Parshas Beha’aloscha 5781
Miriam’s punishment was meant to serve as a cautionary tale. When she is punished at the end of the parsha for speaking lashon hara about Moshe—questioning why he distanced himself from his family if such demands were not made of other nevi’im—the spies who would later be sent into Israel to scout the Land should have taken note. At the beginning of next week’s parsha, Rashi explains that the juxtaposition of the episode of Miriam in our parsha and that of sending the spies in Parshas Shlach is to highlight how the spies failed to learn the lesson of the evils of speaking lashon hara.
But aren’t the two cases radically different from one another? Miriam spoke lashon hara about the holiest Jew of all time and she is punished for it. How is that meant to provide caution against sharing a negative report of an inanimate piece of real estate?
A better understanding of precisely what Miriam did wrong is in order. Miriam questions why it is that Moshe’s life must look different from her own or from Aharon’s. They are both nevi’im themselves and yet remain fully connected to their families. Why should Moshe be different?
The answer, simply, is that Moshe was different. His prophetic experiences were fundamentally different—both in kind and in frequency—from those experienced by any other navi, Miriam and Aharon included. The nature of Moshe’s role as receiver and communicator of Torah was completely unique in history and demanded special rules that simply didn’t apply to other nevi’im. Miriam saw Moshe’s behavior through the prism of her own prophetic experience and couldn’t make sense of it.
It was precisely this lesson that the spies missed. The spies presumed that they would be entering the land on their own terms, fighting their own wars, cultivating their own fields, and living a natural, if elevated existence. What they saw instead was a land that could not be conquered through natural means and that did not produce natural bounty. Grapes were the size of bowling balls and enemies were the size of giants. It behooved them to share with the rest of the nation what they saw. Something was very wrong with the Land.
Indeed. But only from their vantage point. Had they stopped to ask themselves if there was another perspective to adopt that could help explain things, they could have come upon one rather quickly: perhaps Hashem wanted to provide the People with a decidedly miraculous experience, complete with supernatural produce and military victories. What they saw as a death trap could have been re-understood as a Divine gift, had they only paused to consider the situation from a different angle.
The less time we allow ourselves to properly survey, ascertain, and judge, the more difficult it becomes to see things from someone else’s point of view. We immediately understand the world from our own perspective, and disconnecting from that view requires the exertion of no small effort and investment of time.
Unfortunately, time is decreasingly on our side. The pace of life has sped up to a degree that snap judgments are available and encouraged. Social media in particular encourages reactions at hyper speed. If you take the time to process and more fully understand, the issue may well have passed you by. We feel that we must react immediately in order for our words and actions to be relevant, and that pace simply doesn’t allow for slowly untangling ourselves from our own perspective in an attempt to see things from a different one.
So how do we slow down the pace? By learning to question before we comment. What if Miriam would have turned to her brother and had a dialogue? “Moshe, you’ve adopted a different lifestyle from other nevi’im. What’s that about?” Or if the spies had paused and said, “Yehoshua and Calev, you’ve both been awfully quiet. Are you seeing what we’re seeing? No? Why not?”
We need to develop a different workflow; one that puts an inquiry before every editorial. Posing a question slows down the process and helps to ensure that we’re seeing an issue from different angles, rather than formulating an opinion exclusively within the echo chamber of our own minds. Our own beliefs won’t necessarily change, but they’ll be better balanced and more genuine.
And perhaps more importantly, when we put inquiry before editorial, we also gain healthier relationships. Through dialogue we help soften our perspective of the people who feel differently from us and view them in a better light. And in turn, conversation helps allow those we may disagree with to feel heard and understood, even if things cannot be fully resolved.
Precipitating both the episode of Miriam and of the spies is an account of the people complaining as they began their journey from Har Sinai to Eretz Yisrael. While the Torah doesn’t describe precisely what the people were complaining about, we do know how they were punished. The Torah records that a fire broke out and consumed the people who stood “בקצה המחנה—at the edge of the camp.”
Why did the fire break out and punish only those who stood at the periphery? Perhaps because standing at the periphery is what marks the difference between productive conversation and pointless complaining. If we’re standing on the sidelines our grumbling is fruitless and does nothing but sow ill will. It’s only when we move into the interior of the camp, taking up the issue through proper discourse that we are engaged in a worthwhile process.
This is a trend that continues today. And the fast pace of life that curtails slow, thoughful processing of issues has only exacerbated the challenge. But we can’t allow for the same pattern that played out over this series of parshios to define our own times. Let’s train ourselves to question before commenting, and to discuss before we dismiss.
You nailed it Rabbi!