Another matter, “this shall be the law of the leper.” That is what is written: “But to the wicked one, God says: Who are you to speak of My statutes or to invoke My covenant?” (Psalms 50:16). Ben Azai was sitting and expounding and fire was blazing around him. They said to him: ‘Are you, perhaps, engaging in the protocols of the Chariot?’12The Divine Chariot is understood to have been described by Ezekiel in a very deep and esoteric prophetic vision (Ezekiel chapter 1).
He said to them: ‘No. I am, rather, connecting words of Torah to the Prophets, and Prophets to Writings, and the words of Torah are as joyous as the day they were given at Sinai. The essential giving of the Torah was in fire; that is what is written: “The mountain was burning with fire”’ (Deuteronomy 4:11). Rabbi Levi said: We found in the Torah, in the Prophets, and in the Writings that the Holy One blessed be He does not desire the praise of a wicked person.
From the Torah: “He shall cover his upper lip, and shall cry: Impure, impure” (Leviticus 13:45).13But he shall not call out matters of sanctity and praise of God. From the Prophets: “It was as he was telling the king that he had revived the dead…this is the woman, and this is her son whom Elisha revived” (II Kings 8:5).14The Holy One blessed be He arranged that the woman would recount the miracle before the king and not Geḥazi the leper.
Perhaps she was standing just behind the gate?15Perhaps she just happened to be there, and since the story was about her, she was the one to relate its details. The Rabbis say: Even had she been at the ends of the earth, the Holy One blessed be He would have diverted her and brought her so that this wicked one would not speak in praise of the Holy One blessed be He. From the Writings: “But to the wicked one God says: Who are you to speak of My statutes?” (Psalms 50:16).
Rabbi Elazar said in the name of Rabbi Yosei ben Zimra: There are two hundred and forty-eight limbs in a person, some of them are recumbent and some of them are erect. The tongue is situated between two cheeks. An aqueduct16Saliva. passes beneath it and it is folded into several folds.17It contracts in order to fit into the mouth. Come and see how many fires it ignites; if it stood erect, all the more so.
Therefore, Moses cautions Israel and says: “This shall be the law of the leper [hametzora],” of the defamer [hamotzi shem ra].