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this week's d'var torah
What went wrong here?
The portion begins by telling us who these twelve men were. They are not soldiers experienced in scouting; they might not even be soldiers at all. They are among the leaders of their tribes; the word the torah uses is "nasi", prince. They're not scouts; they're celebrities embarking on a campaign in the public eye. It reminds me of when governments or federations send prominent community members -- who have no relevant traits other than well-known names -- on so-called "fact-finding" missions. If we wanted to find facts we would send people who are good at finding facts, even though we've never heard of them. These kinds of missions serve a different purpose -- not fact-finding but public relations. Moshe already knew it was a good land; this mission was supposed to confirm that. Unfortunately for Moshe (and everyone else), human nature got in the way.
The twelve men were chosen specifically because they were leaders of their tribes. Naturally, first and foremost they represent the goals of their tribes. It is their tribes who will hold them accountable for the outcome.
So what happens when these men see a challenge in the land? Does Amiel perhaps wonder how his mother will react if he has to be part of the force that will conquer the land? Will Yig'al, perhaps a new grandfather, be willing to send his son-in-law to fight? Does Gadi think the land in the wilderness is fine for grazing his tribe's flocks and why risk it? All sorts of concerns can be on their minds as they explore a land of giants and fortified cities.
It's not that they didn't have good intentions; of course they wanted to do a good job. Moshe hand-picked them for this assignment and everyone was watching. But there is a natural tension between what the mission needs from them and what their constituents need from them, and they have been chosen as tribe leaders, not as individuals. Naturally their concerns for their tribes are going to win out.
This kind of conflict of interest is common. People are complex; they have multiple allegiances and multiple factors that can affect what they say. When you listen to people you have to consider all that and try to tease out what's really driving them. That doesn't mean we should be cynical, nor does it mean there is necessarily anything untoward going on; it just means we need to consider what else might be influencing them, to ask ourselves some key questions, like: Whom do they work for? Who benefits if we heed their words? What might they be afraid of? What are their qualifications? I'm sure we can all think of obvious examples here, but we could easily miss the less-obvious cases if we aren't careful.
Before we make up our minds about the facts, we need to try to understand the perspectives of the people who are reporting those "facts" to us. This is the mistake the Israelites made -- they listened uncritically to the reports of ten of the men, men they were pre-disposed to believe. Even two prominent men with contradictory views, one already Moshe's heir apparent, weren't enough to give them pause; it seems they did not even consider the possibility that the ten were exaggerating or mistaken.
Being afraid of conquering the land wasn't the problem. Paying heed to their tribal leaders, in and of itself, wasn't the problem. Listening selectively to the reports they wanted to hear and dismissing those they didn't, on the other hand, was a big problem. And it's a problem that is human nature, one we all need to be careful about, whether people are speaking to us one-to-one or via the media. May we learn the lesson the Israelites missed; may we get better at listening and analyzing what we're told.
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