Parashat HaShavua - Shlach Lecha
About 185 years ago, a Frenchman by the name of Alexis de Tocqueville visited the United States to study our young democracy. One of his goals was to report what he saw in order to enable the emergence of strong democracies elsewhere, primarily his homeland. As it happens, his observations also can help us understand this week’s parasha of Shlach Lecha, and provide insights regarding our experiences of this past year.
De Tocqueville marveled at how people are constantly excited by two conflicting passions: they want to be led, and they wish to remain free. So what do we do? We freely elect a government, he wrote, and then give it control over us, believing we have sufficiently protected individual freedom by exercising our right to vote. But the problem, he says, is that this “rare and brief exercise of free choice, however important it may be, will not prevent people from gradually losing the faculties of thinking, feeling, and acting for themselves...”
Now let’s rewind some 3000 years more to this week’s parasha. Leaders of Bnei Yisrael are chosen to scout out Canaan in anticipation of their imminent conquest of the land. Who is sent? The Torah tells us “אִישׁ אֶחָד אִישׁ אֶחָד לְמַטֵּה אֲבֹתָיו,” generally translated as “one man per tribe.” (Nu. 13:2) Note that the phrase אִישׁ אֶחָד is repeated seemingly unnecessarily. Why? Perhaps to emphasize that, though they were going together, they each also needed to be an independent thinker. Unfortunately, as we learn later, ten out of twelve of them failed tragically in this, thereby dooming their entire generation to die in the desert because everyone bought into their negative report. Only Calev and Yehoshua, it turns out, manage to think for themselves.
De Tocqueville, in fact, warns that it is hard to imagine a subservient people - as Bnei Yisrael essentially had been to this point - choosing leaders wisely. In this case, to apply the idea more specifically to our context, the leaders themselves were unable to choose wisely as leaders. It therefore makes perfect sense that after the spies provide their doomsday report the people say, “let us appoint a leader and return to Egypt / נִתְּנָה רֹאשׁ וְנָשׁוּבָה מִצְרָיְמָה!” (Nu. 14:4) In other words, ‘We cannot be individuals, we cannot think for ourselves, we need someone to take us back to where we had no choice!’
And yet, despite everything, this story of the scouts (often mistranslated as “spies”) is understood to be the primary basis for requiring ten for a minyan, using various textual connections. There are twelve scouts to begin with, minus Yehoshua and Calev who separate themselves from the group, which leaves ten who testify as one against the possibility of entering the land. Thus, according to the prevailing interpretation, do we arrive at the number ten for a minyan.
So where in all of this - if anywhere - is there a positive message about davening in a minyan, or about group identity?
Well, there is also another story involving ten where scouting out a land is mentioned: when the original Bnei Yisrael, the children of our forefather Yisrael, descend to Egypt in a group of ten for food. They numbered ten because out of an original twelve - sound familiar? - Yosef was already there and Binyamin was not allowed to go. Not only is Yosef already there, he greets his brothers with the false accusation that...they are scouting out Egypt to cause harm. The brothers, unlike this week’s scouts, ultimately set an example of kedusha, of holiness, that is worthy of being the origins of minyan and of a group identity we can strive for, by showing excessive concern for one another and taking responsibility for previous mistakes.
Rabbi Avraham Mordechai of Ashdod explains beautifully that, according to Rabbi Isaac Luria (“The Ari, 16th cent. Tzfat), “the souls of the brothers were intertwined with the scouts in an attempt to guide them away from sin / “נתחברו נשמותיהם במרגלים לסייעם שלא יחטאו.” Although this unfortunately wasn’t enough to prevent the scouts from making their mistakes, there is still much to learn from this model of caring and interconnectedness, a bond that can exist within a group at a particular moment in time and between groups spanning generations.
During the past year we have learned tremendous lessons about interconnectedness and caring, about finding the right balance between independent thought and commitment to community. As has been emphasized at school and in our community throughout the year, the mitzvah of ve’ahavta le’reicha kamocah / וְאָֽהַבְתָּ֥ לְרֵֽעֲךָ֖ כָּמ֑וֹךָ - our empathy mitzvah - warrants and requires constant nurturing. And, as De Tocqueville and the cautionary tale of the spies teach us, this interconnectedness must be accompanied by, and not come at the expense of, our faculties of thinking, feeling and acting for ourselves.
May we look back at this past year with a profound appreciation for all the care we have shown one another, and look forward to a time when even more care can be shown and shared, when commitment to community coexists comfortably with individuals also maintaining the ability to think for themselves. And may ever learn from the example of Calev, who - despite all pressure to the contrary - implored the people “we can do this / יָכוֹל נוּכַל לָהּ.” (Nu. 13:30)
Shabbat shalom and have a wonderful, healthy and restful summer!
Rabbi Jack Nahmod
Middle School Judaic Studies Head
Rabbinic Advisor