Making sense of the sedra: Schlach

This week we read about the ‘sin of the spies’. They were told to go and assess Israel, whether the soil is rich or poor, the people strong or weak. Upon arrival, they see that the land and the enemy are far greater than expected. They report back: “We cannot attack, they are stronger than we are.”

Many people don’t know the Quranic version of this story, whereby the Jews refused to wage a war God had commanded. It would seem that the fundamental difference lies in the prior identification of the ‘giants’. In the Quranic narrative, the Jews were aware of the enemy’s strength when commanded to wage the war; the sin lies in the disobedience. In the Biblical narrative, they were uninformed about the enemy. It is only upon analysis that they concluded; they can not succeed. Their mistake seems to be a misjudgment of the situation.

If indeed the Jews could not win the war, their conclusion and pacifistic decision would have been right. A war is only worth waging if the payoff outweighs the risks and effort. Their mistake was a category error. They were not told to be meragel (spies), but latur (explorers); they were only told to report back with the facts, not whether the war was worth fighting. This category error clouded their judgement.

I saw a fascinating paper from the 90s about taxi drivers. Drivers face wages that fluctuate on a daily basis and choose the number of hours they work each day. One would assume that they work more on days which are more profitable. In reality they work less. ‘Conversations with many cabdrivers’ led to an interesting psychological explanation: drivers drive as if they have an income target; when they get near the target, the probability of quitting for the day rises sharply.

People set daily goals. Money made before hitting the goal justifies the work, once the goal is met, the effort is no longer worth the payoff. Money is no longer viewed as equally valuable. A few years ago, I was saving up for something. Once I reached the goal, I stopped working. Ironically paying me more made me work less.

I theorise that this is where the “spies” erred. Before entering Israel, they had a goal. Their prior evaluation of Israel’s value and of the enemies’ strength was lower than what they came to discover. In their minds, the additional risk of losing the war no longer justified the gain of conquering Israel. They did not adequately value the ‘better fruit’, just as the driver does not value additional pay. They assumed their job entailed deciding whether the payoff justified a war, which resulted in them setting a goal.

In our current climate, it is easy to assume jobs we were never assigned. This may lead to an undervaluation of our place in this country. I hope we will continue to fight for our future here and not repeat the mistake of the meraglim.

Rabbi Mendel Hurwitz is at Enfield and Winchmore Hill Synagogue