[Avodah] newspapers and LH

[Daniel Israel]

Micha Berger wrote:
> On Tue, Apr 22, 2008 at 10:31:12AM -0700, Liron Kopinsky wrote:
> : The end of the 3rd perek of Megillah (25b) seems to say that if it is known
> : that someone is an adulterer that it is permissible to embarrass them in
> : public....
> 
> : Unless I'm understanding the Gemarrah incorrectly, it seems that there are
> : some halachically permissible ways for spreading news about people in this
> : way...
> 
> It could be the pesaq is bedi'eved -- you shouldn't have been told,
> but if you were... Hil' geneivah have many laws about what to do with
> stolen objects; that doesn't imply that there is a case where theft
> is permissable.

Except that the CC seems to indicate that one who says LH is suspected 
of speaking sheker.  So in a bedi'eved case where you shouldn't have 
been told, it is LH, so you can't believe it, because a person who will 
say LH would also say sheker, and therefore the can be no heter to act 
on it.  So the gemara must be speaking of a case where it was muttar for 
the person to tell you, and moreover, you know it was muttar.

-- 
Daniel M. Israel
dmi1 at cornell.edu