The Characteristic of Dosa - Dosa and unwholesome speech

Four kinds of akusala kamma-patha through speech are performed with dosa-mūla-citta: lying, slandering, rude speech and frivolous talk. Lying, slanderingand frivolous talk can either be done with lobha-mūla-citta or with dosa-mūla-citta. Slandering, for example, is done with dosa-mūla-citta when there is the intention to cause damage to someone else, such as doing harm to his good name and causing him to be looked down upon by others. Most people think that the use of weapons is to be avoided, but they forget that the tongue can be a weapon as well, a weapon which can badly wound. Evil speech does a great deal of harm in the world; it causes discord between people. When we speak evil we harm ourselves, because at such moments akusala kamma is accumulated and it is capable of producing akusala vipāka.

 

We read in the Sutta Nipata (Chapter III, the Great Chapter, 10, Kokāliya,

''Khuddaka Nikāya'') that while the Buddha was staying at Savatthī, the

bhikkhu Kokāliya visited him. Kokāliya spoke evil of Sāriputta and Moggallāna,

saying that they had evil desires. Three times the Buddha told him not to

speak in that way. After Kokaliya had departed boils developed all over his

body which became bigger and bigger and discharged pus and blood. He died

and was reborn in the Paduma hell. Later on the Buddha told the monks

about Kokāliya's evil speech and his rebirth in hell. We read (vs. 657, 658)

that the Buddha said:

 

Surely in the mouth of a man,

when born, an axe is born,

with which the fool cuts himself,

saying a badly-spoken (utterance).

He who praises him who is to be blamed,

or blames him who is to be praised,

accumulates evil by his mouth.

Because of that evil he does not find happiness...