Parashat Shelah 5784
A French Catholic teen’s first glimpse of Jews wrapped in their Tallitot led him to intuit one of Judaism’s essential values
24
06, 2024
13
06, 2023
Parashat Shelah Lekha 5783
God is out of patience, ready to give up on the grumbling Israelites. God and Moshe have attempted to transform a group of homeless, freed slaves into a nation, while the people have struggled with dissension, lack of faith and understandable fears about their future. They complain, rebel and grumble. (The Book of Numbers might also be called the Book of Grumblers!)
In this week’s parasha, this “generation of the wilderness,”dor ha-midbar, has committed the second of its most egregious acts of rebellion. Earlier, they built and worshipped a golden calf. In Shelah lekha, twelve scouts, a leader from each tribe, report on their mission to check out the promised land. They all agree that the land is fertile and desirable, but ten of the twelve recommend against going forward, stirring fear and doubt and demoralizing the people. The Israelites declare, “If only we had died in the land of Egypt! Or if only we might die in the wilderness!” And Read More >
24
06, 2022
Parashat Shelah 5782
In this week's D'var Torah, Rabbi Katy Allen says that Caleb and Joshua teach us not to catastrophize but to seek out the best and maintain a positive outlook even when the future feels fearful.
4
06, 2021
Parashat Shelah 5781
Click HERE for an audio recording of this D’var Torah
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19
06, 2020
Parashat Shelah 5780
A D’var Torah for Parashat Shelah
By Cantor Sandy Horowitz (’14)
Leaders tend to behave in one of two ways. Some promote fear, often spreading lies which may be based on fears of their own; other leaders promote trust, offering hope for a future envisioned but not yet realized. Parashat Shelah tells the story of what can happen when leadership is fear-based.
It begins as twelve men are selected by Moses to scout out the promised land. These twelve are all machers in the community, one from each of the twelve tribes, whose names and lineage are listed in the text. Their mission is to gather information about the land and its inhabitants. The Torah reading describes how they find huge clusters of grapes, as well as pomegranates and figs – indications of fertile land and good produce. Then we read, “And they returned from searching the land after forty days” (Num. 13:25). There are Read More >
3
07, 2019
Parashat Korah 5779
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28
06, 2019
Parashat Shelah Lekha 5779
Grasshoppers and Giants
A D’var Torah for Parashat Shelah Lekha
By Rabbi Matthew Goldstone
Parashat Shelah Lekha recounts the episode of the twelve spies who travel ahead to scout out the Promised Land. Ten of the spies return to the people with a report of the wonderful fruit of the land coupled with the overwhelming danger of its inhabitants. Not only do these ten spies describe the people of this place as gigantic (אַנְשֵׁי מִדּוֹת), but these scouts convey their own depiction of how these people perceived the intruders – “And we looked like grasshoppers (חֲגָבִים) to ourselves, and so we must have looked to them” (Num. 13:33). Their report strikes fear into the hearts of the Israelites who regret leaving Egypt and God gets angry.
Readers often assume that the sin of the ten spies, and the reason for God’s anger, is that they suggest that the people of the land are too Read More >
7
06, 2018
Shelah Lekha 5778
A D’var Torah for Shelah Lekha
by Cantor Sandy Horowitz ’14
In the story of the twelve spies who scout out the land of Canaan in Parashat Shelah Lekha we experience several different leadership styles — from the spies, Joshua and Caleb, Moses and God.
God instructs Moses to send representatives from each of the twelve tribes, “everyone a leader among them”, to spy on Canaan, the land which God has promised to the Israelites. After forty days they return and ten of these tribal leaders produce an “evil report” with regard to the overwhelming size and strength of the Canaanite people. An eleventh, Caleb, expresses disagreement and suggests going right away to possess the land (Numbers 13:30). But his is a lone voice, as the ten continue their litany of fear and exaggeration.
In response the people “lifted up their voice and cried” (Numbers 14:1). They speak out against Moses, Aaron and God, Read More >
13
06, 2017
Parashat Shelah
by Cantor Sandy Horowitz
What’s in a Name?
Parashat Shelah tells the story of twelve spies sent by Moses to scout out the land of Canaan that has been promised by God to the Israelite people. Upon their return, ten of the twelve report that the enemy is too great and the land unconquerable, thereby instilling doubt and fear among the Israelites. Only two of the spies, Caleb and Joshua, remain faithful to God’s promise of a successful outcome.
The Torah portion begins by listing the names of the spies, representatives from each of the twelve tribes of Israel. Joshua, future leader of the Israelite people, is an unassuming fifth from among the twelve: “From the tribe of Ephraim, Hoshea the son of Nun” (Numbers 13:8).
Numbers 13:16 reads, “These are the names of the men which Moses sent to spy out the land; and Moses called Hoshea the son of Nun Joshua/Yehoshua.” Without Read More >
29
06, 2016
Parashat Shelah
The Generations of the Wilderness
by Rabbi Len Levin
Should the Israelites of the wilderness generation be condemned for their unruliness and lack of faith? Or admired for their heroic survival in the face of adversity?
Closer to our time: Should Jews of Diaspora be condemned for their effeteness, rootlessness, and apathy? Or should they be admired for their cultivation of intellectual and ethical values, their balancing of universalistic and particularistic concerns, and their sheer survival over 2000 years, keeping the Jewish legacy alive amid adverse circumstances?
“Negation of the Diaspora” was a topic of fierce debate in early Zionist polemics. The exilic mind-set of Diaspora Jewry was compared to the slave mentality of the ancient Israelites. Jews who were too timid to defend themselves against the pogrom perpetrators would have to undergo a change of character in order to reclaim their place in history and build the Jewish homeland.
In a famous exchange of the early Read More >
