Devarim (1) | The Sins of the Spies and the Nation, and Moshe's Punishment

 

 

A.        The Sin of the Spies

 

            Sefer Devarim consists almost entirely of Moshe's parting speech to the nation, in which he reviews, among other things, the events of the years of wandering in the wilderness. Moshe's narratives offer a perspective that is absent from the parallel descriptions in the previous sefarim; he recounts the events from his own point of view and in light of the specific lesson that he wants to teach.

 

            One of the best-known examples of this phenomenon is the story of the sin of the spies as retold by Moshe in our parasha, which differs quite noticeably from the description in Sefer Bamidbar.[1] The discrepancies were addressed at great length by my rabbi and teacher, R. Mordekhai Breuer ztz"l, in his book Pirkei Mo'adot.[2] The scope of the present shiur does not allow for a general discussion of the relationship between the two descriptions; we shall focus on one central point, which is not necessarily part of the overall analysis presented by R. Breuer.

 

            The account in Sefer Bamidbar places great emphasis on the responsibility of the spies for the sin of the entire nation. The spies are described as central figures in the nation – "each one a prince among them… all of them men who were heads of Bnei Yisrael” (Bamidbar 13:2-3) – and their names are listed. The Torah emphasizes that the spies were the main culprits for what happened when they returned from their mission. Their guilt is described from two different aspects.

 

            First, the spies did not suffice with a description of the land in response to the questions that they were asked to investigate, but went on to express a clear lack of faith in the possibility of conquering the land. At first, they allude to this indirectly:

 

“However, the people who dwell in the land are strong, and the cities are fortified, and very great, and we saw the children of the giants there.” (verse 28)

 

Following Kalev's interruption of their report, they state their position more bluntly, saying explicitly:

 

"We cannot go up against the people, for they are stronger than we." (verse 31; see also Rashi ad loc)

 

In so doing, the spies deviated from the mandate given to them: they were not meant to adopt any position on the question of whether Am Yisrael would be able to prevail over the tribes living in the land or not, since this is fundamentally a question of faith.

 

            Further on, it becomes apparent that even the spies' "objective" description is biased and distorted:

 

They spread an evil report about the land which they had scouted, to Bnei Yisrael, saying, “The land which we passed through, scouting it, is a land that devours its inhabitants." (verse 32)

 

For all of this, the spies (except for Yehoshua and Kalev) are given a special punishment:

 

And the men whom Moshe had sent to scout the land and who returned and caused the entire congregation to complain against him, bringing an evil report about the land – those men who had brought an evil report about the land died in a plague before God. (Bamidbar 14:36-37)

 

B.        The Sin of the People

 

            In contrast to Parashat Shelach, our parasha minimizes the role of the spies and points an accusing finger mainly at Bnei Yisrael. From the first description of what the spies said upon their return it would appear that they fulfilled their mission faithfully and spoke only good of the land:[3]

 

They took in their hand some of the fruit of the land, and they brought it down to us, and they brought us back a report and said, “The land which the Lord our God has given us is good." (verse 25)

 

Nevertheless, in response to this the nation erupts into complaints:

 

And your murmured in your tents, saying, “It was out of God's hatred for us that He brought us out of the land of Egypt, to deliver us into the hands of the Emorites, to annihilate us. Where are we going up to? Our brothers have caused our hearts to melt, saying, ‘[They are] a greater and taller people than we; their cities are large and fortified to the sky, and we have also seen the children of the giants there.'" (verses 27-28)

 

The words of the people here disclose another piece of the spies' report: "A greater and taller people than we; their cities are large and fortified to the sky, and we have also seen the children of the giants there." Why was this not mentioned in verse 25, where Moshe quotes the report of the spies directly? The answer is simple: The quote that appears amidst the complaints of Bnei Yisrael includes no commentary; it contains only facts concerning the might of the inhabitants of the land. The bleak interpretation – that not only will Bnei Yisrael not be able to win, but that the very Exodus from Egypt was "Out of God's hatred for us"[4] j –is the invention of Bnei Yisrael themselves. It is for this reason that the Torah emphasizes their reaction and complaint, rather than the factual report of the spies.[5]

 

            In other respects as well, our parasha is extremely brief in its treatment of the spies themselves. Unlike Parashat Shelach, it does not describe them as holding senior positions amongst Am Yisrael; here they are simply "twelve men, one man per tribe" (verse 23). Our parasha quotes only their security report about the inhabitants of the land, with no mention of the spies maligning the land. In addition, there is not a word about the spies having any special punishment; we read only of the punishment that was meted out to the entire generation. How are we to understand the contrast between the two parashot?

 

            It would appear that our parasha recounts the story from a particular perspective, which essentially reproaches Am Yisrael and explains why the previous generation had not entered the Promised Land. This description emphasizes the role of the nation as a whole in the debacle that followed the spies’ report, painting it in sharp relief by diminishing the guilt of the spies. The main message seems to be that even if the spies had brought a completely objective report, Bnei Yisrael would have responded as our parasha describes; therefore, the entire generation is punished by not entering the land.[6]

 

This also explains why our parasha records Moshe’s rebuke to the nation, which had not been mentioned in Sefer Bamidbar at all:

 

And I said to you, “Do not fear, nor be afraid of them. The Lord your God, Who goes before you – He shall fight for you, as all that He did for you in Egypt, before your eyes; and in the wilderness, where you have seen how the Lord your God has carried you, as a man carries his son, in all the way that you have journeyed, until you came to this place. Yet in this matter you do not believe in the Lord your God, Who journeys before you on the way, to scout out a place for you to encamp – in fire by night, to show you the way that you should journey, and in cloud by day.” (verses 29-33)

 

           The claims that Bnei Yisrael are not grateful to God and do not believe in Him as they should, are part of the central message that Moshe seeks to convey to the younger generation. For this reason, he records here the admonishment that he had delivered following the nation’s sin.[7]

 

C.        Moshe’s Punishment

 

            Following the description of the nation’s punishment, Moshe surprisingly starts speaking about himself:

 

God was also angry at me, because of you, saying, “You, too, shall not go in there.[8] It will be Yehoshua bin Nun, who stands before you, who will go there; encourage him, for he will cause Israel to inherit it.” (verse 37)

 

            What does this tell us, and what has the sin of the spies to do with the decree that Moshe will not enter the land?

 

            Ramban understands this as an allusion on Moshe’s part to the sin of Mei Meriva:

 

“God was also angry at me, because of you” – meaning, “Behold – your sins which you committed at that time, concerning the spies, withheld the good land from you, and then you sinned further, on a different occasion, causing me, too, to be prevented from crossing over.” For [Moshe] wanted to speak collectively of the punishment of all those prevented from crossing into the land, for it was all caused by their sins.

 

       However, the plain meaning of the text suggests that the decree was directly connected to the sin of the spies. Indeed, Abarbanel maintains that it was already at this stage, in the wake of the sin of the spies, that it was decreed that Moshe would not enter the land. To his view, Moshe was punished for the leading questions which he posed to the spies – which, admittedly, had been intended “to bring joy to Israel with good news,” but ultimately, the emphasis on military questions had struck fear in the heart of the people, bringing about their sin:

 

And since Moshe, our master, commanded with these words something which Bnei Yisrael had not asked nor had God commanded, and the consequence of this what that that generation would die out in the wilderness, God saw fit that since Moshe, our teacher, was the cause of this incident, it was therefore only right and just that he who had brought it about would likewise not come there, for a mistaken teaching is like a willful transgression."[9]

 

          However, this interpretation, too, is difficult to accept, since according to our parasha, the dispatch of the spies had essentially been a military intelligence move, initiated by Bnei Yisrael (see note 1); there is no mention of Moshe having added any questions.

 

            Seforno proposes a different view. He maintains that the verse, "And your children, concerning whom you said that they would be prey (asher amartem la-vaz yihye)," is not to be understood as an auxiliary clause; rather, it should be read as follows: "Your children, concerning whom you spoke – will be prey" – referring to future generations, which would suffer persecution in exile. He brings various sources to prove that the decree of exile was a punishment for the sin of the spies. One example is Tehillim 106:24-26:

 

And they despised the desirable land, not believing His words. And they murmured in their tents; they did not obey God. So He lifted his hand against them, to cause them to fall in the wilderness; to cause their descendants to fall among the nations, and to disperse them among the lands.

 

In Seforno's view, this is also the reason why Moshe did not enter the land:

 

For the prevention of him entering the land together with them was a reason that this would be realized for them even more clearly, to worsen the decree that had been passed – that their offspring would be spoils, in future generations. And further on, in 3:26, it is written: “And God admonished me because of you – because I had desired to establish you in [the land], so that you would never be exiled from it, but He had already raised His hand [and sworn] to cause your offspring to fall among the nations. 

 

          According to Seforno, had Moshe entered the land, it would not have been possible to exile Bnei Yisrael; therefore, it was decreed upon him, following the sin of the spies, that he would not enter the land – not as a punishment for Moshe himself, but rather in order that it would be possible to punish Bnei Yisrael with exile from the land.[10]

 

This explanation, too, presents difficulties on the level of the plain reading, since our parasha contains no hint that exile was decreed upon Israel because of the sin of the spies.

 

We therefore humbly propose that, according to the plain text, Seforno and Abarbanel are right in their position that Moshe connects the decree that he will not enter the land with the sin of the spies – but the connection is different from their understanding of it. As we have seen, Moshe places the main responsibility for the decree of death in the wilderness upon Bnei Yisrael themselves, rather than upon the spies. And since Moshe is their leader, the decree applies to him, too; instead of himself, the leader of the younger generation will enter the land. Moshe has overall responsibility for leadership of the people, such that the people's guilt is, by definition, related to him, too.

 

If this is so, then the Torah records to reasons for Moshe not entering the land: his personal misdeed at Mei Meriva, and his ministerial failure as the leader of Am Yisrael in the episode of the spies. Indeed, there are other places in Sefer Devarim where Moshe places the responsibility for his not being able to enter the land upon Bnei Yisrael. For example, at the beginning of Parashat Va-etchanan, he recounts how he pleaded with God to permit him to enter the land, but God refused, and he elaborates:

 

God was angry with me because of you, and would not hear me. (3:26)

 

Later on, he says,

 

God was angry with me for your sakes, and He swore that I would not cross the Jordan, that I should not go in to the good land which the Lord your God has given you as an inheritance. (4:21)

 

At the same time, throughout Moshe's speech, there is no hint of his sin at Mei Meriva. All of this sits well with Moshe's aim of reproaching Bnei Yisrael with a view to disciplining the younger generation – the generation that will merit to enter the land, unlike their parents and Moshe, their leader.

 

 

Translated by Kaeren Fish

, full_html