In this week’s Torah portion we read about the spies that Moses sent to spy out the land of Canaan before moving in to conquer it. And the Torah tells us that all but two of the spies, Joshua and Caleb, came back with negative reports.
The narrative in the portion that tells the story of the spies (13:25) reads as follows: ïThey returned from spying out the land at the end of forty days. They went and came to Moses and to Aaron and to the entire assembly of Israel, to the wilderness of Paran and Kadesh, and brought the report to them and the entire assembly, and they showed them the fruit of the land.
They reported to him and said, ‘We arrived at the land to which you sent us, and indeed it flows with milk and honey, and this is its fruit. But _ the people that dwell in the land are powerful, the cities are very greatly fortified, and we also saw there the offspring of the giant. Amalek who dwell in the area of the south; the Hittitee, the Jebusite, and the Emorite who dwell on the mountain; and the Canaanite who dwells by the sea and by the bank of the Jordan. ”
Before the spies could conclude their negative report by saying (13:31) ‘We cannot ascend to that people for they are too strong for us ‘, the Torah tells us that Caleb interjected and silenced the people towards Moses and said, ‘We shall surely ascend and conquer it, for we can surely do it! ‘ (13:30)
This seems perplexing. Why did Caleb silence the people? According to the narrative it was the ten spies who were in mid sentence when Caleb interpolated – the people had not yet uttered a word! Furthermore what does it mean by ïsilenced the people towards Moses’ this seems to be a nonsensical sentence. How does one silence people towards another person?
In the opening of the story of the spies the Torah (3:13) says, ïMoses sent them forth from the wilderness of Paran at God’s command. They were all distinguished men; heads of the Children of Israel were they.’ The spies started their mission as ïdistinguished men’ – what we might call statesmen. They were leaders with a passion to carry out their mission as specified by their dispatcher. They were not the type to be swayed by the opinion of the masses, which, for whatever reason, did not want to enter the land. However, while on their mission a transformation occurred. They changed from statesmen to politicians. They started to become influenced by popular public opinion and therefore forgot that they were messengers of Moses and God. This grave mistake was the reason for their negative report.
This is why ïCaleb silenced the people towards Moses.’ Caleb tried to silence the influence of the people that was swaying the spies, so that they should turn back towards the thinking of Moses, and be swayed by what was right rather then by what was trendy. But unfortunately all this was to no avail. The spies and the generation were punished for this mistake by not being allowed to enter the land. Instead they wandered in the desert for forty years.
We as Jews are all messengers of God. We have been charged with the task of being ïa light unto the nations’ and to succeed in this task we were given a handbook to follow called the Torah. But sometimes we become influenced by public opinion, which tells us that the Torah is no longer relevant in this age of modernity. To be predisposed towards this ideology would be to ignore the lesson that must be learnt from the colossal mistake of the spies. We must remember for whom we are messengers and keep focused on completing the task that He set for us in the Torah.