Let My People Know

"Every unsocial action, whether specifically forbidden by Torah, is considered a transgression"


There is much more to the Torah than a specific definition of the mitzvot and transgressions. 

Not only is there no total retirement from life, there is general insistence on maintaining a certain vigilance about the welfare of the society and working toward a better world. 

Hence, too, the overall prohibition against the destruction of anything that has use and value, and the instruction to be occupied with things that are creative and useful. 

Concerning society as a whole, every unsocial action, whether specifically forbidden by Torah, is considered a transgression. 

A person has to appear far better to others than he appears to himself.

In fact, the other person has to be like the image of God, and any injury to him is like doing an injury to the divine image in oneself.

Following this line of thought, just as physical injury to one's fellow man is forbidden, so also are lying, theft, guile, and the like. 

Offenses like insult, slander, and gossip are in many ways considered far more severe misdeeds than specifically religious or ritual transgressions. 

Not for nothing has it been said that while the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur) provides atonement for transgressions committed by man against God, it does not provide atonement for transgressions committed against one's fellow man. 

Because the latter wrongdoing is doubly sinful, involving an evil to man as well as to God, and so long as the transgressor does not make amends to his neighbor, he cannot expect a pardon and atonement from God.

–Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz
 
From The Thirteen Petalled Rose by Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz