Truth Magazine

By Ron Daly

God’s word warns against the improper use of the tongue in both the Old and New Testaments. James chapter 3 should be read and studied regularly as it shows how serious the misuse of the tongue is. James presents the tongue as “a little member that boasteth great things” (v. 5), “a fire, the world of iniquity among our members, which defiles the whole body, which sets on fire the wheel of nature, and is set on fire by hell” (v. 6), “a restless evil, full of deadly poison, that no man can tame” (v. 8), “Therewith bless we the Lord and Father; and therewith curse we men” (v. 9), a member which “out of the same mouth cometh forth blessings and cursing” (v. 10), a member of the body which is used for evil purposes by those who are not characterized by the wisdom which is from above, but who are filled with I ‘bitter jealously and faction in the heart” (v. 14), “wisdom not from above, but which is earthly, sensual, devilish; and filled with confusion and every vile deed” (vv. 13-18). Please, consider with me some of the important texts and words in the Old and New Testaments which relate to our subject of study.

Old Testament Words and Passages

Backbiter. There are two Hebrew words which are translated “backbiter.” The first is ragal, and means “one who goes about maliciously as a slanderer, one who speaks maliciously about another” (cf. Brown-Driver-Briggs Lexicon, p. 920, Gesenius’ Hebrew-Chaldee Lexicon, p. 756). This word is used by David in (Psa. 15:1-3), where it is written, “Yahweh, who shall dwell in thy tabernacle? Who shall dwell in thy Holy hill? He that walketh uprightly, and worketh righteousness, and speaketh truth in his heart; He that slandereth (ragal) not with his tongue, Nor doeth evil to his friend, Nor taketh up a reproach against his neighbor. . . “

The second word is sether, and it means “a secret slanderer, or hidden gossip, one of sly tongue” (Wilson’s Old Testament Word Studies, p. 26, Brown-Driver-Briggs Lexicon, p. 712, Genesius’ Hebrew-Chaldee Lexicon, p. 597). Proverbs 25:23 says, “The north wind bringeth forth rain; So doth a backbiting (sether) tongue an angry countenance.” The point of the inspired writer is, no one is made happy to discover that he has been the object of hidden slander and gossip!

Mouth. The Hebrew word is peh. Proverbs 13:3 says, “He that guardeth his mouth keepth his life; But he that openeth wide his lips shall have destruction.” The teaching of this text is “the one who opens his mouth” speaks on every subject, gives his opinion on every matter, even those things which he does not know; and even if he does know whereof he speaks, he should not for the things about which he speaks are none of his business! And, by “opening wide his lips” by engaging in gossip, destruction will be his end. As an old commentator wrote, “God gave us two eyes, and two ears, but one tongue fenced with teeth!”

Slander(er). The Hebrew word dibbah, meaning “Whispering, defamation, evil report, calumny, to spread a rumor” (Brown-Driver-Briggs Lexicon, p. 179, Genesius, Hebrew-Chaldee Lexicon, p. 184). “He that hideth hatred is of lying lips; And he that uttereth a slander (dibbah) is a fool” (Prov. 10:18). Another Hebrew word is lashan which means, “to tongue or make tongue, to use the tongue boldly, to slander, to backbite” (Brown-Driver-Briggs Lexicon, p. 546, Gesenius’ Hebrew-Chaldee Lexicon, p. 443). “Whoso privily slandereth his neighbor, him will I destroy: Him that hath a high look and a proud heart will I not suffer” (Psa. 101:5). This text describes a person of a triple tongue, (1) The man who is slandered, (2) The one to whom the slanderer communicates the slander, and (3) The man who is himself the slanderer. Hence, three deadly wounds are inflicted!

Talebearer. This word comes from two Hebrew words. The first is nirgan which means, “a chatterer, a garrulous person; hence a whisperer, calumniator, a backbiter” (Brown-Driver-Briggs Lexicon, p. 920, Gesenius’ Hebrew Chaldee Lexicon, p. 567). In Proverbs 18:8 it is stated, “The words of a whisperer are as dainty morsels, and they go down into the innermost parts. ” The teaching is that the busybody is a meddling croaker whose words are dangerous because they are eagerly listened to by others! The second word is rakil which describes a “slanderer, defamer, detractor” (Brown-Driver-Briggs Lexicon, p. 940, Gesenius’ Hebrew-Chaldee Lexicon, p. 769). In Leviticus 19:16, Yahweh said, “Thou shalt not go up and down as a talebearer among thy people: neither shalt thou stand against the blood of thy neighbor: I am Yahweh.” Proverbs 11:13 says, “He that goeth about as a talebearer revealeth secrets; But he that is of a faithful spirit concealeth a matter. ” Proverbs 20:19 says, “He that goeth about as a talebearer revealeth secrets; Therefore company not with him that openeth wide his lips.” The teaching is, A walking busybody is one who trades in scandal, revealing what has been confided in him, and told in confidence; he is a newsmonger! A gossiper needs two things in order to thrive and they are: (1) someone or something to gossip about, and (2) someone to gossip to. We should supply neither! Where there is no tale receiver, there will be no talebearer.

Whisperer. Again the Hebrew word nirgan which means “a backbiter.” Proverbs 16:28, “A perverse man scattereth abroad strife; And a whisperer separateth chief friends.” The ambition of the backbiter is to destroy friendships by spreading rumors, scandal, and unfounded allegations, lies, or half-truths in order to create distrust and suspicion.

New Testament Words and Passages

Whisperer. The Greek word is psithurismos which means “to speak into one’s ear, secret slander” (cf. Thayer’s Greek Lexicon, p. 676, Bauer, Arndt-Gingrich’s Lexicon, p. 901). Paul said in 2 Corinthians 12:20 that he did not want to find the saints in Corinth with “strife, jealousy, wraths, factions, backbitings, whisperings (psithurismoi), swellings, tumults.” Also see Romans 1:29.

Backbite. The Greek word is katalalos which means “to slander, to speak evil of” (cf. Bauer, Arndt-Gingrich’s Lexicon, p. 413, Thayer’s Greek Lexicon, p. 333). This is listed among those things which are objects of the wrath of God (Rom. 1:18-32).

Busybody. The Greek word is periergazomai which means “one who meddles with, or bustles about other people’s matters, one who is unnecessarily inquisitive about the affairs of others” (cf. Thayer’s Greek Lexicon, p. 502, Bauer, Arndt-Gingrich’s Lexicon, p. 652). In 2 Thessalonians 3:11 Paul wrote, “We hear of some among you idle, that work not at all, but are busybodies.” See also 1 Thessalonians 4:11.

Meddler. The Greek word is allotrioepiskopos which means, “an overseer of business belonging to another, possibly an informer of other’s affairs” (cf. Thayer’s Greek Lexicon, p. 29, Bauer, Arndt-Gingrich’s Greek Lexicon, pp. 39,40). In 1 Peter 4:15 the apostle commands, “Let none of you suffer as a murderer, or a thief, or an evil-doer, or as a meddler in other men’s matters.”

Prating. The Greek word is phluareo which means “to bring unjustified charges against, malicious gossip, unfounded rumors” (cf. Thayer’s Greek Lexicon, p. 655, Bauer, Arndt-Gingrich’s Lexicon, p. 870). According to 3 John 10, Diotrephes was “prating” against John and the brethren.

Tattler. The Greek word is phluaros which means “a babbler, one who bubbles or boils over (with words), one who gossips” (cf. Thayer’s Greek Lexicon, p. 655, Bauer, Arndt-Gingrich, p. 870). In 1 Timothy 5:13, Paul writes of young women who “learn to be idle, going about from house to house: and not only idle, but tattlers (phluaroi) also and busybodies, speaking things which they ought not.”

Distinguishing Between Gossip, Whispering, and Backbiting

How Do We Know What May Properly Be Spoken or Asked?

Gossip is wrong because it involves idle talk, chatter, verbal nonsense, news spread by a tattler, rumors, information without fact or substance. The word as a noun refers to the person who chatters or repeats idle talk and rumors, especially about the private affairs of others. It is not wrong to inquire about or into the spiritual or physical well-being of others. It is not wrong to receive information about the spiritual and physical state of others. It is right to be concerned about brothers and sisters in the Lord. We have apostolic precedent for this (Eph. 6:21-22; Phil. 1:27; 1 Cor. 1:11).

The following questions with the appropriate answers are critical in assisting us in determining what should and what should not be spoken; what should and what should not be heard. (1) Will I help or hurt the person’s character by repeating this information? (2) Would it be better left untold, even if true? (3) Will anyone be edified if I repeat this information? (4) What is my motive for telling it? (5) Am I really seeking to build or destroy, to hurt or heal? (6) Will I cause unnecessary suspicion to surround the person by repeating the information? (7) Is the information true? (8) Is there any basis for it? (9) Is it rumor or innuendo? (10) Will anybody be made better by telling it? (11) Is the information about something which has been made right with God and man? (12) Is the information about something which has been repented of and stopped? If so, shouldn’t it be left alone? (13) Will I help the one who is spreading the rumors by receiving what he is telling? (14) Do I want to be an accessory in the commission of a sin against another person by receiving information which I should not be privy to? (15) Will I feel better towards the one being talked about by hearing the idle talk being spread about him by a gossiper? (16) Am I assisting in strengthening the character of one whom I allow to gossip about others? (17) Or am I becoming a party to their evil doings? (18) Can I with good conscience say that I am a friend of one from whom I receive information about the private affairs of others? (19) Am I responsible for the unfaithfulness of others when they have been hardened by the deceitfulness of sin through my assistance by spreading unfounded charges about them, or by listening to others do the same? (20) How many people have left active service to Christ by my going to them with unfounded charges and allegations received from others?

What Should One’s Attitude He Toward Those Who Backbite, Whisper, and Gossip?

Do not fuel the fire of such a poisonous snake. Do not be a tale receiver. Do not let “the dog bring a bone, and he will not carry one away!”

Tell those who are guilty of such a sin to mind their own business, do their own work, and stay home (1 Thess. 4:11).

Do not associate with a gossiper (Prov. 20:19; 2 Thess. 3:14-15). Stay as far away as possible from such a person, for they are like rodents that scour dump sites, looking for any piece of dead refuse which the maggots have not already consumed!

Expose by name, all those who persist in this vicious sin, so that the weak and unsuspecting will know who they are in order to rebuke and avoid them (Eph. 5: 11; 3 Jn. 9-11).

Guardian of Truth XXXVI: 15, pp. 464-465
August 6, 1992

By Steve Wolfgang

Footnote: Bernard A. Weisberger, “Reflections on the Dry Season,” American Heritage, May/June 1990, 28-30.

Through the years, there has been a useful body of pertinent research done by well-recognized historians on the general background of Prohibition.

For example, Bernard Weisberger, a nationally-recognized historian who writes a current-events column (“In the News”) for the popular historical journal American Heritage, recently addressed the widespread (niis)conception that Prohibition “didn’t work.” Among the facts cited by Weisberger are:

“Prohibition did reduce drinking. The average annual per capita consumption of alcohol by Americans of drinking age – that is, the total alcoholic content of all the beer, wine, and distilled spirits they consumed – stood at 2.60 gallons” in 1910. In 1934, after more than a decade of prohibition, Weisberger reports the per capita average of 0.97 gallons.

“Census Bureau studies show that the death rate from chronic or acute alcoholism fell from 7.3 per 100,000 in 1907” to “2.5 in 1932, Prohibition’s last year. Deaths from cirrhosis of the liver, one cause of which is alcohol abuse, dropped from 14.8 per 100,000 in 1907 to 7.1 in 1920 and never rose above 7.5 during the 1920’s. Economic studies estimated that savings and spending on household necessities increased among working-class families during the period, possibly from money that once went to drink.” These are not the propaganda of some biased zealot, but the factual report of a nationally-known historian. Furthermore, Weisberger reports that one reason why Prohibition may be commonly thought so unsuccessful is that even the above improvements were achieved with a minimum of enforcement. He continues:

“Drinking might have been cut back even further if more resources had been devoted to enforcement. In 1922 Congress gave the Prohibition Bureau only $6.75 million for a force of 3,060 employees (including clerical workers) to hunt for [violators] in thousands of urban neighborhoods, remote hollows, border crossings, and coastal inlets. State legislators were equally sparing: in 1926 state legislatures all together spent $698,855 for Prohibition work, approximately one eighth of what they spent on enforcing fish-and-game laws. Even so, by 1929 the feds alone had arrested more than half a million violators.”

Nor is this “new” information; a 1968 article by historian of science John C. Burnham of Ohio State University in the Journal of Social History revealed even more data along the lines Weisberger adduces. To imply that attempts to restrict alcohol sales can’t be effective ignores the available evidence. Professor Norman H. Clark’s 1976 study, Deliver Us From Evil, makes a persuasive cause that during Prohibition, arrests for drunkenness and alcohol-related crimes declined markedly.

Of course, a much earlier author reminds us across the ages that “Wine is a mocker, strong drink is raging, and whosoever is deceived thereby is not wise” (Prov. 20:1).

Guardian of Truth XXXVI: 15, p. 457
August 6, 1992

By Robert Wayne La Coste

Here we are in the year 1992 on the eve of another national election. To most if not nearly all Americans, there is a “ho-hum” atmosphere existent. There are probably a number of reasons for this. People are bored with politics, fed up with mud-slinging and in general ready to barbeque anyone who calls himself a politician. In a nation that prides itself on being a winner at everything, it looks like we are losers if not at least lost when it comes to government. While we are yet the richest nation that has probably ever existed on God’s earth, yet we have devised and patented certain evils and sins that would cause other nations both past and present to blush. No one kills more unborn children, treats more cases of drug abuse, and has a higher crime and divorce rate. Who says that bigger or richer means better?

Yet, while all of this is true, this writer certainly would not want to live anywhere else. We yet have a land where many freedoms and liberties exist that would not be afforded us if we resided elsewhere. May we never take these blessings for granted and may we ever thank our God for them.

It is all so easy to get discouraged by the apathy toward sin and evil. Even among those professing to be God’s children, this “ho-hum, bah-humbug” attitude toward government is prevalent. As a result, many Christians continue to sit idly by, while the devil makes more inroads into our society. It is not the purpose of this article to do anything but hopefully remind each of us of certain important truths about the Christian and “the powers that be.” These truths become especially important in an election year.

Render Unto Caesar

Jesus did not come to be an earthly king (Jn. 6:15; 18:36), yet he commanded personal responsibility to those who were in positions of government. When asked about paying taxes, Jesus promptly responded, “Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s; and unto God the things which are God’s.” The Jews paid taxes to Rome (Lk. 2:1) and, like most of us, probably did not like the way their taxes were being spent, but this did not dismiss them from that responsibility.

Paul wrote about this also to the church at Rome: “render to all their dues; tribute to whom tribute is due; custom to whom custom; fear to whom fear; honor to whom honor” (Rom. 13:7).

A Christian’s Duty

Under our system of government we have certain privileges the Jews did not have. One of those is the right to vote. Judea, the home of the Jews, was ruled by Rome and as such, the Jews found themselves the servants of a tyrannical form of government. They had no say in who ruled them and certainly no voice in what laws were created or enacted.

I’m amazed that in a society which screams about “rights,” there is such apathy about voting. It seems reasonable, that when a person will not take a part in his government, he surely has no “beef” coming if he doesn’t like the way it is being run.

Every child of God should take advantage of every avenue afforded him for good. The ballot box is yet an important tool and can be used for good. We are the people who make up this government. We are the ones who send the honest or crooked politician to his respective office. We are the ones who can take him out. Government is to serve the people, not the other way around. Someone once said, that “all that is necessary for evil to prevail, is for enough good men to do nothing. ” Truer words were never spoken. As God’s peculiar people, we must be “zealous of good works” (2 Pet. 2:9). As a matter of fact, “he that knoweth to do good and doeth it not, to him it is sin” (Jas. 4:16). Surely it is good to accept and carry out our civic duty as a Christian. More than good however, it is a command of the Lord.

A Christian’s Influence

Many people are prone to think, “I’m just one person, my voice and vote are unimportant.” This defeatist attitude should never be in the heart of God’s sons and daughters. Many individuals who thought little of their power and influence changed the course of history. Their names are household words: Noah, Joseph, Moses and Jonah just to name a few. Noah stood above his generation and only he and his family “found grace in the eyes of the Lord” (Gen. 6:9). Joseph, though from humble beginnings, and in spite of being sold like an animal to be a slave, rose above his surroundings and became ruler over Egypt, second only to the King himself. Moses didn’t think himself powerful enough a speaker to take on the likes of Pharaoh, but God also was with him and he prevailed. Jonah surely was rebellious and did not want to obey God, but in finally submitting, he converted the entire city of Nineveh and turned them back to God’s way.

Don’t ever underestimate the power of your will, life and influence for evil or good! There is absolutely no one quite like you in the entire universe. Your manner of decision and subsequent speech, and conduct will always influence someone to either good or evil.

There are a hosts of evils the Christian must continue to battle in life. Many of these evils are now in the political arena. Some of the worst remain abortion, “legalized gambling,” vile sexual sins and in essence humanism that has not only gone to seed, but become full grown!

Fight Christian! Your greatest sword is still the word of God (Eph. 6:17; Heb. 4:12). However, the ballot box is also a sword. With both of these weapons let us “continue to fight the good fight of faith.”

Guardian of Truth XXXVI: 15, pp. 460-461
August 6, 1992