Wise Fridays: Sins and Lizards

Advertisement

The rabbis told this story: In a certain place there was a lizard which used to injure people. They came and told Rabbi Hanina ben Dosa. He said to them: Show me its hole. They showed him its hole, and he put his heel over the hole, and the lizard came out and bit him, and it died.

He put it on his shoulder and brought it to the Beth ha-Midrash and said to them: See, my sons, it is not the lizard that kills, it is sin that kills! On that occasion they said: “Woe to the man whom a lizard meets, but woe to the lizard which R. Hanina b. Dosa meets!”

Gemara Berakhot, 33a

Go here for more Wise Fridays wisdom.

Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement

Discover More

Wise Fridays: On Suffering

Rabbi Yochanan once became ill, and Rabbi Hanina went to visit him. He asked him, “Are your sufferings welcome to ...

Wise Fridays: National Responsibility

“Happy is the country and happy the nation that can give an account of what it has taken from others, ...

Best of the Week

Here’s the thing. If God was able to split the sea and allow the Israelites to pass through it, why ...

Advertisement