Lashon Hora... or Haughtiness?

A short thought on B'haaloskha

One of the most famous lines describing Moshe Rabbenu is והאיש משה עניו מאד מכל האדם אשר על פני האדמה. “And the man Moshe was exceedingly humble, more than all humans on the face of the earth.” This depiction comes immediately after Miriam’s one-and-a-half pasuk long discussion about him. Granted, the first verse (12:1) intimates that there was a longer conversation than presented about the Cushite woman (see what R Chaim HaQoton says about this) Moshe had taken (see here and here), but the second verse seems fairly harmless (“Does God only speak with Moshe, doesn’t He also speak with us?”) 

 We tend to think that Miriam got tzara’as because she spoke Lashon Hora. But the Talmud tells us tzara’as can come for lashon hora, murder, swearing in vain, immorality, haughtiness, theft and stinginess. (Arakhin 16a) Perhaps the real crime here was haughtiness, because the verse describing Moshe’s humility seems to stand in full contrast to whatever was being presented about him. It is obvious that when someone says “Who does he think he is? I’m just as good as he is!” that the speaker is a little too into one’s own ego and that certain God-given talents or success the speaker may possess have gotten to his head. If Moshe was exceedingly humble, it means that he never lorded over anyone about his successes and accomplishments. Because humility simply means never making a big deal about what you do and what you’ve achieved – just do what you have to do, even be the best at it, but remember that all success and failure is in God’s hands.