HALAKHAH · SPEECH · 5 OF 5
Love without keeping score
A favor can be given while an old grievance is kept alive. Read how Rambam distinguishes revenge from a grudge, then bring the whole unit into one careful, source-supported account.
In this lesson
What remains after the favor?
In Correct with care, we distinguished a direct conversation from hatred kept inside. The next Torah verse asks us to look at another pair of outward and inward acts: taking revenge and keeping a grudge. Its positive direction is love of our fellow.
This final reading brings the unit together. First learn the distinctions in Rambam's ordinary lending examples. Then work through a new study-group situation using evidence from all five readings. Keep the source references beside your explanations; a good answer shows why it fits.
Refuse revenge; choose love
לֹא־תִקֹּם וְלֹא־תִטֹּר אֶת־בְּנֵי עַמֶּךָ
וְאָהַבְתָּ לְרֵעֲךָ כָּמוֹךָ
אֲנִי יְהוָהDo not take revenge or keep a grudge against the members of your people.
Love your fellow as yourself.
I am Hashem.
Hashem, “the Name,” is our reverent way of referring to God. The verse sets these responsibilities within our relationship with him. It does not stop at removing two wrong responses: it tells us what to cultivate in their place.
The two prohibitions are close, but they are not identical. Nekamah means revenge; netirah is keeping a grudge. Rambam, Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon, makes the distinction concrete in his Mishneh Torah, Laws of Character, chapter 7.
Which positive command follows the two prohibitions?
Love your fellow as yourself. The verse moves beyond rejecting revenge and grudges toward a positive relationship with another person.
Two versions of the same request
In Hilkhot Deot 7:7, Rambam describes a refused request to borrow an axe. The next day, the person who refused needs to borrow. The other answers, in effect, “I will not lend to you, just as you did not lend to me.” Rambam identifies that retaliatory refusal as revenge.
In 7:8, the next request receives a different answer: the person does lend, but points out that he is not like the one who refused him. Rambam identifies this as keeping a grudge. The loan changed; the old score still governs the relationship. These are summaries of Rambam's cases, not his exact wording.
Place the two versions side by side. In the first, the past refusal becomes a reason to withhold a present favor. In the second, the favor is granted while the past refusal is carried into it as a reproach. “But I helped” does not answer everything the second case asks.
What changes between Rambam’s revenge and grudge examples?
In the revenge case, the person refuses the loan in retaliation. In the grudge case, the person grants it while reproaching the borrower for the earlier refusal. The outward favor does not by itself remove the grudge.
A reader says, “Every refusal to lend is revenge.” What fact in Rambam’s example is missing from that claim?
The retaliatory reason: refusing because the other person previously refused. The example identifies a response governed by payback; it does not make every refusal, whatever its reason, the same act.
The work beneath the words
Rambam continues by directing the person to remove the offense from the heart rather than keep nursing it. He connects the remembered grudge with the danger of later revenge. Changing one sentence is a beginning; the deeper work is to stop using the ordinary slight as an account to collect.
In these lending examples, we can ask ourselves whether a present response serves a real need or merely settles an old score. We can address an unresolved wrong directly, as the previous lesson taught, rather than turn unrelated favors into punishments. The distinction matters: naming a problem and planning repair are different from arranging payback.
Why does lending with a cutting reminder still leave work to do?
It preserves the old offense as a reproach. Rambam’s concern reaches the grudge in the heart, not only whether the object changes hands. His explanation connects nursing that grudge with the possibility of later retaliation.
Read a fresh source before explaining it
לפיכך צריך שיספר בשבחו ולחוס על ממונו, כמו שהוא חס על ממון עצמו ורוצה בכבוד עצמו
Therefore he should speak in his praise and care for his property, as he cares for his own property and desires his own honor.
Rambam has just cited “Love your fellow as yourself.” Before reading the answer, identify two areas of life in this excerpt and explain the comparison with oneself. Then imagine what changes when the other person's book or good name receives the same care you want for your own.
How does this excerpt turn love into concrete attention?
It names speech about a person and care for his property. The comparison with our own possessions and desired honor supplies a measure for that attention. Love reaches how we speak and how we treat what belongs to another person.
Read that alongside the earlier chapters of our unit: careless speech can injure a good name; love moves us toward care. The relationship is more exact than simply saying “be nice.” Rambam names particular responsibilities and lets us examine our conduct through them.
Work through the whole situation
Use a blank page for this fictional case. At a study gathering, a shared reference book disappears from its shelf. You saw David carrying a similar book, but did not see its title or who owned it. Someone proposes telling the whole group that David took the missing book. Later, David explains that he moved the shared book to another table and forgot to return it; it is found there. You had needed it for the session. Last week David declined to lend you his personal commentary, and now he asks to borrow yours.
- Separate what was observed from what was assumed before David explained.
- Explain why broadcasting an accusation would be a different act from asking a specific question.
- Draft a private opening about returning shared books to their shelf.
- Compare refusing the commentary to repay last week's refusal with lending it while making a pointed reminder.
- Use the fresh source in 6:3 to propose one positive action, beyond merely avoiding a wrong.
For each step, name a passage and the connection you are making. Keep the answers closed until you have written your own account. Your goal is a reasoned explanation, not guessing a hidden keyword.
Review the evidence and speech portions of your account.
Seeing a similar book did not establish that David took this one. Leviticus 19:15 directs just judgment; 19:16 and Rambam’s discussion of tale-bearing challenge harmful circulation. The later explanation supplies a specific issue: the shared book was not returned to its place. A private, gentle request about that act draws on Deot 6:6–8 without making an accusation of theft.
Review the lending and positive-action portions.
A refusal made to repay last week’s refusal matches the retaliatory structure of Deot 7:7. Lending while reproaching David for last week matches the grudge in 7:8. An action shaped by 6:3 could be returning the shared book to its shelf and caring for it so others can use it. That treats shared property with the attention we want for our own. Explain which fact makes your chosen action relevant.
Change one fact
Now change the situation: the missing item is a necessary safety device, and someone is about to enter a dangerous area without it. Explain what becomes urgent. Then explain what remains uncertain about David. Use Do not stand aside alongside the present lesson.
How can protection and careful judgment belong in the same answer?
Act to keep the person out of danger and obtain appropriate help. That need does not establish who moved the device or justify an unsupported accusation. Leviticus 19:16 places responsibility for another’s life beside the prohibition of tale-bearing; care about speech is not a reason to withhold necessary protection.
At your next session, reconstruct the five-reading sequence in your own words: just judgment, words that travel, active protection, careful correction, and love without payback. Give one source reference and one distinction for each. Then choose a fresh, ordinary fictional example and explain it to a study partner.
Keep the sources open
Leviticus 19:15–18; Rambam, Hilkhot Deot 7:7–8 on revenge and grudges; Hilkhot Deot 6:3 and 6:6–8 on love and correction. This edition shows familiar halakhah numbers in brackets alongside its continuous paragraph numbering.
For the distinct question of what to do after causing harm, continue with Returning and repairing.