[Avodah] Publicizing a Chillul Hashem

Harry Maryles hmaryles at mail.yahoo.com
Wed Dec 2 19:47:51 PST 2020


On Dec 2, 2020, at 8:50 PM, Akiva Miller via Avodah <avodah at lists.aishdas.org> wrote:
> I'm currently discussing a specific event on Areivim, and this is the
> place to ask my question in general terms:

> If someone commits a public Chillul Hashem, of course we must protest
> it to the onlookers, to impress upon them how awful and unacceptable
> such behavior is. I think Pinchas is an adequate demonstration of this.

> My question concerns the people who DON'T know about the event. Is it
> a chiyuv / mitzva / good idea to inform them about this, so that we can
> tell them how awful it was and that they should not do such things?

There are several issues to consider. For one thing if someone commits a
CH, it rarely stays confined to the people who witnessed it. To keep it
confined only to the people who you know saw it risks giving a message to
others that might have also seen it that Judaism is OK with what happened.

And if it becomes known due to media publicity, then in my view it
must be protested in kind. The more people that hear your condemnation
the less of a risk that bad behavior will be seen as acceptable to us,
thus contributing to the CH.

Now if you are absolutely certain that nobody saw it, (which I’m not
entirely sure is even possible) then publicizing it has no Tachlis. But
that does not let you off the hook. You still have to give hochacha to
person who did it to prevent him from doing it again. The one thing you
can never do in the face of a CH is to ignore it.

My two cents.

HM
Sent from my iPhone, Shirley.



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