Shalom Friends;
This week, our Parshat HaShevua Shelach is being sponsored by Dr. Eli and Miri Behar of Ramat Beit Shemesh L’ilui Nishmas for the Yahrtzeit of Yerachmiel Meir ben Nissim Avraham. To the Behar family, many thanks for your sponsorship and continued kindness.
You can celebrate a Simcha — a birth, a Bar/Bat Mitzvah, a Chassuna or other Simcha event in your life, or commemorate a Yahrtzeit of a loved one, or for whatever other reason by sponsoring a Parshat HaShevua.
Please forward to your relatives and friends and encourage them to sponsor a Parshat HaShevua. And please be in contact with me with any questions, or for further details.
Best Regards,
Moshe Burt
olehchadash@yahoo.com
skype: mark.burt3
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As a hagdamah to this vort, this author has indicated over the years that Parshiyot Hashavua are generally compiled three of four weeks of more before the Shabbos of the Parsha. And so, our Parshat Shelach is compiled against the backdrop of the fight over judicial reform, leftist demonstrations against the reform measures, the IDF’s hits on Islamic Jihad terror leaders, the current barrage of Gaza terror rockets launched against Sderot, Tel Aviv, Rechovot and other locale’s and the IDF’s continuing massive response against numerous Hamas targets and terror leaders.
Our Parsha Shelach, and the affair of the miraglim — the spies, annually brings to mind the evolution of the Israeli media, academia, political, judiciary and governmental scene which has brought us to the state of affairs we are facing and continue to face today, and conjures up ways in which today’s state of affairs could parallel the event of the miraglim in Bamidbar.
Our Parshat Shelach opens:
“Hashem spoke to Moshe, saying, ‘Send forth for yourself men, and let them spy out the Land of Canaan that I give to the B’nei Yisrael…” (Perek 13, posukim 1-2 as rendered to English in “The Sapirstein Edition — The Torah with Rashi’s Commentary” on Sefer Bamidbar)
Rashi comments on the above posukim:
“Send forth for yourself” — by your discretion. I do not command you to do so: if you wish, send forth. “For yourself” implies that Hashem was not ordering Moshe to send forth the spies, but rather, was leaving the decision to him [Moshe] (Rashi citing Devek Tov) Since Israel came and said — “Let us send men ahead of us,” as it says — “All of you approached me [and said, ‘Let us send men ahead of us’]. etc. and Moshe consulted the Shechinah. Hashem said, “I told them that [the Land] is good, as it says, — ‘I shall bring you up from the affliction of Egypt, etc.’ I swear by their lives that I give them room to err — through the words of the spies — so that they shall not take possession of it.” This explains why Hashem agreed to sending the spies although He did not order it. Hashem wished to give the B’nei Yisrael the option of sending the spies, and sinning through them, because they showed a lack of faith by suggesting that they be sent. (Rashi cites Tanhuma 5 and Sotah 34b and Devek Tov)
We now excerpt from Rabbi Goldin’s summary of our Parshat Shelach in his sefer, “Unlocking The Torah Text” on Sefer Bamidbar ( page 117):
Upon their return, the spies [miraglim], with the exception of Calev ben Yefuneh and Yehoshua ben Nun, offer discouraging testimony concerning [their opinion of] the nation’s inability to conquer the inhabitants of Canaan. In despair, and ignoring the counterarguments of Calev and Yehoshua, the nation rises in rebellion against Hashem, Moshe and Aaron.
The populous of the nation had already rebelled numerous times against Hashem as Torah related in last week’s Parshat Beha’alotcha.
So we find that the stage was already set, due to the peoples’ rebellions, prior to the episode of the miraglim.
In previous vorts on Parshat Shelach, this author discussed the errant protocol of the miraglim and the modern-day parallels to the miraglim’s false conclusions and the ongoing battle for the collective soul of Am Yisrael which manifests in what we see playing out today in battles such as over judicial reform, draft reforms, etc. which seem, at least to this author as part of an internal milchamot shel Torah.
This author recalls the infancy of the so-called “peace movement,” in theaftermath of the Yom Kippur war which has grown into modern-day Israeli “progressivism” with its multitudinous tentacles which eventually became the alt-leftist NGOs (non-governing organizations funded by foreign lobbies and governments).
Among the secular, the Chilonim, it’s a case where many have no clue as to how or why they are here. Many of them are so separated from Hashem and Torah due to generations of lacking any Torah grounding, such that many lack the ability to even recite “Shema Yisrael” — The Central Tenet [noun: any opinion, principle, doctrine, dogma, etc., especially one held as true by members of a profession, group, or movement. synonym: belief] of Judaism. In their lack of Torah grounding, they have been so misguided by generations of governmental, leftist-defeatist-cancer-infected military establishment, media and intelligencia elitist mythical “dogma” indoctrination and the evolution of an agendized self-appointed judiciary, i.e. a judiciary dictatorship that vetoes every piece of Eretz Yisrael-related legislation which Knesset votes to become law that, even being in close quarters in our small Medinat Yisrael, and having to interact with our various observant and settlement-related segments — sectors, seems abhorrent to them. They seemingly lack the initiative — the mesirut nefesh to learn the truth.
Thus, just as ten of the spies seized on an Am whose Emunah in Hashem had not yet matured and blossomed in their second year in Bamidbar, we face today an internal war for, and to bring out the Jewish heart and neshama. — as Shimon Peres lamented after he and the Labor party lost to Bibi and the Likud: Jews vs Israelis — “the Jews won, the Israelis lost.”
B’Ezrat Hashem that the current Israeli government survives, and thrives, that a Torah brand of judicial objectivity emerges, based on the representation of the people, and that the Truth of Emunah in HaKadosh Borchu reigns supreme.
May we, the B’nei Yisrael be zocha that our brethren — the refugee families from Gush Katif be permanently settled and be made totally whole — be totally restituted for all that was stolen from them, that the thrice expelled families of Amona be restored to their rebuilt homes and the oft-destroyed Yeshiva buildings in Homesh be rebuilt, all at total government expense; due to alt-leftist-agendized, supreme court legalized Yassamnik gunpoint. Baruch Hashem that our dear brother Jonathan Pollard is now in his third year at home in Eretz Yisrael and has embarked on a new chapter in his life. May Esther Yocheved bat Yechiel Avraham have an aliyah in Shemayim and may her spirit and memory continue to lift Jonathan to at least 120 years. May the MIAs be liberated alive and returned to us in ways befitting Al Kiddush Hashem — as with the return in April, 2019, via Russia, of the remains of Zachariah Baumel, as should the remains of the two chayalim from the Gaza War of nine years ago. May we have the courage and strength to stand up and physically prevent the possibility of Chas V’Challila any future eviction of Jews from their homes and prevent Chas V’Challila the handing of Jewish land over to anyone, let alone to enemies sworn to Israel’s and Judaism’s destruction and eradication. And may we soon and finally see the total end to the Communist Chinese corona virus pandemic and all like viruses. May we fulfill Hashem’s blueprint of B’nei Yisrael as a Unique people — an Am Segula, not to be reckoned with as with “the nations” and may we be zocha to see the Moshiach, the Ge’ula Shlaima, as Dov Shurin sings; “Ki Karov Yom Hashem Al’Kol HaGoyim”, the Ultimate Redemption, bimhayrah b’yamainu — speedily, in our time”, — Achshav, Chik Chuk, Miyad, Etmol!!!
Good Shabbos!
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Moshe Burt, an Oleh, is a commentator on news and events in Israel and Founder and Director of The Sefer Torah Recycling Network. He lives in Ramat Beit Shemesh.
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