The Pure Words of God and the Slanderous Tongue That Kills Three

Rabbi Tanhum son of Hanilai opened: "The words of the LORD are pure words, silver refined in a crucible on the earth, purified sevenfold" (Psalms 12:7). Rabbi Tanhum son of Hanilai said: The words of the LORD are pure words; the words of the Holy One, blessed be He, are [true] words, but the words of flesh and blood are not [reliable] words. In the way of the world, a mortal king enters a province, and the people of the province praise him, and their praise is pleasing to him, and he says to them: Tomorrow I will build you bathhouses, tomorrow I will bring you a water channel; then he goes to sleep and never rises again. Where is he, and where are his promises? But the Holy One, blessed be He, is not so; rather, "the LORD God is truth" (Jeremiah 10:10). What is "truth"? Rabbi Abun said: that He is the living God and eternal King (Jeremiah 10:10). "Pure": Rabbi Judah in the name of Rabbi Yohanan, and Rabbi Berekhiah in the name of Rabbi Eleazar, and Rabbi Jacob of Kefar Hanin, and some say it in the name of Rabbi Joshua ben Levi: We find that the Holy One, blessed be He, bent two or three words in the Torah so as not to bring forth an impure expression from His mouth, as it is written, "Of every clean animal take to yourself seven" (Genesis 7:2), but of the animal that is impure it is not written here "impure," rather "that is not clean, two, a male and its mate" (Genesis 7:2). Rabbi Judah son of Rabbi Menasheh said: And when He came to set out for them the signs of the impure animal, He opened only with the signs of the clean animal: "the camel, because it does not part the hoof" is not written thus, but rather "because it brings up the cud" (Leviticus 11:4); "the rock-badger, because it does not part the hoof" is not written thus, but rather "because it brings up the cud" (Leviticus 11:5); "the hare, because it does not part the hoof" is not written thus, but rather "because it brings up the cud" (Leviticus 11:6); "the pig, because it does not bring up the cud" is not written thus, but rather "because it parts the hoof" (Leviticus 11:7). Rabbi Yose of Maliha, Rabbi Joshua of Sikhnin in the name of Rabbi Levi: Little children in the days of David, before they had tasted the taste of sin, knew how to expound the Torah in forty-nine faces of impurity and forty-nine faces of purity. And David would pray over them and say, "You, O LORD, will guard them" (Psalms 12:8): guard their Torah within their hearts; "You will preserve him from this generation forever" (Psalms 12:8): from that generation that is liable to destruction. And after all this praise, they would go out to war and fall, because there were informers among them; therefore they went out to war and fell. This is what David said: "My soul is among lions; I lie among those who blaze" and so on (Psalms 57:5). "My soul is among lions": these are Abner and Amasa, who were lions in Torah. "I lie among those who blaze": these are Doeg and Ahithophel, who blazed after slander. "Men whose teeth are spears and arrows" (Psalms 57:5): these are the men of Keilah, as it is written, "Will the masters of Keilah hand me over, me and my men?" and so on (1 Samuel 23:12). "And their tongue a sharp sword" (Psalms 57:5): these are the Ziphites, as it is written, "When the Ziphites came and said to Saul" and so on (Psalms 54:2). At that hour David said before the Holy One, blessed be He: Master of the worlds, what is the Divine Presence doing on earth? "Be exalted above the heavens, O God" (Psalms 57:6); remove Your Presence from among them. But the generation of Ahab were all idol-worshippers, and because there were no informers among them, they would go out to war and conquer. This is what Obadiah said to Elijah: "Was it not told to my lord what I did when Jezebel killed the prophets of the LORD?" and so on (1 Kings 18:13); if bread, why water? Rather, this teaches that the water was harder for him to bring than the bread. And Elijah proclaimed at the head of Carmel and said, "I alone am left a prophet to the LORD" (1 Kings 18:22), and all the people knew it and did not make it known to the king. Rabbi Samuel son of Nahman said: They say to the serpent: Why are you found among the fences? It said to them: Because I am the one who breached the fence of the world. Why do you go along with your tongue darting? It said to them: Because it caused me [my downfall]. Why do all beasts and animals bite without killing, while you bite and kill? It said to them: "If the serpent bites without a whisper" (Ecclesiastes 10:11); is it possible that I do anything unless I am told from on high? And why do you bite one limb and all the limbs feel it? It said to them: To me you say this? Say it to the master of the tongue, who speaks here and kills in Rome. And why is its name called "the third one"? Because it kills three: the one who speaks it, the one who receives it, and the one of whom it is spoken. And in the days of Saul it killed four: Doeg who spoke it, Saul who received it, Ahimelech of whom it was spoken, and Abner. Why was Abner killed? Rabbi Joshua ben Levi, Rabbi Shimon ben Lakish, and the rabbis. Rabbi Joshua ben Levi said: because he put his own name before David's name, as it is written, "And Abner sent messengers to David on his behalf, saying: Whose is the land?" (2 Samuel 3:12); he wrote "From Abner to David." And Rabbi Shimon ben Lakish said: because he made the blood of young men into sport, as it is written, "And Abner said to Joab: Let the young men arise and make sport before us" (2 Samuel 2:14). And the rabbis said: because he did not wait for Saul to be reconciled with David, when he said, "And my father, see, yes see, the corner of your robe" and so on (1 Samuel 24:11); Abner said to him: What do you want from this fellow? You caught it on a thorn. And when they came near to the encampment, David said, "Will you not answer, Abner?" (1 Samuel 26:14): you said about the corner that it caught on a thorn; how then did the spear and the water-jug catch on a thorn? And some say: because it was within his power to protest against the slaughter of Nob, the city of priests, and he did not protest. Rabbi Hanan son of Pazi expounded the verse with regard to the portion of the heifer, which has in it sets of seven and seven: seven heifers, seven burnings, seven sprinklings, seven washings, seven impure, seven pure, seven priests. If a person says to you they are fewer, say to him: Moses and Aaron too were included, "And the LORD spoke to Moses and to Aaron, saying: This is the statute of the Torah" (Numbers 19:1, 2).