GC#79 - The Truth Hurts - Perek Shira 10 - The Desert's Song Part 2

Perhaps one of the most poignant one-liners I have encountered is the one which says: ' 'Be yourself', is about the worst advice you can give some people'. We don't always think that some people would find the prospect horrific. As a famous wag once said - 'Why ruin a good story with the truth?'

Picture the scene. The pupil runs into the classroom saying, 'Do you know what so and so said?' The most common automatic response to that is: 'That's Loshon Hora'. The complainant retorts: 'But it's true!' To which everyone else choruses: 'That's exactly what classifies it as Loshon Hora!' This has happened to most of us in our lives. By why is it wrong if it is true? There are quite a few answers to this.

For the purposes of this topic, we need to know this: We don't realise that not only can the truth be hurtful, but it can be distorted, and eventually distort and corrupt the disseminator of that 'truth'. We will see Blake's words ring true: 'a truth that's told with bad intent beats all the lies you can invent'.

In Part 2 of the Desert's Song, we examine how truth can be distorted, how those with tremendous potential can end up not actualising it, and see a hopeful vision of the future, where the midbar will once again express the will of the Medaber, the One who uttered the world into Creation...