Almost all major religions comment on the power of the tongue. The Buddha named four types of speech to abstain from: false speech, divisive speech, hateful speech, and idle chatter. Imam Ja’far al-Sadiq, an eighth-century Shia Muslim scholar, jurist, and theologian, wrote that “murderers, habitual drunkards and those who go to and fro bearing tales will not enter paradise.” Jewish scholars quote the Torah injunction against rekhilut, which reads, “Cursed be he that smiteth his neighbour in secret.” Even Greek mythology has that divide. Deities are usually somewhat omniscient. They don’t need
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