Behar-Bechukotai 5772

This week’s double parsha begins with the mitzvah of shemitah (sabbatical year), the commandment to leave fields fallow for an entire year, every seven years. This is a tremendous test of the farmer’s faith in G-d that there will be enough food to sustain him and his family during the seventh and eighth years of the agricultural cycle.

Torah interrupts its discussion of shemitah to introduce the prohibition of onaah, wrongdoing. “When you sell to your fellow or buy from your fellow, do not wrong each other…And you shall not wrong, one man his fellow, and you shall fear your G-d, for I am the L-rd, your G-d.”

Why does Torah introduce the prohibition of onaah in the midst of laws about shemitah? If the first prohibition refers to behavior during sales and purchases, what form of onaah does the second address?

Rabbi Yissocher Frand cites the Beis Av who explains that the point of shemitah is to remind us that what we have, and how much we have of it, comes from G-d.  By extension, there can be no point of cheating. Writes Rabbi Frand: “A person may think that he can beat the game. He may think that his underhanded methods will bring him additional money that he would not have otherwise. But if he honestly believes that everything comes from G-d, he certainly cannot expect to outsmart Him…In the end, the bottom line will be what G-d wants it to be.”

The commentators interpret the second verse as referring to the prohibition of onaat devarim, doing harm with one’s words. Why does this injunction appear in the midst of laws about shemitah? Rabbi Frand makes this connection: “The motivation behind snide remarks is really a lack of satisfaction with one’s own portion in life. It reflects an insufficient trust and faith in G-d.”  When we speak badly about a person, it is just as if we have cheated him in a business transaction – we have diminished him in order to enrich ourselves.  The verse concludes with “I am the L-rd, your G-d” in order to remind us that only G-d has the ultimate say on one’s portion in life.

Talmud (Bava Metzia 58b) provides examples of onaat devarim. One is not permitted to remind a penitent of past transgressions. To a person who has rectified his behavior, such a reminder can be painful and embarrassing. As parents, we should keep this in mind when speaking to our children, or when sharing humorous stories about them. No child is comfortable recalling how difficult he was as a toddler; no young adult wants herself or others to hear about the trouble she got into as a teen. Once children have matured and moved beyond old behaviors there is no need to embarrass them with outdated stories.