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Friday, May 31, 2013

Parshat Shlach: Of Men and Grasshoppers

This week's Torah portion deals with "the sin of the spies". Ten of the twelve spies that Moses sent to gather intelligence on the land of Canaan were not strong enough in the "faith" department.
"And the LORD said unto Moses: 'How long will this people despise Me? and how long will they not believe in Me, for all the signs which I have wrought among them?"
They did not believe that the children of Israel, with God's help, would be able to conquer the land of Israel. They saw the Canaanites and their fortifications, and they did not believe that they had the military might to beat these people. One verse is quite telling:
"And there we saw the Nephilim, the sons of Anak, who come of the Nephilim; and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight."
Indeed, if a person thinks that he is small and of little worth, it is no wonder that others think of him in the same way.

I myself encountered a "spy" almost eight years ago, in the early days of this blog. To my great sorrow, back then the grasshoppers got their way and the Jews of the Gaza Strip and Northern Samaria were expelled from their homes. It was quite obvious even back then that nothing resembling peace would result from this crime. Now, eight years, thousands of missiles and a few wars later, I wonder if the guy from "Ohel Hidrabrut" has had second thoughts. After all of the suffering that the "disengagement" caused, I wonder if he has repented and become a man.

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