some kind of speech by Yidden which also is a ma'aseh itself, the speech itself has an effect of a ma'aseh, accomplishes something. What kind of speech do we mean?

So this could be understood from what the Midrash there, a little bit further, it says that מצינו תינוקות בימי דוד, we find the children in the time of דוד, עד שלא טעמו טעם חטא, till they tasted the taste of an עבירה, היו יודעים לדרוש את התורה מ״ט פנים טמא ומ״ט פנים טהור. They were able to learn and darshan the Torah 49 ways to explain tamei and 49 ways tahor. So they were great scholars. והוה דוד מצלי עליהון, דוד דאוונט for them, אתה השם תשמרם, you Hashem should save them, should protect them. אתה השם נטר אורייתא בלבהון, you should protect the Torah in their heart. תנצרם מן הדור זו, you should save them from this generation, etc. And then the Midrash continues, אחר כל השבח הזה, after all this praise, יוצאים למלחמה ונופלים, when they would go to war, they would fall, they would die. And the reason was, the Midrash says, אלא על ידי שהיו בהם דלטורין היו נופלים, because they had people who spoke לשון הרע, that's why they fell. And the Midrash continues to explain how terrible it is to speak לשון הרע. And the Midrash continues and says that לשון הרע affects, kills, three: the one that speaks the לשון הרע, the one that accepts the לשון הרע, and the one that לשון הרע is spoken about. So since the Midrash here explains how terrible it is to speak לשון הרע, to speak the genut, the bad, the evil of another person, so when we want to understand what is a good speech that is expected of a Yid, and we said before that that's a speech that will have a good effect, obviously it must be the complete opposite of לשון הרע. And what is that? The speech of שבח חבירו, the speech concerning the praise of another person. As the Rambam says in הלכות דעות פרק ה׳ הלכה ז׳ that a תלמיד חכם is מספר בשבח חבירו ולא בגנותו כלל, that a תלמיד חכם speaks only praise of his friend and not at all of his genut, of his evil. And later on in פרק ו׳ הלכה ג׳ the Rambam says that מצוה על כל אדם לאהוב את כל אחד ואחד מישראל כגופו, it's a mitzvah on every person to love every single Yid like his own body, שנאמר ואהבת לרעך כמוך, you should love your friend like yourself, and the Rambam says לפיכך צריך לספר בשבחו, therefore you must speak praise on your friend. So this is the good speech that we're talking about here. And as we said before, the speech, the good speech, not only is something that later on will be kept, but it's more than that. Just like by Hashem, the speech itself has an effect of a maaseh, so too, when we say that by a Yid the good speech is speaking בשבח חבירו, we must say that this also has an effect of a maaseh. But lichorah, how do we explain that? How can we say that when you speak שבח חבירו, when you speak praise about another Yid, this itself is a maaseh? What kind of maaseh, what kind of action, what kind of effect does this have?

But the pshat is based on first understanding what we quoted before from the Midrash, and also according to the girsa of the Bach, the Gemara says this in Arakhin דף ט״ו עמוד ב׳, it's also brought down in Yerushalmi Peah פרק א׳ הלכה א׳, and the Rambam in הלכות דעות פרק ז׳ הלכה ג׳ brings it, that lashon hara kills three people. It affects three people: the one that said the lashon hara, the one that accepted the lashon hara, and the one it was spoken about. And lichorah, the question that comes up is, mileh the one that speaks lashon hara is affected because he did an aveirah, he spoke lashon hara which he wasn't allowed to do. The one that heard the lashon hara also did an aveirah, you're not allowed to hear lashon hara. And it's such a terrible aveirah that the Gemara there in Arakhin says that it's compared to the three aveirot of עבודה זרה, גילוי עריות and שפיכות דמים together. So we can imagine why it affects the one that spoke the lashon hara and the one that heard the lashon hara. But the one that the lashon hara was spoken about, why does it affect him? Why should he suffer from it when he didn't participate in the aveirah, it was just spoken about him, why should it affect him? So the explanation that is given to this is because the characteristic, the quality of speech is that it brings out things from helem to gilui, from being covered up to becoming revealed. Just like by the person himself, the idea of speech is that things that he has in his mind, in his machshavah, in his thought, which is not bagilui, not revealed, people do not know what he has in his mind. The inyan of דיבור is that you bring out, you reveal what you had hidden in your מחשבה. Because a person when he speaks, it is the revelation of his מחשבה. First it has to be in his mind, in his thought, and from there it comes out into דיבור, into speech. So the תוכן, the quality of דיבור, of speech, is that it brings out from העלם to גילוי, from things which are revealed, hidden, to becoming revealed. And therefore When you speak about someone's evil which is there, because we know that lashon hara means that you're saying things which are true, as the Rambam פסקנט in Hilchot Deot and brought down in Shulchan Aruch etc., מוציא שם רע, that's when you speak things which are not true. Lashon hara is when it's true, which means that you're talking about an evil which exists in the person. But it's possible that the evil that's there in that person is hidden, and maybe it'll stay hidden and never come out into the open. When someone speaks about that evil that's within that person, and since speech has the תוכן, the quality, of bringing out from העלם to גילוי, so therefore this could have an effect that that person's evil will come out into the open. Which is actually the reason why the Gemara says in Ketubot דף ח עמוד ב, and the way the Maharsha explains it, that לעולם אל יפתח אדם פיו לשטן, a person should never open his mouth to say bad things. And the reason for that is because possible that there was a גזירה on this person, a decree that a bad thing should happen, but maybe it will remain בהעלם, it will remain covered up and never come into actual being, as it says in Sefarim that this happens many times. But by someone bringing it out in words, in speech, this brings it out from העלם to גילוי, reveals it, and therefore it would come true. That's the power of speech. We find in a Sefer Meah Shearim written by the Baal HaTanya, so he writes there that many times his Rabbi, the Mezritcher Maggid, would say certain things which no one understood. And the reason why he did that was he said, because there are certain thoughts that came into his mind, and by him saying it, this brings it, the גילוי into the world, that later on someone might also think of it and someone might understand it. If he wouldn't have said it, it would have just remained in his מחשבה, in his thought, it would have remained בהעלם, remained covered up, and so to speak it didn't come into the גילוי in the world, and therefore no one later is able to get it. After someone already says it, then it's already בגילוי in the world, and it could be absorbed and taken by other people also. In other words, the ענין of דיבור is to bring out the גילוי of what's there בהעלם. And that's the reason why lashon hara could affect the person who it's spoken about, because it could bring out the רע, the evil that he has בהעלם into גילוי. If this is said concerning lashon hara, which is מדה רעה, a מידת פורענות, a punishment, and we know the rule that מרובה מדה טובה ממידת פורענות, that when it comes to a good middah it's always better than a מידת פורענות, than bad, 500 times as much, the Gemara says in Sotah דף י״א עמוד א, and Rashi brings it in Yisro, קפיטל כ׳ פסוק ו׳. So certainly when it comes to speaking good about someone else, that it's possible that there is a certain good in the person which is בהעלם, which is covered up, by a person, someone else, speaking about the shevach, the praise of that person, this could bring it out into גילוי, this could bring it out into the open. So it comes out here that when a person speaks בשבח חבירו, in the praise of another person, so this actually has an effect like a maaseh, it has an effect like an action. This actually brings out that other person's good מן ההעלם אל הגילוי, from being covered up to becoming revealed. So here we see already where we find a similarity between the דיבור of a Yid to the דיבור of Hashem. Just like we say Hashem's דיבור actually is a maaseh, that brought about the creation of the world, the דיבור, the speech of a Yid, when you speak בשבח חבירו, the praise of your friend, the opposite of lashon hara, then this is a maaseh, and it brings about the good that the other person has בגילוי.

This could also be a deeper explanation in the מאמר חז״ל in Pirkei Avos that הוי דן את כל האדם לכף זכות. You should judge everybody l'chaf zechut, to the side of merit. And the פשטות, the כפשוטו, the way the מפרשים learn and it seems the pshat, that means that when you see someone do something that's no good, you always have to find an excuse that probably the reason he did it because he had no choice, and something forced him, but really he didn't mean to do it as a bad thing, etc., etc., etc. But according to this, the לשון, the expression in Pirkei Avos is not understood, and it's not a zechut. All you're doing is you're showing how it's not a חובה, how it's not bad what he did. But it's not a zechut. A zechut usually is used for something good, for a merit. It can't turn into a merit. At best, you could just show that it's not bad. How can you, when you see something bad done by somebody, be done in such a way that you should turn it into a zechut, into good? The best that you could do is show that it's not really bad, it's not his fault. But the pshat as we said before is, that when you see someone do something bad and he was forced into it, etc., as the cheshbon that we make, now the question is why did Hashem bring about that this person should have to go through such nisyonot, such Since we're saying that we're דן him l'chaf zechut, meaning that we always find an excuse, it's not his fault, he was just put to the to the spot, etc., etc. Why did Hashem put him into such a position that he should have such a problem? Obviously, Hashem gave him the ability to withstand the nisayon. Maybe someone else was not put into this position because Hashem saw that that person doesn't have the ability to withstand this test. This person, Hashem saw, did have the ability, and that's why Hashem put him to the test. Now, even though it seems that that person is not withstanding the test, the reason could be because that koach, that power, that strength that he has to withstand the test remained בהעלם within him, it's hidden within him. When a person brings out how that is only a test, and really that person is not at fault, etc., etc., and really you are explaining that this person has the kochot, the strength to withstand the test, the proof is from the fact that Hashem gave him the test, so then what will happen is you will actually bring out the koach that the person has to withstand the test, and he will next time withstand the test. Which means when the Mishnah says הוי דן את כל האדם לכף זכות, when you see someone do something bad, you should dan l'chaf zechut, so it doesn't only mean you should say, well, it's not his fault. You should add that this is also a zechut. This shows a merit in that person. This shows how special that person is, what kind of zechut he has, that he has a special koach to withstand such a hard test. And when a person says it that way, so then actually it brings out that koach from him, בגלוי, that he will be able to withstand the test. And this is connected to what Rashi brings in the beginning of the פרשה on אמור אל הכהנים, that it means להזהיר גדולים על הקטנים, that the gedolim, the adults, have to warn the ketanim, make sure that the ketanim, the children, do the mitzvot. There it's talking about the tumah of kohanim, etc., etc. Now the לשון להזהיר has a meaning also from the לשון זוהר, which means to shine. That when the gedolim, meaning not only in age, but when somebody who is greater than somebody else, when he has to affect the other person, he has to do it in the form of זוהר, in the form of shine, which means the way to affect the other person is by bringing out the מעלות of the other person, being מספר בשבח חבירו, talking about the praises of the other person, bringing out the light of the other person, and this is the way you're takeh gonna have an effect on the other person, on the katan, whether it's a katan in age or a katan in knowledge or a katan in action because he doesn't do properly the תורה ומצוות. But by doing this, will bring out his zechuyot and this will help him continue to do only good things, only zechuyot, only מצוות ומעשים טובים.