LEV1005 A baraita on B. Bava Metzia 58b roots the prohibition of oppressive speech in [this verse]. M. Bava Metzia 4:10 begins with an example of "oppressive speech" in a commercial context: a person should not inquire about an item's price if he has no intention of buying it. The Mishnah also prohibits reminding the penitent of his prior bad deeds and reminding the convert of his ancestors' non-Jewish past. The aforementioned baraita on B. Bava Metzia 58b goes further than the mishnah. The baraita directs that if a convert comes forward to study Torah, one should not say to him, "The mouth that ate [forbidden foods] comes to study [the] Torah that was given from the mouth of the Power [God]!" Also, if illnesses come upon a person or he has buried his children, speaking to him in a manner of Job's companions (Job 4:6-7) is considered oppressive speech: "Is not your piety your confidence.… Think now, what innocent man ever perished?" Three talmudic sages go so far as to say that oppressive speech is even worse than commercial overreaching. One reason given for this is that [this verse] (oppressive speech] says "but fear your God," an admonition missing from Leviticus 25:14 (commercial overreaching). A second reason is that while commercial overreaching is only a matter of money (b'mamono), oppressive speech is something one does with oneself (b'gufo). Ultimately, the baraita says that the matter of oppressive speech is given over to the heart. R. Vidal di Toulousa (fourteenth century), commenting on M.T. Law of Sales 14:18, explains that a person may claim that the words he had spoken were intended for good, or that he had meant something other than what the hearer thought. Whatever the speaker claims about his own speech, ultimately God will look to the inner intentions behind what was said. The Talmud on B. Bava Metzia 58b-59a juxtaposes a discussion of embarrassing someone in public ("whitening their face") to the treatment of oppressive speech. Embarrassing someone in public is also linked to a prohibition against calling someone by an evil name. The Talmud asks why the latter is singled out, being a subset of the former, but the response is given that even if a person has become accustomed to being called by that name, one who uses it is still guilty of publicly embarrassing him. This latter point is psychologically insightful: at the stage at which someone is no longer visibly embarrassed by the name, he is probably so humiliated that he no longer reacts to it. (By Alyssa M. Gray, "Jewish Ethics of Speech")