Choose Life — Ecclesiastes/Koheles # 12

The Lion and the Ox: Two Modes of Jewish Leadership

Thought, speech, action. That is the magic formula of human effectiveness.

Speech is the most powerful human faculty, and Solomon's enjoins us to use it well.

1. Keep your mouth from being rash, and let not your throat be quick to bring forth speech before God. For God is in heaven and you are on earth; that is why your words should be few.
2. Just as dreams come with much brooding, so does foolish utterance come with much speech.
3. When you make a vow to God, do not delay to fulfill it. For He has no pleasure in fools; what you vow, fulfill.
4. It is better not to vow at all than to vow and not fulfill.
5. Don’t let your mouth bring you into disfavor, and don’t plead before the messenger that it was an error, else God may be angered by your talk and destroy your possessions.
6. For much dreaming leads to futility and to superfluous talk; rather, fear G-d.

Our minds might be flooded with anxious and confusing thoughts. But we get to choose which thoughts to develop and verbally express, and which thoughts to discard.

Choose your words carefully. Only make commitments that you know you'll carry out, and you will become a new person.