Exploring the Book of Ya’aqov, Pt. 13

If anyone does not stumble in word, this one is a perfect man, able to also bridle the whole body. Now if we put the bits into the mouths of the horses for their being persuaded by us, then we can also turn about their whole body. Look! also the ships of the sea—being so great, and being driven by fierce winds—are led about by a very small rudder, wherever the impulse of the helmsman wants. So also the tongue is a little member of the body, yet it boasts greatly. Look! such a little fire—yet how great a forest it sets aflame! And so the tongue is a fire—the world of the unrighteousness. (יַעֲקֹב Ya’aqov 3:2b-6a, mjlt)

The ability to speak—the capacity to formulate thoughts in our minds, and then to express those thoughts vocally in a way that other people can understand—is a miraculous gift from God to man. One would think that the mouth and the tongue are necessarily subservient to the mind—that one is only capable of saying what he is thinking. But many times—too many times—it seems as if our tongue has a mind of its own. We speak “without thinking,” and then claim we didn’t mean what we said. Or we say exactly what we’re thinking, although we didn’t intend to say it out loud. How is such a phenomenon possible? Can our tongues actually speak independently of our minds? Read more