Likutay Moharan - Torah-teaching 197

197 - Evil Tongue of the World Harms and Damages the Humility

Know that the world's evil tongue harms and damages humility – through such speech, it becomes impossible for tzadikim to be humble, as evil tongue damage separates humility from wisdom. This damages humility, making it impossible, and even if achieved, it lacks wisdom. It is known that humility without wisdom is worthless; it is not a virtue to display humility foolishly by bowing the head as if humble – that is invalid humility. True humility is accompanied by wisdom. Evil tongue creates separation between humility and wisdom, preventing true humility.

This was Moses our master's virtue: the Torah praises his immense humility, unaffected even by evil tongue. As written (Numbers 12:1): "And they spoke etc. against Moses" – evil tongue existed, yet "and the man Moses was very humble" (Numbers 12:3), for his humility was at such a high level that evil tongue did not harm it.