As the chapter continues, King David pursues the theme he began earlier: disputing the path of the hermits and ascetics of the nations, who withdrew from the world and presented asceticism as the only religious ideal. In contrast to them, David teaches an entirely different path: fear of Heaven does not demand that a person flee from life and from civilized society, but rather that one live within society - refining one's speech, actions, and interpersonal relationships.
מִי־הָאִישׁ הֶחָפֵץ חַיִּים אֹהֵב יָמִים לִרְאוֹת טוֹב׃ - Who is the man who desires life, who loves days of seeing good?
Those ascetics among the nations separated themselves from the world for one of two reasons: either because they despised life itself, telling man that the world is a place to be fled; or, even if they did not despise life, they despised the good of the world, saying: if one must live, let it be in misery; if one must live, let it be a life of affliction. To this, King David says: that is not my way. "Who is the man who desires life, who loves days of seeing good" - I teach the fear of Hashem even to someone who desires life and is not like those misguided ascetics who prefer death, and also to someone who says: I want to live a good life here in this world. The person who loves days of seeing good also has a way to live with fear of Heaven, a life of success and blessing.
For fear of Hashem does not demand that a person distance himself from civilization and lead an ascetic life. On the contrary, a nazirite, who merely abstains from wine and avoids ritual defilement from the dead, is called a sinner by the Torah. The Torah does not demand that a person live a life of total asceticism. To be sure, there are elevated levels for the holy ones upon the earth, and those who have reached such statures are an exception; but there is no such general requirement. The Holy One, blessed be He, desires that man enjoy His world. What, then, is demanded of him?
נְצֹר לְשׁוֹנְךָ מֵרָע וּשְׂפָתֶיךָ מִדַּבֵּר מִרְמָה׃ - Guard your tongue from evil, and your lips from speaking deceit.
That one should not speak lashon hara (evil speech) with one's tongue, nor speak deceit with one's lips. We have already learned many times in Mishlei that the "tongue" signifies intelligent, discerning speech - the tongue is internal, and therefore it expresses wisdom; whereas the "lips" express outward speech, as the lips are external. When a person wishes to deceive his fellow, he speaks with his lips: outward speech that conceals inner ambush, which does not reflect his true inner state at all - and that is deceit. Therefore, it says, "and your lips from speaking deceit." In contrast, the tongue, which is more internal, must be guarded against lashon hara: even if what you are saying is true and accurate, you must nevertheless take care not to speak evil of others.
The Gemara in Avodah Zarah notes: lest a person say, "I have guarded my tongue from evil, so now I will go and indulge in sleep!" If the main objective is simply not to speak evil, I could just go to sleep and solve the problem. To this, the Gemara responds that this is not so, for there is also a requirement to "do good." Therefore, in the very next verse, King David tells us:
סוּר מֵרָע וַעֲשֵׂה־טוֹב בַּקֵּשׁ שָׁלוֹם וְרׇדְפֵהוּ׃ - Turn away from evil and do good; seek peace and pursue it.
It is not enough to turn away from evil; one must also do good. "There is no 'good' other than Torah," says the Midrash, as it is stated, "For I have given you good doctrine." Therefore, with every spare moment a person has - on the contrary, let him seek how to do good.
One might wonder: why is this called "doing good"? It would have been more fitting to say "and learn good," or "and meditate on good." What action have I performed when studying Torah? Rather, it is this: anyone who wishes to do good for his fellow and be a person of lovingkindness must perform an action - giving charity, lending a helping hand when seeing someone's donkey collapsing under its burden, and so on. Every act of kindness toward others involves physical action. And who is the greatest master of chesed in the world? The person who immerses himself in Torah.
An example of this is the Talmudic statement: "The entire world is sustained for the sake of Chanina My son, yet Chanina My son is satisfied with a kav of carobs from one Erev Shabbat to the next." What do we learn from this? One person establishes a soup kitchen, another opens a meal distribution center, a third opens a hospitality house, a fourth runs a free-loan fund, and a fifth distributes food packages. Can you distribute food packages to the entire world? Rabbi Chanina did - the entire world was nourished through him. And did he leave his home? Did he leave the beit midrash? No. The very fact that he immersed himself in Torah brought divine abundance down to the entire world. This is the aspect of "doing good": there is no good other than Torah, and there is no greater action than this to benefit the public and the community. As we have explained in the past, "bishvil Chanina beni" means along the pathway (shvil) of Chanina My son does the abundance descend; and because he takes nothing for himself other than a kav of carobs, sustenance for the entire world passes through that channel.
The Malbim explains: "Turn from evil and do good" applies only when one is among other people, where the realities of evil and good exist. To a person living in the desert, one cannot say "turn from evil," since he is not in human society; nor can one say "do good," since there is no one to do it with. But when a person lives in the company of others, he is called upon to turn from evil and do good. This means that the Torah wants a person to be civilized, a participating member of society.
Indeed, for everything you need a community: three times a day you need a minyan. There is no reality in which a person should isolate himself. And if he is a talmid chacham who says, "I will pray alone" - behold, "Mighty are all her slain" refers to someone who possesses Torah knowledge and does not transmit it, and you are commanded to teach others. And if you are not a talmid chacham, you are commanded to learn, "Make for yourself a Rav," and you must go to a talmid chacham who can teach you. In short, there is no place for a person to say, "I will live in isolation"; the Torah rejects this. Of course, as the Rambam writes, if all the people of the world are wicked, one should retreat to the deserts; but we are speaking of the regular, normative course of life: the Torah requires a person to live among people, and there fulfill "turn from evil and do good." Furthermore, one should know that specifically in human society does one attain both: there exist temptations toward evil, and thus "turn from evil"; and there exists "do good," enabling one to perform acts of kindness with other people.
Once, a Jew came to Rabbi Yisrael Salanter and said he wished to make a career change. Rabbi Yisrael asked him: "What is your profession?" He replied: "A shochet." He asked: "And why do you want to change it?" He answered: "I studied the laws of shechitah, and I saw what a grave responsibility rests upon the shochet - that through one small mistake or an inadequate examination of the animal, he could feed hundreds of people non-kosher meat. I said to myself: Why do I need such trouble? I will go and become a merchant." (Incidentally, the responsibility of a scribe of sacred texts is even graver: if he writes tefillin and a small error creeps in, a person may go his entire life without having fulfilled the mitzvah of tefillin, making blessings in vain all those years - and it is all on the scribe's head.)
Similarly, it is told that someone once came to the Chazon Ish and said he was deeply afraid of making a mistake, and therefore wanted to leave the profession of shechitah. The Chazon Ish told him: "And whom do you want to be a shochet - someone who is not afraid? We need people like you!"
In any case, Rabbi Yisrael Salanter asked that Jew: "And what do you want to become? A merchant?" He took a thick volume of Choshen Mishpat from the shelf and showed it to him, and contrasted it with the laws of shechitah in the Shulchan Aruch, which take up only a slim section. That is to say: understand that in interpersonal matters, in commerce and business ethics and all that they entail, how many trials there are, how many challenges and struggles! It would have been far better for you had you remained a shochet. And that is what David is saying here: Hashem does not want you to live as a hermit. "Turn from evil and do good, seek peace and pursue it" - remain among people, where both evil and good exist, and within that very reality, turn from evil and do good. In the desert you cannot do good, nor is there an inclination toward evil.
Incidentally, this does not mean that a person should bring himself into temptation, Heaven forbid. It is told that the Vilna Gaon asked the Dubno Maggid, Rabbi Yaakov Kranz, to come and rebuke him, and the Gaon would sit like a servant before his master to hear his reproof. On one occasion, the Maggid rebuked him: What great trick is it to sit secluded in a room, closing and shuttering the blinds even by day, lighting a candle and studying by its light, disconnected from the entire world? A person needs to be in the world and maintain his righteousness there. The Gaon immediately stopped him and said: I am willing to hear mussar from you, but only on condition that it is true. If the way to serve the Holy One, blessed be He, is by closing the blinds, lighting a candle, and sitting down to learn - close the blinds, light a candle, and sit and learn. And what will you say, that it is no trick? The Holy One, blessed be He, does not look for tricks. The Holy One, blessed be He, wants you to be righteous. When the soul descends to the earth, it is adjured: 'Be righteous and do not be wicked.' Whatever you can do to be righteous, do. And if it is by shutting yourself in - shut yourself in.
Undoubtedly, this pertains to elevated spiritual levels and attainments, but in our time these matters carry sevenfold force. Today, a person can hardly step outside without burning his eyes and stumbling into severe prohibitions. Therefore, in our era, whenever one can minimize going out, he should do so. If you have no need, do not go out. If there is no necessity to walk through here, do not walk here; drive that way instead. If it is possible to travel on an intercity highway rather than through city streets, even if it adds a few minutes to the trip, take the highway. Today, a person cannot drive and pause at a pedestrian crossing, or look at the sidewalk while driving, without facing objectionable sights. The reality is that we have no choice and we must travel - one travels to deliver a shiur, or goes to his job and daily work - but whatever can be minimized should be minimized. 'If there is an alternate route, he is wicked': if you have another path, why deliberately choose the problematic one? The Gemara there speaks even of someone who closes his eyes when passing through the compromised place, yet it argues: true, but he could have gone through a different place. Why did he come through a place of temptation?
We find, then, that while a person should ideally be a societal figure connected to the community, when that community is problematic, he must distance himself as much as possible and minimize contact with them. Certainly when one knows that the crowd engages in lashon hara, where every time one arrives this person gossips about someone and that person speaks of another - in such situations, one should never say, 'You must remain in the company of people and overcome your yetzer.' These are places prone to downfall, and on the contrary, it is proper to keep one's distance from them.
What is peace? The Malbim explains: it is social union, human society. Do not think that you will achieve peace by fleeing from people; rather, 'and pursue it' - pursue connection with other human beings, and be among them. Even though being among people is a recipe for strife, division, and dispute - for just as their faces are not alike, so their minds are not alike, and seemingly this will lead to conflict with them - regarding this, David tells you: pursue peace. Be among people, but pursue peace. Do not be among people and take sides in all sorts of controversies and debates; rather, keep your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking deceit, be among people, and there seek peace and pursue it. This is the most proper path that the Torah demands of a person.
The Malbim adds that David also directed this against Doeg. We have seen that Doeg was 'detained before Hashem' - how wonderful, a tzaddik, an ascetic! Yet he did not learn to 'guard your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking deceit.' It was he who went and spoke slander against David and against Nov, the city of Kohanim, to King Saul. As a result, eighty Kohanim wearing the linen ephod were killed, with the Kohen Gadol at their head, and David was pursued. It all came about because of him - the very one who was supposedly a nazirite, supposedly secluded and detained before Hashem. See how much lashon hara and deceitful speech emerged from him. This is another explanation offered by the Malbim.
Since we mentioned the matter of going into the desert, we should note that someone once asked the Chazon Ish: Our master, the words of the Rambam are being fulfilled in our times. The Rambam writes that if all the people of the world are wicked, one should go to the deserts, and he adds, 'such as in this time' - and he was not living in the twenty-first century, but speaking of his own era, nine hundred years ago, when not everyone had smartphones. If so, what are our deserts? The Chazon Ish replied: The deserts of our generation are the synagogues and houses of study, the holy yeshivot - that is the meaning of 'he should go to the desert.'
Notice that the Rambam himself, although he wrote these words, lived among people and did not separate himself from them. Evidently, the Rambam saw within himself the ability and strength to influence others, and therefore said: It is neither fitting nor right for me to isolate myself in the desert, enjoying the quiet of some traveler's inn, while here the people would be deprived of the Rambam. Thus, the matter depends on a great deal of discretion. We do not tell someone today to head out to the desert, but rather to be in the company of people - yet in the manner of 'being with people without being with them': being in their company without being close to them. There is a vast difference between coming to a congregation, greeting them with shalom, sitting and praying with them, learning Torah with them, and then returning home, versus forging deep ties and attachments with people who are on a lower spiritual level - which is decidedly harmful. Moreover, the reality is that today a person cannot survive in the desert at all.
A third point: reality proves that when a person tries to adopt a path of asceticism higher than his actual standing, it not only fails to bring him closer to the Holy One, blessed be He, but actually leads him to even greater distance. As Rav Dessler says, the yetzer hara has a 'spring effect': if you compress it too forcefully, it will subsequently snap back - and when it snaps back, it is exceedingly dangerous. Therefore, a person should not think that he must push himself to take on mortifications characteristic of tzaddikim and ascetics when he does not hold at that level.
We have already seen this regarding Mar Ukva, who said of himself, 'I am vinegar the son of wine,' because his father would wait twenty-four hours between meat and dairy, whereas he waited six. Seemingly, what is the difficulty of waiting twenty-four hours? The answer is that if it does not genuinely reflect who he is, it is merely imitation, and imitation is not worth much; one must truly hold at that level. A person who decides today to conduct himself with isolation and asceticism when he is not holding there will find, first, that it will only distance him from avodat Hashem, and second, that he will feel an inner suffocation until he rebels and casts off everything. Therefore, we do not rush to dispatch people to the desert, even though the fundamental idea is to detach from a compromised society, because connecting to them is harmful.
From here we see that even when a person finds himself in negative company, the idea is not to mingle with them. Their nonsense, the ideas in their heads, their banter: one talks about politics, another about what was on television yesterday, a third about his trips abroad, a fourth about his hobbies. Do not get entangled with them - mingling will drag you down. True, you work with them, share the same office and workspace, but remain a handbreadth above them. Rise above the reality in which they live, for retreating to the wilderness nowadays is hardly the ultimate solution.
Rashi explains the double expression "Seek peace and pursue it": "Seek peace" - in your own place, where you live; "and pursue it" - in other places as well, ensuring that peace is achieved there too.
The Divrei Menachem explains: "Depart from evil" - if evil presents itself to you, God forbid, turn away from it; "and do good" - if an opportunity for good presents itself, on the contrary, seize it; "seek peace and pursue it" - applies even if no opportunity presents itself naturally at all. Peace is the foundation of all holy character traits, and one must pursue it. Do not say, "If an opportunity for peace comes my way, I will act." Rather, pursue it! If you see controversy, if you see strife - what is written concerning Moshe? He went to Datan and Aviram so as not to perpetuate dispute. Should he have thought, "Shall I go to them, the leader of the generation, when they are the ones rebelling against me?" Yes, "and pursue it" - pursue peace even if it is distant.
Commentators further explain: sometimes a person wants to do good, but the evil inclination comes and sets before him mountains upon mountains of his past iniquities, transgressions, and corrupt deeds. "Are you really capable? Do you know what things you have done? Regarding this it is written that there is no forgiveness; regarding that it is written that one falls into Gehinom..." The evil inclination is thoroughly versed in all of Scripture, an expert scholar, and he comes and says: "You are wasting your time; you are finished, there is no hope for you. You have another twenty or thirty years left - enjoy them, and come what may; your story is already over." This is the counsel of the yetzer hara - to drive a person to despair.
Therefore it says: "Depart from evil and do good." You want to do good? Depart from evil - remove your mind from the evil you did in the past; do not dwell on it right now. First and foremost, think about how to do good. This does not mean that the past is erased; when the time comes, you will repent for that as well. But to sit now and brood over the evil done and conclude that there is no hope - that is the counsel of the yetzer. Think now as if you have never done any evil, and what is your task right now? Only to do good, to draw close to Hashem. And once you have drawn close, you will repent for what you did as well. Hashem is gracious and compassionate, and there is no sin for which there is no repentance - for some, repentance is harder, for others less so, but there is no sin without teshuva.
And as we have noted in the past, this is the evil inclination's tactic against someone seeking to draw close. When a ba'al teshuva wants to transform his life, the yetzer approaches him with this advice. For this reason, the Gedolei Yisrael consistently instruct ba'alei teshuva not to deal with their past at all during the first five years. The first five years are strictly "do good"; depart from evil, do not dwell on the past. Only later, once one is firmly established in teshuva, does one begin to reflect: what did I do in the past, and how can I rectify it? And there are indeed actions that can be taken to rectify things. But if one plunges into asceticism right away - a common pitfall among ba'alei teshuva, who immediately begin practicing mortifications: "I won't eat this, I won't do that, I won't go there, I won't look at that, sand in the shoes, sackcloth beneath the shirt" - what happens? He suffocates himself; he became religious two months ago and already cannot breathe, until he falls apart, and that unraveling is terrible. Therefore, in the first years: do not dwell on your history, do not seek severe penances. "Depart from evil" - do not think about the wrongs of the past, as if you had never done wrong at all; first and foremost, do good and improve your deeds.
The Dubno Maggid offers a parable for "Depart from evil and do good." Often, people want to mend their ways, taking upon themselves one good resolution after another, but it does not last. Why? It is like a man who went to a tailor to buy a suit. The tailor showed him a suit tailored to his measurements. The man put it on and said, "This doesn't fit! The suit is too tight, uncomfortable, pinching - don't you have one in my size?" The tailor was astonished, as it was his exact size. He looked at him and said, "My friend, to try on the suit I am giving you, first take off your own suit! Only then put this one on, and you will see how it fits. But when you put it on over your old suit, of course it feels tight, unpleasant, and uncomfortable." That is not the way.
Therefore, one must realize: the first step in teshuva is not to say, "Begin doing good deeds alongside the bad ones." We do not tell someone: continue driving to soccer on Shabbat, but go to the synagogue too - we have no right to say such a thing. The basics of beginning to feel connected to Torah and mitzvot are recognizing that you cannot swallow the whole world in a single day and fulfill every mitzvah all at once, especially when you are just starting out. So first and foremost - stop the transgressions. Do you drive on Shabbat? Resolve that you will not drive on Shabbat.
Do not misunderstand: if someone is not yet capable of everything, one might say to him: You drive twice on Shabbat? Drive only once. You smoke all Shabbat? Decide that from Friday evening until you go to sleep, you will not smoke. Whatever can be salvaged should be salvaged, but under no circumstances does one legitimize continuing to smoke for the rest of Shabbat. Even so, the instruction for a baal teshuvah is: stop committing transgressions; that is the first step. As for the fulfillment of mitzvot, that is a long journey: setting fixed times for Torah study, how one's prayer will look, three prayers a day, in a synagogue, with a minyan, with proper concentration - these are levels. At first we tell him: put on tefillin for two minutes at home, recite Shema; for a start, that is enough. "Do good" is accomplished in stages; "turn from evil" has no stages - turning from evil means stop doing evil, and that is the very first thing.
Do you want the suit to fit properly? First take off the soiled garments, take off the old clothes, and then do good - and then that good action will truly influence you. But if not, what happens? A person does good, and one mitzvah leads to another mitzvah - a good angel pulls him toward another mitzvah; a moment later, he goes and commits a sin - an evil angel drags him toward another sin. He swings back and forth like a pendulum: right, left, evil, good, evil, good. Then he comes and says: "Rabbi, for two months I have not progressed; for half a year I have not progressed!" That is true - first of all stop the evil, and then proceed slowly with the good; that is the way to truly move forward.
There was once a woman from Rosh HaAyin who used to attend lectures organized there by the Arachim organization for years. Once, she shared that she was trying to draw closer to Torah and mitzvot but was completely unsuccessful. She was told: "What do you mean? Take upon yourself one small mitzvah, washing hands in the morning (netilat yadayim)." She replied: "Yes, people have already told me that, and I cannot keep it up." She was asked in wonder: "What is so complicated about it? Every normal person washes their face and hands in the morning - what is the difficulty in doing it with a cup?" Then a thought arose, and she was asked: "Tell me, do you eat kosher?" She replied: "To tell the truth, no." When asked what she meant, it turned out that at her workplace they would occasionally go out to restaurants serving seafood, Heaven spare us - the height of impurity, creeping creatures and other abominations. She said: "I am not crazy about it, but..." She was told: "Not crazy about it? It is spiritually fatal, God forbid! As long as you continue in evil, there is no chance that you will feel drawn to the good; and when it comes to forbidden foods, it is worse than other wrongs, because it causes timtum halev (spiritual blockage of the heart). Start with this: even if you go to such places" - since she was not yet ready to be told to cut ties completely - "order rice. Is the rice definitively pure and kosher? No, but at least there is no absolute certainty of non-kosher creatures, no certainty of dulling the heart. Choose things that are not definitely forbidden; start with that, and then you will feel that you can gradually progress." But if someone is sunk in the mud and expects to feel transformed while performing mitzvot at the same time, it simply does not work. Turn from evil, and do good.
The book Pri Tzaddik explains: "Turn from evil and do good" - first, one must distance evil from the heart, and through that, one will be able to introduce words of Torah into the heart. This means that the first stage applies not only to actions, but also to the heart. When the heart stores evil, and its thoughts are evil thoughts - whether negative thoughts toward others or immoral thoughts and the like - the heart is not clean, so how can one introduce words of Torah there? It will not stick. Therefore, the first step is to turn from evil: remove the heart from evil, and then do good.
However, he raises a difficulty: supposedly it is challenging, for in the Ten Commandments it is written first, "I am the Lord your God" - believe in Me, which is the aspect of "do good" - and only afterward, "You shall have no other gods before Me," which is the aspect of "turn from evil." Why, then, did the Holy One, blessed be He, speak in reverse order? He should have preceded with "You shall have no other gods," turning from evil, and only then "I am," doing good.
The Pri Tzaddik offers a wonderful resolution: this is why the holy Zohar teaches that "I am" and "You shall have no other gods" were spoken in a single utterance. "Remember" and "Safeguard" were spoken in a single utterance - as we all know from the Gemara; and the Zohar comes and explains that "I am" and "You shall have no other gods" were likewise spoken in a single utterance. Since they were spoken in a single utterance, the evil inclination was uprooted from their hearts and the words of Torah were embedded in their hearts, all simultaneously - turning from evil and doing good were accomplished together. The essential point is that "do good" must never precede "turn from evil"; at Sinai that was not the case, for both came as one.
Incidentally, this also resolves another question. The Jewish people said to Moshe: "You speak with us and we will listen, but let God not speak with us lest we die." When did they say this? After "I am" and "You shall have no other gods," for "I am and You shall have no other gods we heard from the Almighty," while the remaining eight commandments they received through Moshe. A difficulty arose here: if they saw that they were unable to absorb speech directly from Hashem, "lest this great fire consume us," did they really need two commandments to realize this? Already after the first commandment they should have turned to Moshe! But according to the Zohar, the matter is beautifully resolved: "I am" and "You shall have no other gods" were spoken in a single utterance, effectively making them like one commandment. Thus, immediately after the first utterance, they turned to Moshe and said: "You speak with us and we will listen, but let God not speak with us lest we die."
The commentators also explain the phrase, "Seek peace and pursue it." It is also written concerning Aharon: "Be of the disciples of Aharon, loving peace and pursuing peace." On the surface, the expression "pursuing peace" is difficult to understand, for the term "pursuit" (redifah) is usually used in a negative sense, as in "pursuing him to kill him." True, we also find it used positively, as in "Let us pursue knowledge of Hashem," but even so, the phrase "pursuing peace" seems surprising: it would have been more fitting to say loving peace and running after peace.
It is cited in the name of the Chafetz Chaim: This comes to teach us that at times a person must pursue "peace" to eradicate it. When? When it comes to peace with the wicked. Someone comes along and says: Look, we have made peace with so-and-so, and now we are united; the synagogue will be shared between Reform and Orthodox services; there is room in our hearts for everyone, after all, everyone is Jewish, and the Holy One, Blessed is He, loves peace, and there is no vessel that holds blessing like peace - with praises of peace on their lips. Regarding this it is written: "I am peace; but when I speak, they are for war." My friend, do you think this is peace? This is war! Know that one must not make peace with such people; on the contrary, one must wage war against them. As King David says: "Do I not hate those who hate You, Hashem, and strive with those who rise up against You? I hate them with utmost hatred; they have become my enemies." And if you were to say to David: Make peace with them, why be so extreme toward them? - No, absolutely not! There are those with whom one must not make peace, and when people seek to make such a peace, one must pursue it in order to thwart it.
This, then, is the meaning of "Seek peace and pursue it": under ordinary circumstances, the Torah wants you to seek peace, but there are times when one must pursue and undo that peace rather than forge it. And Aharon was wise enough to know when to be an "ohev shalom" (a lover of peace) and when to be a "rodef shalom" (a pursuer of peace) - when to chase peace away to keep it at a distance, when such peace can only cause harm.
King David opens with a statement that counters all paths of asceticism and monastic withdrawal: "Who is the man who desires life, who loves days to see good?" - The Torah does not ask you to despise life or its goodness, but rather to live within society and sanctify your path there. And how? "Guard your tongue from evil" - from lashon hara; "and your lips from speaking deceit" - from superficial speech where the mouth does not match the heart. Nor is passive restraint enough; rather, "Depart from evil and do good" - first remove the evil, from action and from the heart, and only then can good deeds take root; and there is no "good" other than Torah, through which a person becomes the greatest benefactor to the entire world. And finally, "Seek peace and pursue it" - stay connected to people and pursue peace with them, without assimilating among them, without bringing yourself into temptation, and without mistakenly seeking "peace" with those with whom peace must not be made.