Shelach: miracles and expectations 2.0
Shelach: miracles and expectations
Moshe sends scouts to bring back an assessment of the promised land. Is it as good as Gd said? What obstacles would block their entry? The mission come from the highest source. Bravely, they do as instructed. ( This is a distinctly American reading, trying to sympathize/understand the positions of the villains as well as the heros)
The omniscient ( GD? Moshe?) narrator confirms that giants lived in Hevron, a place that the spies visited (we are not told that they saw the giants, only that it was possible to see them, they existed. Rashi quotes that it was only Caleb who saw them. Did he tell them a tall tale that they embellished?) They brought back the giant fruit. They reported on what they saw. Ten of the twelve said that the Israelites could not possibly rout these dug-in supermen who lived in the high ground. Based upon their observations, there was a very low probability the puny Israelites could conquer the land(like grasshoppers; but grasshoppers can conquer , eg plague of llocusts). Victory would require a miracle.
The intelligence assessment greatly distressed the people. They were demoralized (chosen word, loss of moral and consequent loss of morals). Gd deemed the people's reaction so inappropriate that a 40 year desert wandering banishment from the Promised Land was decreed. ( headed back in the direction of Egypt, irony)
The people were supposed to rely upon miracles. But even after seeing so many wonders (most recently the slav), they did not know when, or if, the miracles would appear ( Moshe expressed doubts with the slav). Miracles have an intrinsic unpredictable nature (definition) . It is generally not a sound policy to rely on the improbable. In addition, miracles usually come only after exhausting effort.
In my hematology/oncology practice I ask people to try for unlikely outcomes(remission/cure) all the time, all the while trying to guide them through whatever actually happens ( usually not a miracle). It is always a big ask. ( not modern like hospice)When it happens there is no greater joy. It happens more often than commonly expected.
The decision to chase the miracle looks different from the inside. The safe bet, from the outside is against the rarity. On the inside, one must look at the alternatives. For my parents when they were hunted by the Nazis and their allies, it was beat the odds or die. That is also the situation for many of my patients. You can fight the odds, especially if you have no choice.
But the spies felt that they had a choice: Return to their previous life: Egypt, with its leeks and garlic.(hence they were planning a revolution. Miriam had tried a coup just prior to this parsha; Korach's uprising is the next. This is a theme for this section of the Torah).Better a live slave than a dead soldier. That was a wrong choice. Although proceeding forward, into the hostile Promised Land would require the help of the extraordinary, the continued survival in the desert( that would be required for a return to Egypt) necessitated manna from heaven and sources of water. It seems easier to rely on the miracles that are already present than to expect novelties.
The parsha ends with the mitzvah of tzitzith, the strings that hang down around the lower part of the body. The asher yatzar blessing, the blessing said after private body functions, attests to the miraculous nature of the body and its orifices. Our control over bodily functions (including, and perhaps especially sex, possibly a reason for the male designation) is an everyday miracle, a miracle we rely upon .
We should appreciate the miracle that is our control over nature - and use it wisely.
The omniscient ( GD? Moshe?) narrator confirms that giants lived in Hevron, a place that the spies visited (we are not told that they saw the giants, only that it was possible to see them, they existed. Rashi quotes that it was only Caleb who saw them. Did he tell them a tall tale that they embellished?) They brought back the giant fruit. They reported on what they saw. Ten of the twelve said that the Israelites could not possibly rout these dug-in supermen who lived in the high ground. Based upon their observations, there was a very low probability the puny Israelites could conquer the land(like grasshoppers; but grasshoppers can conquer , eg plague of llocusts). Victory would require a miracle.
The intelligence assessment greatly distressed the people. They were demoralized (chosen word, loss of moral and consequent loss of morals). Gd deemed the people's reaction so inappropriate that a 40 year desert wandering banishment from the Promised Land was decreed. ( headed back in the direction of Egypt, irony)
The people were supposed to rely upon miracles. But even after seeing so many wonders (most recently the slav), they did not know when, or if, the miracles would appear ( Moshe expressed doubts with the slav). Miracles have an intrinsic unpredictable nature (definition) . It is generally not a sound policy to rely on the improbable. In addition, miracles usually come only after exhausting effort.
In my hematology/oncology practice I ask people to try for unlikely outcomes(remission/cure) all the time, all the while trying to guide them through whatever actually happens ( usually not a miracle). It is always a big ask. ( not modern like hospice)When it happens there is no greater joy. It happens more often than commonly expected.
The decision to chase the miracle looks different from the inside. The safe bet, from the outside is against the rarity. On the inside, one must look at the alternatives. For my parents when they were hunted by the Nazis and their allies, it was beat the odds or die. That is also the situation for many of my patients. You can fight the odds, especially if you have no choice.
But the spies felt that they had a choice: Return to their previous life: Egypt, with its leeks and garlic.(hence they were planning a revolution. Miriam had tried a coup just prior to this parsha; Korach's uprising is the next. This is a theme for this section of the Torah).Better a live slave than a dead soldier. That was a wrong choice. Although proceeding forward, into the hostile Promised Land would require the help of the extraordinary, the continued survival in the desert( that would be required for a return to Egypt) necessitated manna from heaven and sources of water. It seems easier to rely on the miracles that are already present than to expect novelties.
The parsha ends with the mitzvah of tzitzith, the strings that hang down around the lower part of the body. The asher yatzar blessing, the blessing said after private body functions, attests to the miraculous nature of the body and its orifices. Our control over bodily functions (including, and perhaps especially sex, possibly a reason for the male designation) is an everyday miracle, a miracle we rely upon .
We should appreciate the miracle that is our control over nature - and use it wisely.
posted by Sheldon Goldberg at 1:32 PM
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