.בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יי אֱלהֵינוּ מֶלֶך–הָעולָם אֲשֶׁר קִדְּשָנוּ בְּמִצְותָיו וְצִוָּנוּ לַעֲסק בְּדִבְרֵי-תורָה Barukh atah Adonai Eloheinu melekh ha’olam asher kid’shanu b’mitzvotav v’tzivanu la’asok b’divrei torah. Blessed are You, Eternal our God, Sovereign of time and space, who has sanctified us with commandments, and commanded us to study words of Torah.
About This Parsha
Numbers 13:1 - 15:41
https://www.sefaria.org/Numbers.13.1?lang=bi&aliyot=1 (link to parsha text on Sefaria; click on any line to read commentary and double click any Hebrew word to see the dictionary definition)
Quick Summary:
This week, we’re reading the story of the 12 scouts. We learn that this generation will wander the desert for 40 years, and we receive laws about taking a portion of bread for challah and about tzitzit.
Summary Details:
Moshe instructs one leader from each of the 12 tribes to go scout out the land of Canaan. He asks them to report back about things like the geography, population sizes, and agricultural potential.
The scouts spend 40 days in Canaan and bring back produce to show everyone. Ten of the 12 said that while the land is fertile, the people are way too powerful for them to conquer.
Joshua and Caleb are the two scouts who tell the people not to fear, but the people want to riot anyway.
In response to the people’s dissent, God says that the whole generation (except Joshua and Caleb) will die in the desert after wandering for 40 years. Only after that will the people get to enter Canaan.
The people of Yisrael then try to enter the land of Canaan anyway, but they’re quickly defeated. God tells Moshe that when they do enter the land, they need to bring a meal offering. God also instructs the people to make a dough offering (challah) when eating the bread of the land.
God distinguishes between knowingly and unknowingly breaking God’s laws. We read an example of this when the community sees a man gathering sticks on Shabbat. They bring him to the leaders, and he gets stoned to death.
God instructs the people to wear fringes on their garments.
Glossary
שְׁלַח־לְךָ sh’lach lecha; “send out for yourself.” The 2nd word, “lecha,” is a way of adding emphasis to the command verb “sh’lach” (send). Notably, it recalls another parsha title: lech lecha or “go forth.” כָּנָף kanaf; wing/edge. This is where we’re instructed to wear tzitzit, on the “wings” of our clothes.
Topics to Look Out For (while you read):
Reactions to the 12 scouts (from the people, from Moshe, from God)
Questions/Considerations (reflecting after you read):
Why do you think two of the scouts held back from giving the same review as the other ten? What does this parsha have to say about leadership, responsibility, and communication? What would you have done while on a scouting trip, and how would you report on it?
What is the incident of the 12 scouts about for the people? What’s it about for God? What would it mean to you that people & God can misunderstand one another?
Why would the person gathering sticks on Shabbat decide to do so right after the incident of the 12 scouts? How does it change the story for you?
What’s your relationship to tzitzit? Do you wear them regularly, or maybe you wear a tallit for morning prayers? When do you see or feel the tassels? What thoughts, feelings, etc. do they elicit in you?
Commentary & Supplemental Texts (translations via Chabad.org “Parshat Shelach In-Depth”):
Send out for yourself men (Numbers 13:2) “Send out for yourself”—as your mind dictates. I am not instructing you; if you so desire, send. For the people of Israel had come to Moses, saying “Let us send men before us,” as it is written (Deuteronomy 1:22), “You all approached me . . .”; and Moses consulted with G‑d. Said G‑d: I have said that it is a good land. . . . By your life, I shall now give you the option to err . . . (Rashi; Talmud)
Moses named Hosea . . . Joshua (13:16) The letter yud, which had been removed from Sarai’s name (when she was renamed “Sarah”—cf. Genesis 17:15), was soaring and flying before the divine throne all those years, and saying before G‑d: “Because I am the smallest of the letters, I was taken out of the righteous Sarah?” Until she was added to Joshua. (Midrash Rabbah)
They went up . . . and he came unto Hebron (13:22) Should it not have read “and they came”? But it was Caleb alone who went to Hebron, to pray at the graves of the Patriarchs that he not be enticed to join in the conspiracy of the spies. Thus it is written (Deuteronomy 1:36), “And to him (Caleb) I shall give the land upon which he trod”; and it says (Judges 1:20): “To Caleb they gave Hebron” (as his portion in the Land of Israel). (Rashi; Talmud, Sotah 34b)
We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we (13:30) They said this even regarding G‑d Himself (the Hebrew word mimenu, “than we,” can also mean “than he”): Even He cannot remove them from there. (Talmud; Rashi)
The people wept that night (14:1) On the ninth of Av it was decreed that our fathers would not enter the Promised Land. For we know that the children of Israel decamped from Mount Sinai on the 20th of Iyar (Numbers 10:11), and set forth on a three days’ journey (ibid. 10:33), following which they ate the quail for thirty days (ibid. 11:20). That brings us up to the 22nd of Sivan. Then Miriam was secluded outside of the camp for seven days (ibid. 12:15), following which Moses sent the spies (ibid. 13:1). Thus, the spies went out on the 29th of Sivan. And it is written, “They returned from spying out the land at the end of forty days.” The month of Tammuz was a “full” month (of 30 days) that year, meaning that they returned on the 8th of Av. And it is further written, “All the congregation lifted up their voice and cried; and the people wept that night.” Rabbah said in the name of Rabbi Yochanan: That night was the night of the ninth of Av. Said G‑d to them: You have wept without cause; therefore I will set aside this day for a weeping throughout the generations to come. (Talmud, Taanit 29b)
They found a man gathering sticks on the Sabbath day (15:32) The Torah relates the shame of Israel, in that they all kept only the first Shabbat, and on the second Shabbat this one came and violated it. (Rashi; Talmud)
Those who found him gathering sticks brought him to Moses (15:33) This teaches us that a person is not executed for a capital offense unless he is first warned by the witnesses, and then proceeds with the deed despite the warning. (Since the Torah twice emphasizes that “they found him gathering”—i.e., he continued gathering even after they found him doing so). (Talmud, Sanhedrin 40b; Rashi)
They shall put upon the fringe of each corner a thread of blue (15:38) Why is blue singled out from all the varieties of colors? Because blue resembles the sea, and the sea resembles heaven, and heaven resembles the divine throne, as it is written (Exodus 24:10): “They saw the G‑d of Israel, and at His feet was as it were a paved work of sapphire stone, like the very heaven for clearness." (Talmud, Sotah 17a)
It shall be to you as fringes; and you shall see it (15:39) Said Rabbi Meir: it does not say “and you shall see them,” but “and you shall see Him” (the Hebrew oto also translates as “him”). This teaches that everyone who fulfills the mitzvah of tzitzit, it is as if he has greeted the face of the Divine Presence. For the blue thread resembles the sea, the sea resembles grasses, grasses resemble the sky, and the sky resembles the divine throne. (Jerusalem Talmud, Berachot 1:2)