The Eighth Commandment in the Catholic Catechism

Today we will learn and reflect on the Eighth Commandment,
DO NOT BEAR FALSE WITNESS AGAINST YOUR NEIGHBOR, or DO
NOT SLANDER. Stated positively, we are exhorted to protect the
reputation of our neighbor, which is the opposite of SLANDER, or
harming the reputation of our neighbor.
This is the Eighth Commandment because the Catholic
Catechetical tradition splits the commandment against
Envy and Coveting into two commandments, one against
coveting your neighbor’s wife, concupiscence, and another
commandment against coveting your neighbor’s
possessions.

At the end of our talk, we will discuss the sources used
for this video. Feel free to follow along in the
PowerPoint script we uploaded to SlideShare.
Please, we welcome interesting questions in the
comments. Let us learn and reflect together!

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Do Not Slander, Church Fathers and Preachers,
Catholic Catechism Introduction, CCC 2464
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The Eight Commandment in the Catholic Catechism exhorts, (REPEAT)
“You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.” Many people
shorten this commandment to, You shall not lie, and although lying is
usually sinful, this is a shallow understanding of this commandment, as
sometimes lying is not sinful, one vivid example is Schindler’s List, where
his virtuous lies saved thousands of his Jews in his factories.
It was said to the men of old, "You shall not swear falsely, but shall
perform to the Lord what you have sworn.”

Opening Scriptural References in Catholic Catechism:
You shall not bear false witness against your
neighbor (Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5).
It was said to the men of old, "You shall not swear
falsely, but shall perform to the Lord what you have
sworn.“ (Matthew 5:33)

The short summary of this commandment in the Catholic Catechism is very carefully
worded. (REPEAT) The Catechism teaches us, “The eighth commandment forbids
misrepresenting the truth in our relations with others.”
When we say something truthful yet hurtful about our neighbor, we show we do
not love our neighbor, we show we delight in shredding his reputation.
The Catechism continues, “This moral prescription flows from the vocation of the
holy people to bear witness to their God who is the truth and wills the truth.”
How we treat our neighbor bears witness to the world on whether we are truly
Christian.
The Catechism continues, “Offenses against the truth express by word or deed a
refusal to commit oneself to moral uprightness: they are fundamental infidelities to
God, and, in this sense, they undermine the foundations of the covenant.”
God is love, God is truth, God is kind, we deeply offend God when we harm our
neighbor by damaging his reputation.

CCC 2464 The eighth commandment forbids misrepresenting the
truth in our relations with others. This moral prescription flows
from the vocation of the holy people to bear witness to their God
who is the truth and wills the truth. Offenses against the truth
express by word or deed a refusal to commit oneself to moral
uprightness: they are fundamental infidelities to God and, in this
sense, they undermine the foundations of the covenant.

Why does this commandment not say, Thou shalt not Lie, or Thou
Shalt Not Slander, but rather forbids that We Shalt Not Bear False
Witness Against Our Neighbor? Is this commandment more
concerned with our testimony in court than what is our
motivations, our intent? What is true is that there was no
forensic science in the ancient world, eyewitness testimony was
often the only evidence, sometimes the only permissible
evidence, there were few rules restricting frivolous lawsuits,
which meant that perjury was indeed a serious offense.

Brevard Childs in his commentary on Exodus
translates this commandment as “You shall
not testify against your neighbor as a lying
witness,” which is similar to the NIV
translation, “You shall not give false
testimony against your neighbor.” Childs
notes that “Deuteronomy 19:19 specifies
that if a witness is proven false, ‘you shall do
to him as he had intended to do to his
brother. Likewise, the Code of Hammurabi
specifies that in capital cases the false
witness should be put to death.”

Both in ancient and modern times this
commandment also applies to private
conversations and gossiping, and stated
positively bids us to protect our
neighbor’s reputation.

The Church Fathers focus on our
love for our neighbor when
contemplating this
commandment. St Gregory
Palamas in our English translation
renders the commandment as,
“You shall not accuse anyone
falsely.” We are warned that if we
accuse anyone falsely, we may
“become like the devil, who falsely
accused God to Eve and was cursed
by God. Rather, we should conceal
our neighbor’s offense, unless by
so doing others may be injured;
and in this way we will imitate not
Ham, but Shem and Japeth, and so
like them receive the blessing.”
Noah and his sons, by Andrea Sacchi, 1600’s

The story of Ham, the son of Noah, and the covering of Noah by his
brothers Shem and Japheth, after the Ark had landed in the New World,
the world newly created, when Noah was overcome by despair and drink,
is a favorite of the rabbis, you can our blog on the Torah for this story. The
poetry of Genesis tells us this story the best:

Drunken Noah,
by Simone
Brentana, 1600’s

Noah began to be a man of the soil
And he planted a vineyard.
He drank of the wine and was intoxicated.
He then uncovered himself in the tent.
Ham the father of Canaan saw
The nakedness of his father,
And told it to his brothers who were outside.
Shem and Japeth took the cloak,
Placed it on their shoulders,
And walked backwards,
Covering the nakedness of their father.
They faced away from him,
And did not see the nakedness of their father.
Noah awoke from his wine
And he realized what had been done to him
By his youngest son.
He said, “Cursed is Canaan.
A slave of slaves shall he be to his brothers.”
The Drunkenness of Noah by Michelangelo, 1509
Genesis 9:20-25

(REPEAT) Perhaps the prohibition against slandering, or bearing false
witness, is also referred to in the Mitzvah forbidding us to build a roof on
a house without a parapet, or fence on your roof. People in ancient Israel
often slept on the roof in the summer to keep cool, and if you did not
build a parapet on the roof you could roll off and die when you fall
several stories.

Perhaps the prohibition against
slandering, or bearing false witness, is
also referred to in the Mitzvah
forbidding us to build a roof on a
house without a parapet (or fence):
Negative Mitzvah 298.
When you build a new home,
You are to make a fence for your roof;
And do not place blood liability in
your house,
For someone who should fall
May fall from it.
Deuteronomy 22:8-9
David sees BathSheba bathing, peering over his parapet, by James Tissot

The Decalogue has a progression both among the
commandments that exhort us to Love God with all
of our heart and with all of our soul and with all of
our strength and with all of our mind, and those
that exhort us to love our neighbor as
ourselves. The progression is we must think holy
thoughts, so the words we speak are holy, so our
actions are holy and righteous.

Ilias the Presbyter teaches us that “a
person may have sullied his soul with
words even if he has not degraded it by
actions; and he may still be impure in
his thoughts even if he watches over his
words. For these are three different
ways of sinning.”
St Maximus warns us, “Do not listen
gleefully to gossip at your neighbor’s
expense or chatter to a person who
likes finding fault. Otherwise you will
fall away from divine love and find
yourself cut off from eternal life.”

(REPEAT) St Thalassios links our thoughts about God
to those of our neighbor:
“The intellect energized by divine love cultivates
good thoughts about God, but when impelled by self-
love it produces diabolical thoughts.
When the intellect is moved by love for its neighbor,
it always thinks well of him, but when under
diabolical influence it entertains evil thoughts about
him.”

St Thalassios links our thoughts about
God to those of our neighbor:
“The intellect energized by divine love cultivates
good thoughts about God, but when impelled by
self-love it produces diabolical thoughts.”
“When the intellect is moved by love for its
neighbor, it always thinks well of him, but when
under diabolical influence it entertains evil
thoughts about him.”
Allegory of Love, by Jacob de Backer, late 1500's

The Church Fathers in “Unseen Warfare”
teach us how giving careful attention to
how we speak is the key to avoiding gossip
and slander that slips out. We think we
know more than we do, we grow too fond
to the sound of our voice. We are warned,
“You should only speak of yourself and
your accomplishments only when
compelled to do so, and then you should
be as brief and modest as possible.”

The Church Fathers in “Unseen Warfare” continue:
“Good feelings are silent. Those feelings that seek
expression in words are most egotistical,” feeding
our self-love, always justifying our faults, putting us
in the best light. “Loquacity, endless talking, mostly
comes from vainglory,” wants to make us the expert
in whatever we babble about.
Such loose talk is spiritually dangerous, “empty talk
is the door to criticism and slander, the spreader of
false rumors and opinions, the sower of discord and
strife.” Empty talk stifles our intelligence and tries
to hide our ignorance. “When wordy talk is over,
and the fog of self-complacency lifts, it always
leaves behind a sense of frustration and
indolence. Does this not prove that, even
involuntarily, the soul feels it has been robbed?” Cyril, Methodius, Clemens and Theophilact
1864 Icon Simeon Molerov Zograf Monastery

How should we speak? The Church Fathers
in “Unseen Warfare” advise us not to speak
about topics we are not sure of, particularly
if we could harm someone if we express
our opinion, or if “we confuse the simple
hearts of listeners.” Listen carefully, speak
less. Always, when “speaking or listening,
raise the eye of your mind on high where
your God is, thinking of His greatness and
remembering that He never loses sight of
you and look at you either with approval or
disapproval, according to what is in the
thoughts of your heart, in your words,
movements, and action.”
Icon of St Peter, Mt Athos Monastery

The Church Fathers in “Unseen
Warfare” continue:
“Silence is a great power in our unseen
warfare and a sure hope of gaining
victory. Silence is preferred by he who
does not rely on himself but trusts in
God alone. Silence is the guardian of
holy prayer and a miraculous helper in
the practice of virtue; it is also a sign
of spiritual wisdom.”
St Justin the Philosopher, by
Theophanes the Cretan, circa 1546

DL Moody pairs this command
with the commandment not to
take the Lord’s Name in vain,
language is what distinguishes
us from the beasts, language is
what binds our social fabric, our
“words must command
confidence.” Slander is murder
by the tongue, slanderers are
like flies that settle on a man’s
sores, ignoring all that is good
and noble about him. Slanders
are like the burning tails of
Samson’s foxes that burn up
whole field of wheat in the
world up in flame.
Samson Massacring the Philistines, by Hilaire Pader, 1600's

DL Moody relates a story of gossip who
confessed her sins to a priest, as a
penance he gave her a thistle, and
asked her to scatter the seeds one by
one. She was puzzled by this, but did
as he asked, but when she returned the
priest asked her to gather the seeds
back up. Such is the nature of slander,
slanders scattered can never be
gathered back up and forgotten.
The Sower, by James Tissot, circa 1894

The Oscar ceremonies at the 94th Academy Award recently, when we
were working on this video, provided an excellent object lesson on the
spiritual dangers of slander and lying, and how often these are preceded
by joking:
(REPEAT) Step 12.1 On Lying, St John Climacus teaches us, “the offspring
of flint and steel is fire; and the offspring of chatter and joking is lying.”

Step 12.1 On Lying, St John Climacus
teaches us, “the offspring of flint and
steel is fire; and the offspring of
chatter and joking is lying.”

We are not justifying Will Smith’s decision to slap Chris Rock when his
joke offended Jada Smith, Will Smith’s wife, and we also concur with
those who feel that this act of violence, which could have possibly led to
a criminal assault charge, is a greater offense than Chris Rock’s joke.
But this incident does illustrate the spiritual dangers of joking, especially
jokes that belittle our neighbor, especially jokes about our neighbor’s
race, gender, weight or ailment, all of which are either impossible or very
difficult to change. We know that monastic manuals such as the Ladder
of Divine Ascent lay down strict rules that can be tempered by laymen,
but everyone should be very cautious about what jokes they tell,
especially jokes that laugh at our neighbor. Perhaps Christians should be
reluctant to become comedians.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will_Smith%E2%80%93Chris_Rock_slapping_incident

St John Climacus in the Ladder of Divine
Ascent teaches us that the liar commits a
most serious sin, “a lie is the destruction of
love,” you must be careful what you say,
what you hear, you should be especially
careful lest your joking and chatting crosses
over into gossip and slander. Laughs and
jokes should never be at the expense of your
neighbor’s reputation and the salvation of
your soul. Why do we lie and
slander? “Some lie for sheer wantonness,
some for amusement, some to make
bystanders laugh, some seek to trap their
brother and injure him.” “Hypocrisy is the
mother of lying, and often its occasion.”

St John Climacus teaches that there is great
spiritual danger in lying for any reason, even
when we twist the truth to avoid hurting our
neighbor, or even to save his reputation. “When
we are completely cleansed of lying, then we
can resort to (exaggeration), but only with fear
and as occasion demands.” We discuss this in
greater depth in our blog on Dr Laura and her
rabbi’s book on the Decalogue. We should
always be very reluctant to exaggerate and twist
the truth, only telling white lies when the truth
would harm our neighbor, and we should never
slander, as slandering is always done with
malicious intent.

SOURCES: Since so many of our videos on the
Decalogue use many of the same multiple sources,
we have decided to cut videos on the Book Reviews
so we are not overly repetitive, and we have a video
on Book Reviews for books that discuss the
Decalogue, or Ten Commandments.

To find the source of any direct
quotes in this blog, please type in
the phrase to the search box in
my blog to see the referenced
footnote.
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The Eighth Commandment in the Catholic Catechism

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