Please Don’t Make a Chillul Hashem

You clearly don’t know what that means

This world is filled with confusion and misunderstanding, often intentionally so. I am here to set the world upright. In this piece, we will discuss two concepts that everyone thinks they understand yet almost no one does: kiddush Hashem and chillul Hashem. They are usually translated as “sanctifying G-d’s name” and “desecrating G-d’s name.” Simple enough, and yet most religious Jews manage to invert them entirely.

Modern Rashi exists to flip the world right side up.

There is apparently vast disagreement over how Hashem’s name is sanctified. Rather than waste time cataloging what is wrong and stupid, I will explain what is correct. Hashem’s name is sanctified through the public act of doing what He commands, regardless of how it is received. That is it, full stop. It does not matter whether it looks good, looks bad, people boo, or Christiane Amanpour clutches her pearls on CNN. Publicly following Torah and Hashem’s will is a kiddush Hashem. The inverse is equally obvious and everything else is copium.

Let’s take a common example: a member of the opposite gender reaches out to shake your hand in a professional setting. You politely explain that the Torah teaches such physical contact is special and reserved for husband and wife. That is a kiddush Hashem. Shaking the hand to avoid embarrassment is a chillul Hashem. “Looking bad,” “being awkward,” or “making someone uncomfortable” are not halachic terms. Disobeying Hashem in public is. Violating halacha to appear normal, polite, or socially acceptable is itself a chillul Hashem. If your conviction to observance collapses the moment someone raises an eyebrow, you are not practicing Judaism; you are practicing social camouflage.

The Rebbe explicitly rejected the idea that Torah must bend to social pressure in order to avoid embarrassment. On the contrary, public adherence to halacha, when done with clarity and confidence, is itself a kiddush Hashem. In multiple letters and talks, the Rebbe states that fear of what others will think is not a legitimate justification for violating halacha, particularly in public settings. In Igros Kodesh, the Rebbe writes that when a Jew feels embarrassed by Torah observance, the embarrassment is not in the Torah but in the person. When a Jew stands firm with Hashem, even non-Jews respect it.

The Rebbe rejected the redefinition of chillul Hashem as “making people uncomfortable.” One could argue that this clarification was issued as an act of mercy, so that graduates of Yeshiva University could be permitted to appear in public at all. They are, after all, the constituency most invested in treating observance as secondary to social approval.

Rav Soloveitchik is often cited as permitting opposite-sex handshakes under the banners of darkei shalom or kavod habriyos. This is a category error as Kavod habriyos does not permit violating Torah prohibitions. Darkei shalom does not mean assimilation and “normalcy” is not a halachic value. In actual Orthodox hashkafa, a Torah that survives only when it blends in with the dominant culture has already been lost. It is a sociological coping mechanism for Jews whose true religion is earning approval rather than respect from the goyim.

The Rebbe understood something his detractors did not: the nations respect strength and despise apologetics. When a Jew is embarrassed by his Torah, the world learns to disrespect it. When a Jew stands tall without apology, the world adjusts. Not the other way around.

This is why the public menorah battles matter. When the Rebbe pushed public Chanukah parades and giant menorah lightings in city centers, Jewish leaders had meltdowns. Rabbonim warned of backlash, church-state violations, public embarrassment, and the ever-useful incantation of “chillul Hashem.” They said it would look undignified, unsophisticated, even goyish. Jews, they insisted, were being too loud, too aggressive, too visible. In other words, they defined chillul Hashem as being noticed. For people whose religion is respectability, visibility is the ultimate sin.

The Rebbe ignored them entirely, he pushed forward with bigger menorahs, public lightings, public ceremonies. He understood that a Judaism which hides indoors to preserve its dignity has already surrendered it. Chanukah is about lighting publicly, loudly, and unapologetically. Retreat does not buy safety; it buys contempt. The Supreme Court upheld public menorahs, cities normalized Jewish symbols, and the predicted catastrophe never arrived. The Rebbe was not afraid of mockery; he was afraid of invisibility. Once again, fear masquerading as responsibility was exposed as cowardice, and the Rebbe’s clarity reshaped the landscape.

The same principle applies to something as simple as dress. Other rabbis taught their people sheep to tuck their tzitzis in, hide their kippah under a baseball cap, and generally avoid advertising Jewishness in public. The Rebbe rejected this instinct completely. Tzitzis out and yarmulke on. A Jew should look like a Jew from a mile away, not only upon closer inspection of his nose. Only insecure rabbis and communities confuse dignity with invisibility.

The psychology is simple: a Jew who hides his observance teaches the world that Torah is something to be embarrassed by. A Jew who wears it proudly teaches the world to adjust. Respect follows confidence, not concealment. Dignity does not come from invisibility, it comes from unembarrassed truth. Jews who wore their Judaism openly did not become pariahs, we became anchors. The world learned what Jewishness looks like because some Jews stopped pretending it was shameful.

Most of modern Jewish leadership, however, chose apology. Every mitzvah had to be justified. Every practice had to be softened, translated, and reframed to sound reasonable to outsiders. Mr. Sacks turned this instinct into an art form, recasting Torah as well-mannered philosophy for people who already disagreed with it. Judaism became a sequence of disclaimers and throat-clearing reassurances: we do this, but only in spaces where it won’t offend. We believe this, but not in a fundamentalist way. The goal was acceptance, and the price was clarity.

The Rebbe rejected this model entirely. Explanation is fine, while apology is poison. Torah does not need a public relations department. When Jews explain mitzvos confidently, people listen. When Jews apologize for them, people learn to sneer. The Rebbe understood that the moment Torah is presented as negotiable or embarrassing, it stops commanding respect. Kiddush Hashem does not come from sounding reasonable, it comes from being authentic.

Here is the pattern no one wants to admit: every time Jewish leaders incorrectly defined chillul Hashem as standing out, they were proven wrong. Every time the Rebbe defined chillul Hashem as backing down, he was proven right. Over and over again: tefillin booths, menorahs, dress, campus shlichus, public mitzvos. The same fear, the same objections and the same outcome.

What these people actually worship is not dignity or peace or even halacha. They worship approval and they fear being judged more than they fear being wrong. “Chillul Hashem” becomes a useful incantation, a way to sanctify cowardice and reframe anxiety as responsibility. The Rebbe saw through this instantly: fear dressed up as virtue is still fear.

The Rebbe did not guess correctly. He understood something fundamental: chillul Hashem is not being mocked, chillul Hashem is teaching the world that Torah bends under pressure. Kiddush Hashem is not fitting in, kiddush Hashem is standing firm without apology and letting the world recalibrate around that reality. History has already rendered its verdict. The only people still confused are those who mistook cowardice for wisdom and hiding for respect.