Sefer Chofetz Chaim chapter 10, halacha 2

There are 7 prerequisite rules that must be met before you are allowed to speak lashon hara to help a fellow person. We discussed the first two rules:


 There are 7 prerequisite rules that must be met before you are allowed to speak lashon hara to help a fellow person. We discussed the first two rules:

1.      You have to have seen the act with your own eyes or have circumstantial evidence to know what you heard second hand is for sure true. If you just heard something 2nd or 3rd hand with qualifying its authenticity it would be lashon hara to repeat what you heard even if the purpose is to help someone who was stolen from or hurt. However, there is a difference between name calling, meaning dropping a name of the perpetrator, if you only have second hand knowledge, which is forbidden, or just warning someone of what happened without any names. For example, the Rashbam in Bava Basra 39b was saying that people can pass along information that someone’s property might have been taken over by someone else illegally, and this can be passed on person to person until it reaches the owner so that he will be care to bring documentation that he is the real owner. Even though it’s possible the would-be squatter is just taking care of the land since the owner lives some place else, and it all might be a misunderstanding which could result in giving a bad name of a thief to someone, but that is of course forbidden, but what one can do is say I heard someone took over your land, without dropping any names, so that the real owner will put together his proof of ownership.

2.      You can’t jump to conclusions, and make a quick judgement call about what you saw. You have to first digest the matter. See if there is something you missed, do some investigation before reporting what you saw to someone else, to be sure your claim is true. For example, if one is 80% sure he saw someone take something out of someone purse, you can’t just inform the authorities of a certain man who you name which is a thief, you have to first clarify that it is in fact true, for example you can tell the owner you think something was stolen from his purse. If he can confirm that to be true then a name might be able to be revealed in order to get the stolen object back because it is more clear it actually happened. Or if you see someone hurt or embarrass someone else you can just tell people what happened and tell them to stay away from this guy. Research the matter, maybe he was responding to what the victim did to him first. Bottom line, what you saw must be clearly known and understood before telling someone else about it, even if it is to help the victim or help the would-be perpetrator to repent because you have to make sure there is a real perpetrator and understand what exactly he did.