פרשה: שלח · עלייה: ראשון (חסד)

וידבר ה׳..אל משה לאמור, G'd spoke to Moses to say: Why was the word לאמור needed here, seeing the instructions were given only to Moses? Perhaps the Torah wrote לאמור to indicate that Moses had permission to tell the people that he had received the instructions to despatch spies from G'd. [The author is always at pains to prove that Moses had no right to relay anything G'd had told him unless especially told to do so; he bases himself on Yuma 4. Ed.] The Torah may also have wanted to prevent the impression being created that Moses initiated the idea of sending out spies and that he was of the same mind as the people in this respect. By telling the people that he had been commanded to select the spies he had made it plain that he would not have done so unless G'd had commanded him. The word לאמור was especially necessary in view of our sages' interpretation of the word לך meaning לדעתך, (verse 2) "in accordance with your understanding but not because you have to." In other words, G'd gave permission for the spies to go but He certainly did not command the expedition. It may have been hoped that when Moses told the people how he had been told by G'd to send the spies that they would reconsider and understand that their request to send spies revealed a lack of faith in G'd.

שלח לך אנשים, "send out men for yourself, etc." We need to analyse why the word לך was written here. I have already quoted that our sages in Sotah 34 understand the word as indicating permission rather than a command. This leaves us with the puzzle why G'd would consent to an initiative which He knew would result in disaster. Before explaining all this let me begin with an introduction to the problem. Whence did the whole terrible disaster originate? If we were to see the fact that spies were sent out as the root cause of the disaster then Joshua certainly should have learned a lesson and should not have sent out spies before capturing Jericho (compare Joshua 2,1). It follows that the idea of sending spies to help in the conquest of the Holy Land was not objectionable in itself. If the reason the mission failed was due to the calibre of the spies, this too is hard to accept seeing that the Torah testifies that Moses sent out righteous men, men of whom G'd had approved.

We may glean a better understanding of the subject when reading the words of the Yalkut Shimoni item 742 that the Israelites came to Moses asking to send spies. Moses said that this was unnecessary seeing G'd had already given His assurance that they would defeat the Canaanites. Thereupon the Israelites countered saying that the local inhabitants were aware of the plans of the Israelites to invade their country and that is why they had hidden all their valuables. As a result the Israelites would be deprived of a great part of what G'd promised them as they would not inherit much more than the mere soil. They convinced Moses that it was in order to make G'd's words come true that they wanted to send out spies. This is why Moses is quoted in Deut. 1,23 as having given his consent to this request. This is also why in Deut. 1,22 the Torah describes the spies' mission as ויחפרו לנו, "that they may dig up for us (hidden treasures)." Moses was trapped by the words of the Israelites. Thus far the Yalkut.

Spies may have more than one mission then. 1) They have to find out the best approach to invade a country. They also have to determine if the whole army has to be involved in the campaign or if it suffices to send a relatively small number of troops. We find evidence of this in Joshua 7,3 where the spies told Joshua that 2-3000 soldiers would be enough to capture the town of Ai. This kind of spying, or reconnaissance in our language, would be repeated each time a specific target such as a town was to be captured. 2) The other kind of spying involves something of a more comprehensive nature. The spies' mission is to evaluate whether the target is capable of being captured. This is the kind of spying that the Israelites had in mind when they requested from Moses to send out spies. This kind of mission presupposes a lack of faith in G'd's power or willingness to help the Jewish people attain their objectives. Moses perceived this and that is why the Midrash tells us that Moses reacted negatively to their request at first. The Israelites tricked Moses into agreeing to the spy scheme as it made searching all over the land of Canaan a legitimate endeavour. Joshua too sent the spies for a necessary purpose, one that did not denigrate G'd's part in the preparations to conquer each part of the land of Canaan. The only thing about the scheme of sending out spies which was flawed was the purpose, not the scheme itself.

We may therefore understand G'd's command or consent for Moses to send out spies as G'd agreeing for Moses to send out spies provided their mission was what Moses understood it to be, i.e. to discover the hidden treasures of the Canaanites, but not if the spies' mission were to determine if the land was capable of being captured by the Israelites. I will explain that Moses may have misunderstood G'd's command as to the function of the spies. Or, he may have understood correctly but seeing that G'd had not denied him the sending out of the spies he failed to divine what G'd really had in mind when He granted His consent. G'd had given hints to Moses as He always does to His servants. As to the question why G'd gave His consent seeing that he knew what was going to happen, we must conclude that if G'd had denied the people's request the result would have been even worse.

Another meaning of the word לך may relate to the definition of אנשים, men of valour, righteous people. G'd told Moses that these men were righteous לך as long as they were in Moses' presence, facing him. As soon as they would turn around and begin their mission the wreath of piety they wore on their heads would begin to crack wide open. Sotah 35 interprets the words וילכו ויבאו, "they went and they came" in verse 26 of our chapter as meaning that their departure could be compared to their return. They were wicked when they returned as they had been wicked the moment they set out on their mission. Moses had an uncomfortable feeling about this and this is why he gave Joshua a special blessing praying that he should not follow the advice of the wicked. Bamidbar Rabbah 16,1 states: "but the spies whom Moses sent out were wicked. How do we know this? Because the Torah wrote שלח לך אנשים." This Midrash sounds very enigmatic. How do the words שלח לך אנשים prove that the men in question were wicked? We must therefore assume that the author of that Midrash understood the word לך as we have explained it, i.e. "you Moses think that they are אנשים, righteous men, but as soon as they commence their mission they will become wicked on the way out." A simpler way of explaining the word לך is: "in your eyes Moses they may be righteous; but in My eyes they are wicked." This would again raise the problem why G'd approved of sending such men when our sages have said that G'd Himself selected the spy who was to represent each tribe (based on verse 3 על פי השם)? Perhaps the reason they were already called "wicked" at the beginning of their mission was that they shared the view of the Israelites as a whole that they should investigate if the land could be conquered by them at all. This lack of faith in G'd stamped them as "wicked."

Alternatively, the reason they are referred to as wicked was that they carried out a mission initiated by the people who delegated them and whose intent was wicked. When a messenger allows himself to be used by a wicked person for a wicked mission he himself becomes wicked. On the other hand, when a messenger is sent on a sacred errand, then by accepting the errand he himself shares in the sanctity of the person who has delegated him. This enables us to understand why people who, individually, had been known as righteous people at that time became "wicked" when they became tools of the ones on whose behalf they accepted the mission.

Still another way of understanding the word לך is that G'd wanted this mission to be known as something Moses had initiated not as something He Himself had initiated.

Or, the word לך means that the mission ought to be the one Moses perceived it to be as contrasted with what the Israelites wanted it to be. The comment by the Talmud that לך means בדעתך, means "according to what you, Moses, have in mind, not according to what they, the Israelites, have in mind."

The word לך may also be an allusion to what our sages said in Shemot Rabbah 5,23 on the words עתה תראה, after Moses had complained about the ways of G'd's conduct when the Israelites' fate worsened after his appointment as their leader (compare Exodus 5,22-6,1). The Midrash says that the word "now" means that whereas Moses would live to experience G'd's war against Pharaoh, he would not live to experience what He would do to the 31 kings of the Canaanites. In order for G'd to fulfil this prophecy without Moses being demoted as king and leader of the Israelites, the entry of the Israelites would be delayed by 40 years as a result of the failure of the mission of the spies whom he sent out. According to this interpretation Moses would benefit by this mission. This is in line with the usual understanding of the word לך when it appears in a context similar to the one here.

ויתרו את את ארץ כנען, "they shall tour the land of Canaan, etc." why did the Torah write ויתורו instead of לתור, "in order to tour?" The words אשר אני נותן are also difficult. Once G'd had mentioned the name of the place the spies were to tour there was no need to write: "which I am about to give to the children of Israel." Who did not know that this is what G'd was about to do?

According to our commentary that the whole scheme of sending out the spies was made Moses' project by the Torah's using the word לך, as well as the other alternatives which we suggested as possible explanations, plus the other condition, that the spies be אנשים, men known as righteous people, the Torah added yet another condition to make this mission an acceptable one. It is that the people doing the spying be aware that it was G'd who was about to give them this land. The words mean that the spies were not to evaluate whether the Israelites (by themselves) would be able to conquer the country and to disinherit its inhabitants. There was no question that they would not be able to do that. They would not be able to conquer even a single town in that land by themselves. The only way the Israelites would be able to do that would be if אני נותן להם, "if I give it to them." Seeing that the land was to be a gift to the Israelites from G'd, it was up to the Donor to ensure the recipients would not face difficulties in obtaining their gift. To this end G'd would have to do the fighting on behalf of the Jewish people. It would be one of the objectives of G'd to show the spies during their tour of the country that G'd would subdue even the most powerful people. In order for the people to appreciate the power of G'd, the people He would subdue had to appear as invincible by natural means. This is why G'd showed the spies the strength of the Amalekites and the giants that still lived in that land. He showed them cities which were fortified beyond one's imagination so as to convince them that G'd certainly did not expect the militarily inexperienced Israelites to wage such a war. He wanted to drive home the point that conquest of that country and its people was G'd's task, not theirs.

This is the reason that the Torah wrote the otherwise unnecessary words אשר אני נותן, "which I am about to give." The spies were quite correct when they reported that the country could not be conquered by the Israelites. We still need to explain why the Torah wrote ויתרו instead of the expected לתור, and why the word ארץ כנען had to be mentioned. I have seen that Yalkut Shimoni was aware of this difficulty and explains that the Torah wanted to allude to who the person was through whose merit the Israelites were going to receive this gift. Isaac had been born to Abraham and Sarah when his parents had a combined age of 190 years which is the numerical value of the word כנען. This is, of course, a homiletical comment. I believe that more to the point is the verse in Deut. 9,5 that Israel did not inherit the land of Canaan due to their own merit but due to the wickedness of the people dwelling there and to G'd's desire to keep His promise to the patriarchs. The other reason was that it was ארץ כנען, the land named after Canaan who had been cursed by his grandfather Noach for his behaviour and whose descendants had followed in his footsteps so that now their measure of guilt had overflowed and called for divine retribution.

תשלחו, "you (pl) shall despatch." In this instance the singular שלח used by the Torah in verse 2 was not adequate. The reason may have been that the Torah wanted the men chosen to be listed in this order, i.e. one man per tribe, not more and not less.

אלה שמות האנשים, These are the names of the men, etc. Why did the Torah repeat this seeing it had already written: "and these are their names, etc." in verse 4? We may understand this by reference to Sotah 34. Rabbi Yitzchak said: "we have a tradition that the names of the spies recorded in the Torah reflect their deeds;" The name סתור בן מיכאל describes that the man bearing that name contradicted the words of G'd, etc." So far the Talmud on the subject. We have noted that Moses renamed Joshua so as to protect him against the advice of wicked people and we asked why this was necessary. This means that Joshua's name did not reflect the fact that he was wicked. It was necessary to write: "and these are their names" in order to show us why Moses was concerned about the character of these people, i.e. he did not like their names. Whereas I wrote earlier that Moses had the feeling that these men might be wicked because of the word לך, this was not an absolute as the word לך could have other connotations as I have demonstrated. Moses may have been alerted to the potential wickedness of these people when he reflected on their names. Alternatively, Moses did have his suspicions about the enterprise and any men who would be delegated to act as spies; however, had it not been for their names, Moses could not have justified his suspicions.

ויקרא משה להושע בן נון יהושע, Moses called Hoshea son of Nun Joshua. We already mentioned that our sages said that Moses prayed concerning Joshua. Why did he have to change his name in addition? Perhaps Moses wanted to give Joshua additional power to resist wicked advice seeing that the first three letters of his name now represented the three letters making up the tetragram. The letter י which Moses added to Hoshea's name has a numerical value of 10 and symbolised that he could resist the advice of ten of his colleagues. It would also eventually enable him to inherit the share of ארץ ישראל that the ten wicked spies would forfeit due to their conduct. This is based on a comment in Chagigah 15 according to which each person has a place allocated to him both in גן עדן and in גיהנם. If he merits it he will occupy his place in גן עדן, whereas a wicked person will occupy both his own place in גיהנם as well as the place left vacant by his pious colleague.

וישלח אותם משה, Moses sent them on their way, etc. Why did the Torah need to write the first half of this verse; we have heard about this both in verse 3 and in verse 16? Perhaps the verse was meant to tell us that Moses accompanied them a short distance when they departed as this is a halachic requirement. The Torah speaks about לתור to indicate that Moses warned the spies that they were engaged in a dangerous mission.

וראיתם את הארץ מה היא, "and you will observe the nature of the land." This was a reference to the climate of the land, the topography of the land such as whether it had many natural sources of water, and if such sources of water were pure or contaminated, etc. Moses referred to those aspects of the land which anyone traversing it can determine with ease. When he told the spies to evaluate the people, i.e. ואת העם היושב עליה, he asked them to evaluate if the nature of the people, their health, their strength, etc. reflected that the land they lived on had contributed to these people's being healthy, etc. Moses suggested that the health of its inhabitants was proof of the goodness of the land these people dwelled on. Seeing that it could be argued that if the people were extremely robust this might be due to such factors as healthy living habits, in particular not overindulging in sex, he asked the spies to find out if the people were numerous or relatively few in numbers. If the people were numerous this too would be testimony to the topographical and climatic conditions being favourable.

Why did the Torah always mention the positive alternative first whereas when describing the size of the population Moses chose to mention the negative aspect, i.e. an underpopulated country first? In view of the manner in which Moses phrased his instructions we must conclude that he considered it a positive factor if the spies would find the land underpopulated, i.e. if its population was מעט.

Perhaps Moses connected the number of people in the land to the strength of these people. If the people were exceptionally strong this would be proof of the quality of the land as only in very few places on the globe does the land produce such powerful people. If, on the other hand, the population would be found to be numerous, there are many countries which are fully populated. Moses remained consistent in always naming the positive alternative first. This also explains why Moses spoke about "the land" first and about "the people" next only to revert again to "the land."

ומה הארץ אשר הוא יושב בה, "and what is the earth like that the people dwell on." In this verse Moses referred to the infrastructure and standard of living that the spies would find in the land of Canaan. Were the houses the people lived in of sound construction? Were their chattels of good quality, etc? We will find in Deut. 6,10 that Moses describes the towns and houses the Israelites would inherit in the land of Canaan as of good quality. Moses asked the spies also to find out whether the towns were planned defensively, i.e. as fortresses surrounded by walls or whether they were open cities, as these factors had great bearing on the beauty of the respective towns. Bamidbar Rabbah 17 claims that Moses gave the spies a sign suggesting that fortified cities were an indication that its inhabitants felt insecure, etc. whereas open cities testified to the people's confidence in their ability to repel any potential intruder. This is pure homiletics. The plain meaning of the words is that the questions all related to the quality of the land and that Moses took it for granted that the people were of exceptionally great physique and included giants. One did not have to send out spies to find out this well known fact. The only reason Moses referred to the physical prowess of the people was to emphasise the miracle G'd would perform in disinheriting these people of their land.

ומה הארץ השמנה היא, and what about the land, is it fat, etc.? Did this land impart its fat to the fruit it produced without becoming impoverished, or was it such that after each harvest it became impoverished, רזה, so that it had to be given a year's rest before being sown again?

היש בה עץ, is it wooded, etc.? The word עץ refers to the variety of trees to be found there. The words אם אין mean if there is any known kind of tree that cannot be found in that land? This is what Moses had in mind when he said in Deut. 8,9 that the land of Canaan was a land that lacked nothing (good).