Shelach

Adapted from a d'var by Rabbi Lawrence Kushner

When the spies come back from the land of Canaan, they report that the land is inhabited by "the Nephilim, gigantic people." In the presence of these Nephilim, say the spies, "we looked like grasshoppers in our own eyes and in theirs also" (Bamidbar/Numbers 13:33). For ten of the spies, the presence of the Nephilim is a good enough reason to avoid the land. But two of them, Joshua and Caleb, are not afraid to face the gigantic Nephilim.

The Nephilim are mentioned early in the Torah. In the world's childhood, "the Nephilim were then on earth" (Bereisheet/Genesis 6:4). Perhaps the story of the spies' reaction to the land holds a teaching about the challenges of maturity. Some of our childhood memories may recount a similar picture of a world inhabited by giants where we were but grasshoppers. As we grow up, we face those giants, and increasingly stand as their equals. Perhaps the ten worried spies represent an impulse to revert to our childish behaviors around the "giants." And perhaps Joshua and Caleb represent an ideal of maturity.

The austere Hassidic teacher Rabbi Menachem Mendel Morgenstern of Kotzk comments on the spies' report. It's okay, he teaches, to say that you feel like a grasshopper in your own eyes -- that means you're aware of your shortcomings. But when you start guessing what you look like to someone else, you've given them permission to define you -- so you're still a child.

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