The Power of Speech [PRAYER]

Prayer must be spoken out in actual words – literally. It is not enough to think the prayers. It is true that God knows what we are thinking. But the words have to be spoken, because speech is the vessel with which we receive the flow of blessings. According to our words, so is the blessing we receive.

One who perfects his speech can receive abundant blessings through the vessels he forms with his words. This is why we must actually articulate our prayers with our mouths.

Likutey Moharan I, 34

Guard your tongue

Never let a word of wickedness leave your mouth. Don’t ever say you will be wicked or commit a sin, even if you mean it as a joke and have no intention of carrying out your words.

The words themselves can be very damaging. They can compel you to fulfill them even though you did not mean them seriously.

This was what caused King Jehu’s downfall, because he said, “Ahab served Baal a little, but Jehu will serve him very much” (II Kings 10:18). When King Jehu said these words, he had no intention of committing idolatry. He said them only to trick the Baal worshipers, as explained in the following verse. Yet these words were his downfall, because he later came to commit idolatry.

From this the Talmud learns that “a covenant is made with the lips” (Sanhedrin 102a). You should therefore be very careful about what you say.

Sichot Haran #237

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Speaking derogatorily about other people reinforces the hold of fantasy and illusion over us. When people use bad language and speak derogatorily about others, their spiritual awareness and understanding are withdrawn from them and they fall from the love of God and descend into animalistic passions and desires. The source of these passions and desires is man’s faculty of imagination, which is part of his animal nature. Imagination feeds on falsehood and slander and is directly opposed to the faculty of memory with which we keep our true situation in this life and our eternal destiny in the forefront of our minds.

Those who abuse language fall into forgetfulness, which is the death of the heart. Their heart dies within them and they never remember that the true goal of our life in this world is the eternal life of the world to come. Such people are dead even in their lifetime, because they have no conception of their true goal and purpose.

Likutey Moharan I, 54

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Speech is the breath of the lips of the Holy One, blessed be He. To abuse it is to turn it into a “raging storm­ wind” (Psalms 148:8). This raging storm wind is the great accuser – the source of all man’s trials and challenges. This wild spirit erodes man’s very flesh. It is the root of all the slander, falsehood and evil that people speak about each other. It is called the “end of all flesh” (Genesis 6:13) because it wastes and destroys man’s flesh and his very life. All this is the result of abusing speech.

Likutey Moharan I, 38

Taken from THE ESSENTIAL RABBI NACHMAN.

By Azamra Institute, Israel.