This Shabbat has special personal resonance for me. Parashat Sh’lach L’cha is the parasha of my bar mitzvah — just a few years back, a little more than four decades ago.
Embedded in this portion is a lesson that was particularly relevant to my adolescent self.
Perhaps it was this way for you as well, but middle school was not an especially wonderful time for me. There was a lot of uncertainty around self-esteem, hormonal changes, and a deep suspicion that things just might not turn out the way I wanted them to in life. And one of the lessons of this parasha is an acknowledgment of how easy it is to default to pessimism in this world — but also about the possibility of hope.
Twelve spies are sent out to check out the land of Israel. To see what it is like. Whether the cities are inhabited. Whether the land is good for growing the food we would need — not just to survive, but to thrive. The spies come back with their reports, and as you will probably remember, ten of them return with pessimistic news. The cities are fortified. The people who live in the land are powerful. They are so pessimistic, in fact, that they see the world in a distorted fashion. “The people of the land are giants, and we are like grasshoppers.” Their very sense of self is deeply compromised.
But two of the twelve, Caleb and Joshua, bring back a positive, more hopeful, more optimistic view. Yes, the cities are fortified. Yes, there are people in the land. But we are capable. We have strength and we have faith. We are returning to a land that has been promised to us, and we will prevail.
And of course, that is precisely what happens. It is not easy. It is not simple. Most things aren’t. But we ultimately inhabit the future that we long for and that we hope for.
That was true for our ancestors in the wilderness. I believe it is true for us today.
This is important Torah, not just for adolescents, but for this moment as well. We are in the middle of a crisis of hope. Studies suggest that people are as pessimistic about the future today as they have ever been since sociologists began tracking it. And that is perhaps what the ratio of ten to two reminds us. It is easy, maybe even natural, to default to pessimism. Often we find ourselves unable to see the possibilities of the future.
But the final lesson of our parasha is not only about the importance of hope. It is also the reality that Joshua and Caleb are not alone. That is to say, they have one another. That is not unimportant, and it is not accidental.
Our parasha is telling us that to hold on to hope, we need a chevruta. We need a partner. We need someone who will hope alongside us to give us strength, to give us fortitude, to remind us that especially in the face of challenges, we cannot do it alone. We might not have the majority with us. Most people will not see it the way we do. But we will persevere and ultimately prevail when we stand side by side with a friend, a compatriot, a colleague, another person who holds on to hope right alongside us.
This is precisely what a synagogue community does for us. It is, at its best, a chevruta writ large, a gathering of people who show up for one another, who remind one another of what is possible, who refuse to let each other give in to the grasshopper report. In a world awash in pessimism, community is not a luxury. It is a spiritual necessity. We come together not only to pray, but to strengthen one another’s capacity to hope.
That is why deepening your connection to this community matters so much right now. Not just attending, but showing up to Shabbat, to Torah study, to the moments large and small where we are present for one another. And then going one step further: bringing someone with you. A friend, a neighbor, a family member who has drifted. Invite them to synagogue. Invite them to Torah study. Be for them what Caleb was for Joshua: the voice that says “come, there is something here worth seeing, and you do not have to face the world alone.”
That is a lesson we need for this moment, especially in the face of pessimism and even despair. We need one another to remind each other that we have been in difficult situations before and made it to the other side. We need each other to remember that while our foes are powerful, we are not without agency.
We have strength. We have faith. We have one another.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Yoshi