Kol Nidrei Sermon: Stick and Stones - on the power of words
“Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can also hurt me.
Stones and sticks break only skin, while words are ghosts that haunt me.
Slant and curved the word-swords fall, it pierces and sticks inside me.
Bats and bricks may ache through bones, but words can mortify me.
Pain from words has left its scar, on mind and heart that's tender.
Cuts and bruises have not healed, it's words that I remember.”
― Ruby Redfort (Lauren Child)
Words are powerful
‘Sticks and stones may break my bones but words can also hurt me’.
We tell our children (and ourselves) to ignore taunts, hurtful comments, and words that are meant to break our skin. And though we would like for words to do no harm, we know that the old sticks and stones adage does not hold true in reality. ‘Pain from words has left its scar, on mind and heart that's tender’.
Words can hurt. They can twist our souls into anguish, they can turn loved ones away from us, they can break bonds, and sometimes bones too.
And yet words are also necessary, they are what bond and bind us, they can be beautiful, uplifting, and they can create new worlds.
Judaism is a religion of words, as is well known. Just look at the size of our prayer book. Where other religions have sacred places, sacred people, sacred time or consecrated rituals, Judaism is primarily about sacred words. God’s first act of creation was to speak; ‘And God said, Let there be - and there was’. The primary form of communication between God and humanity in the Torah is through language. And so, Jewish tradition teaches us that words themselves are sacred, which is why one of the ultimate forms of harm from a Jewish perspective is ‘lashon hara’ - evil language, using words to harm others. Gossip, malicious speech, using words to hurt others is a form of desecration.
‘Slant and curved the word-swords fall, it pierces and sticks inside me’.
Lashon hara can destroy worlds, sever bonds, and divide people. We all recognise this. We know that hurtful words are bad for us and others.
The author of Proverbs goes as far as saying; ‘Death and life are in the power of the tongue’ (Proverbs 18.21), and in the Psalms we find an equally challenging idea: In a multitude of words there is no lack of sin, but [the person] that refrains [their] lips is wise. (Ps10.19)
In paying heed to these sentiments maybe we would be best off not saying anything at all. For whenever someone speaks there’s the possibility of getting it wrong. And yet, not only is language a basic necessity for communicating, it is also a positive and creative force, as our Genesis story tells us.
Words can also be healing, they can enrich the world and make it a more wondrous place to live. Saying “I'm truly sorry” face to face has the power to heal and to change a mind; and responding “I forgive you” - has the power to release a person from their burdens.
Words can bring our relationships to a new level, they can create ways to bridge divides and bring peace. While saying certain words can create something new; ‘harei at mekudeshet li’- behold I betroth you to me. Such words are not simply saying ‘I love you’, but creating a new and binding ‘married’ legal entity. Not affection alone, but effecting. Especially as in Hebrew the term ‘dvar’ can mean both a ‘word’ or a ‘thing’, meaning the spoken word and the new reality are tied.
Words are also creative in other less legal ways. The sociable small talk or greetings when we go for a walk; saying good morning to a stranger, or a quick chat about groceries while waiting in aqueue; these all create and symbolise a sense of welcome, a bond of neighbourliness. Yet in recent months the fear of spreading illness has meant many necessary forms of ‘social glue’ have become less common. The lack of these interactions has highlighted how important they actually are, especially when we can only see each other's eyes over our masks.
The changing nature of communication at present is making it even harder to see the impact of our words. It is hard to read a person’s feelings when they wear a mask and body language is hidden from our screens. And then there are all of the missing words, the silence in queues and looking away when passing another person; these are not a neutral act, and can have potentially damaging effects for us personally and for society as a whole. Because of these barriers to communication we all have to reach much further to overcome misunderstandings, and be much more forgiving of distance and absence.
Social distancing is changing the nature of what it means to be social. We cannot show our care, love or thoughts in the same ways, through hugging or a comforting hand, we will have to find new ways and new words to make up for this.
So for now, we must heavily rely upon thoughtful words that can create worlds of friendship, love, and comfort. We need to caution ourselves from thoughtless words that can confuse, divide and destroy. But importantly also remember that a lack of words can be problematic.
So how can and do we distinguish between the words that are needed and the words that are harmful?
How to distinguish
The most common form of harmful language is lashon hara, deceitful and malicious language, or in modern parlance, gossip. The rabbis define it as any words that are being said about a person that is not present. The Bible says “Do not go up and down as a talebearer among your people” (Leviticus 19:16).
The main problem is that this definition of lashon hara , targets all forms of social conversation, especially the conversations between women. Rabbi Jill Hammer points out that the term ‘gossip’ is not as simple as the patriarchal Jewish tradition has led us to believe.
The word “gossip” comes from the old English word “God-sib”–a close relative bound by ritual ties, a beloved intimate….Some gossip is simply malicious, but networks of “informal communication” can also work for the benefit of individuals and relationships. I know that my own private talks with loved ones–rants, reflections, and ad hoc psychological analyses–are vital to my mental health. Yet some of my words would be labeled by the sages of Jewish tradition as lashon hara (slander), the deadly “evil tongue”...[1]”
Hammer therefore distinguishes between helpful (or serious) and harmful ‘gossip’. In her article she cites Patricia Spacks who says;
“…The gossip I call ‘serious’…. exists only as a function of intimacy… Its participants use talk about others to reflect about themselves, to express wonder and uncertainty and locate certainty, to enlarge their knowledge of one another” (Spacks, p. 5).
Gossip as it is pejoratively termed, is simply a way of communicating. It is part of weaving close bonds with friends, but not necessarily out of maliciousness towards others. It can be a way to use experiences and thoughts to reflect upon and understand our worlds. To define all such talk as harmful gossip, takes away its ability to be both a help in understanding and creating meaning.
“Did you hear what so-and-so did?” can easily turn into harmful gossip. Where as “I find it difficult what so-and-so did, for it makes me feel angry/sad/worried/irritated etc” has the potential and orientation towards self-reflection, and can therefore be helpful.
One way then to distinguish between harmful and helpful words would be to ask ourselves the question; does what I say reflect something about me or someone else? Or as Rabbi Hammer suggests: “Will what I plan to say create meaning or destroy it[2]?” And perhaps we can add, will what I say, or not say, create or destroy relationships?
Lashon hatov
Pain from words has left its scar, on mind and heart that's tender.
Cuts and bruises have not healed, it's words that I remember.”
We know lashon hara in its harmful form. We are all guilty of having used masked malicious speech at some point. We are also aware of helpful ‘gossip’, words that create bonds, and build bridges of understanding and love. But what about lashon hatov[3]- “good speech’? It is something more than helpful gossip, and yet it is almost unspoken about in Jewish tradition.
Lashon hatov is about praise, according to Rabbi Sacks, about motivating people to grow. It is not expansive, general praise but should be thoughtful of a person’s strength and it should be focused so that it helps a person develop. Lashon hatov is the opposite of destructive language, it sees the good in a person, and by verbalising it helps it to become real.
Avoiding lashon hara and harmful language is a focus (and sore point) for many of us, but what about lashon hatov? One of the main lessons of lockdown, and having to teach our own children, was the realisation that I have a tendency to veer into criticism first, looking at mistakes, pointing out all that is wrong, and only then, as an afterthought, perhaps, giving some praise. Importantly, Lashon hatov is not a feedback sandwich. Rather it is a way to highlight and celebrate the good and the positive about a person, and in so doing to help them to grow. How much and how often do we really praise those whom we spend most time with?
Vows
We began this service with a prayer about the power of words and being released from them. In the Kol Nidrei, probably the most iconic Jewish prayer, we are reminded that words are enormously powerful.
“All vows, oaths and promises which we make to God from this Yom Kippur to the next and are not able to fulfil- may all such vows between ourselves and God be annulled. May they be void and of no effect”. (Machzor p.436).
This is not actually a prayer but a legal text, which absolves us not from the vows that we have made but the ones that we will make. In the future. You’d be forgiven by thinking that the focus of the Kol Nidrei should be on the year that has been, asking for an annulment of the vows we have already made.
One suggestion to the reason for this is that it’s a way to ‘let us off the hook’ as one writer suggests; “At the precise time when we’re seeking to start anew and wipe the slate clean, we try to stack the deck in our favor for the coming year by annulling any careless promises in advance” (quote).
Though this might be the case, I think there is another reason for the focus on what will be. We cannot take back what we have said, we cannot remove the hurt that words might have caused no matter how much we would like to. We can apologise, and hope to heal the hurt, but we cannot undo the harm we may have caused. And so, instead of only looking back, the kol nidrei forces us to look ahead immediately, to think about what we might say, and to remind us to be careful. The words we say can be as important as what we do. To change our behaviour in the coming year we have to begin with our words.
[1] https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/harmful-helpful-gossip/
[2] https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/harmful-helpful-gossip/
[3] https://rabbisacks.org/thing-lashon-tov-tazria-metzora-5777/