By Rabbi Nuriel Zargari
A group of boys went to Harav Chaim Kanievsky zts”l to get a bracha. Rav Chaim gave them all a bracha except one boy. The boy was taken aback and asked Rav Chaim why he didn’t get a bracha. Rav Chaim responded, because you eat basar vechalav [meat and milk together] you are not worthy of bracha. The boy was surprised and said he only keeps kosher. His friends told him if Rav Chaim said that, you must think again. After some thought the boy said the truth is I have big desire for milk chocolate and sometimes even after I eat meat, I give in to my yetser hara and eat the milk chocolate. The people close to Rav Chaim asked him how he knew that this boy is not careful with meat and milk. Rav Chaim responded, “because I saw a form of a cow on his forehead and the Gemara Yerushalmi says that’s a sign that the person ate basar vechalav!
The lesson is clear: when someone does an avera, its real and it makes its mark on his neshama, only we don’t have the eyes to see it. This week’s parsha talks about Tsarat that comes on a person that speaks lashon harah. The Seforno explains that tsarat is from the wonders of Hashem and His mercy on us to turn our attention to our averot so we can do teshuva on them and be forgiven. Without tsarat a person goes through life talking lashon harah thinking that no damage was done, until he dies and it’s too late to fix it up. Like that boy not being careful with Basar vchalav would have continued sinning were it not for Rav Chaim showing him that his sins were real and even visible. The lesson for us is although we are not zoche to have tsarat in our time, we have to ingrain in ourselves that lashon harah and all averot are real and have a real impact on our neshama.