(9) “I charge you: Be strong and resolute; do not be terrified or dismayed, for the LORD your God is with you wherever you go.”
אמר לו רבי יהודה לא כך היה מעשה אלא זה אומר אין אני יורד תחילה לים וזה אומר אין אני יורד תחילה לים קפץ נחשון בן עמינדב וירד לים תחילה
Rabbi Judah said to [Rabbi Meir] This is not what happened, rather, this [tribe] said, "I will not be the first to go down to the sea," and this one said, "I will not be the first to go down to the sea." Then Nachshon ben Aminadav sprang forward and went down first to the sea
(א) בֶּן זוֹמָא אוֹמֵר...אֵיזֶהוּ גִבּוֹר, הַכּוֹבֵשׁ אֶת יִצְרוֹ, שֶׁנֶּאֱמַר (משלי טז) טוֹב אֶרֶךְ אַפַּיִם מִגִּבּוֹר וּמשֵׁל בְּרוּחוֹ מִלֹּכֵד עִיר.
(1) Ben Zoma says:...Who is the mighty one? He who overpowers his inclination, as it says, "slowness to anger is better than a mighty person and the ruler of his spirit than the conqueror of a city." (Proverbs 16:32).
– Rabbi Laura Geller
It is forbidden for a person to speak in smooth speech and flattery. He ought not be one thing in mouth and another thing in heart. Rather, his inside ought be like his outside—what is in his heart ought be in his mouth. It is forbidden to deceive (literally steal the mind of) another human being. Even the mind of an idolator. For instance: a person should not sell an idolator a piece of meet that has died a natural death, as if it were a ritually slaughtered animal. Nor should one sell a shoe, the leather of which came from the hide of a beast that has died naturally allowing it to be believed as if it were a ritually slaughtered animal. One must not invite another to a meal when one is aware that the person will not accept the invitation. Nor should one display signs of friendship which he knows will not be accepted. So too one should not open casks of wine for a guest which must be opened for sales in any case as if you are opening them in his honor. Even a single word of flattery or ‘mind stealing” is forbidden. A person should always cherish truthful speech, an honest spirit, and pure heart.
Our rabbis have a midrash on this verse: They have said; “That which is right and good refers to a compromise and going beyond the letter of the law. (Baba Kama 101a) The intent of this is as follows: At first Moses stated that you are to keep His statutes and testimonies which he commanded you, and now he is stating that that even where He has not commanded you, give thought, as well to do what is good and right in His eyes, for he loves the good and the right.
What were R. Akiva's beginnings? It is said, up to the age of forty, he had not studied a thing. One time, while standing by the mouth of a well in Lydda, he inquired, "Who hollowed out this stone?" and was told, "It was water falling upon it constantly, day after day." They said, "Akiva, haven't you read that ‘water wears away stone' (Job 14:19)?" At that, R. Akiva asked himself all the more so, "Is my mind harder than this stone?" He immediately returned to study Tora, and he and his son sat with a children's teacher.... The teacher wrote down alef and bet for him... he went on learning until he had learned all five Books of Moses.9