"And we seemed in in our eyes as grasshoppers, and thus we seemed in their eyes". With these words, the party of the majority amongst the spies seal the "debate" with the two dissenters, Calev and Yehoshua, both implanting the spark and fanning the flames of mutiny amongst the distraught masses of Am Yisrael. The people had their doubts before (see commentators especially on the presentation of the story in Devarim), but now, they are terrified. The image of giants toying with their masses before crushing them arises in their minds, and all the benefit of a land described so lavishly at first become detriments in their minds.
The Gemara asks, how did "this evil assemblage" of ten slanderous spies know how they appeared in the eyes of the inhabitants of the land? It answers that they heard them remarking upon looking upon them, "what are those grasshoppers doing there?".
When Rashi comments on the same verse, however, he phrases it as "what are those doing there?" The Me'iri assumes that a copyist's error fell into the text here, while the Maharal, in his supercommentary on Rashi (Gur Aryeh), explains why Rashi might have substituted ants for grasshoppers. He then goes on to suggest a very powerful psychological reading:
Why is it necessary at all to mention how the spies looked in the eyes of the inhabitants? If they comment on their size by reporting, "we seemed as grasshoppers in their eyes", then surely that's how they would see them. The Maharal suggests that the impression we make on others is keyed by the way we see ourselves: if we see ourselves as grasshoppers, then we project that image so that others see us in this fashion. In fact, the Maharal comments, there would have been every reason to assume that the inhabitants would have seen Am Yisrael as giants. After all, do we not have such a statement from the mouth of Rahav, who speaks of the terror cast by the approaching hordes of Am Yisrael upon the inhabitants of the land.
In fact, Dor Deah, the generation of the desert, WERE giants. Here's the story told by Rabbah Bar Bar Chana (paraphrased from Bava Batra 73a-b): Once I was traveling in the desert and an Arab said to me, "come and I'll show you those (of Am Yisrael) who died in the desert". We went, and they looked as though they were drunk, sleeping on their backs, the knee of one of them was upright, and the Arab rode on his camel under the crook of that knee, holding his spear upright and it did not touch!".
So we see that, in fact, the giants were actually Am Yisrael and not the other way around. But they saw themselves as mere grasshoppers, and thus, they reported, were they seen by their adversaries-to-be.
But why grasshoppers? Why not, indeed, ants, as Rashi has it? After all, they're much smaller? One might suggest that grasshoppers are skittish, their jumping around indicative of fear, whereas ants are doggedly determined. But I'd like to suggest another explanation.
Did you notice the positions assumed by the giant corpses seen by Rabba bar bar Chana? Now compare with grasshoppers. That's right, grasshoppers also look like they have a knee sticking up in the air. As described in Vayikra, when indicating the signs of kashrut for grasshoppers and their ilk: Which have kera'ayim above their legs to leap with upon the earth.
Four legs plus kera'ayim. Those giant hopping legs are, in a certain way, most un-leg-like. Instead of descending from the body, they begin by ascending, but then, half-way, at the knee-joint, they suddenly change directions and go down. Thus they are called kera'ayim - "bowers", "benders".
Note the description carefully: they rise up, majestically, confidently, and suddenly, they make a complete turnabout and head down. It this contraption that enables the grasshopper to half-fly, half-walk, somewhere between heaven and earth, but not really of either place.
This is Am Yisrael upon its approach to Eretz Yisrael. Unable to conceive itself as a real people conquering the inhabitants at G-d's word, ready to take refuge in the ready self-conception of slavery, they start off with a false bravado that evaporates leaving behind it only the nothingness - ephes, in the words of the spies - which they see at the core of their identities. Having jumped around the Land for forty days, they frantically leap away from the implications of what their eyes saw: it is a good land, and, as Yehoshua and Calev state in their last-ditch attempt to reassure the faltering people - ascend, let us ascend, for able, we are able to do it!
The next verse: The people lift up - those kera'ayim start off by heading upward, but then - they give voice and cry. We will fall , all of us, to the sword of those giants. Leap away from acting on faith, leap to a new place for a short time, until that position becomes untenable.
We are told that that vain cry fixed for us a template for our subsequent history and determine the eventual destruction of our Temples and our exile, leaping from land to land, each time imbued with a faith of bravado in our new situation, only to be revealed as misplaced as the foot of the giant comes down upon Am Yisael -quick, jump!!
It's time for Tikkun: let us look at our adversaries, every one of them, but Ahmadinejad will do, for what they are: Have you seen him? He's a midget! And have you noticed that Olmert is actually taller than most of his foreign diplomatic guests? The stature conferred by a realization of the Divine promise: I shall walk with you (in your land) UPRIGHT! is enough to bring us to realize what real grasshoppers know: The kera'ayim only propel them into the air to use their wings and soar on high. Our wings are folded carefully within our hearts and souls - - - time to get them out, stretch them forth, and....
Rav Yehoshua Kahan
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Rav Yehoshua Kahan is a teacher at Yeshivat Bat Ayin. He has held pulpits in Knoxville, Tennessee and Los Angeles, and served as educational director of Livnot U'Lehibanot. He blogs on Parashat Hashavua here |