Shabbos Parashas Devarim - 5780
Shabbos Parashas Devarim - 5780
Rabbi Hal Miller
Except for Caleiv son of Yefunneh, he shall see it, and to him shall I give the
land upon which he trod, and to his children because he followed God
wholeheartedly. [Devarim 1:36]
After explaining that the entire generation that left Egypt is going to die in the
desert, Moshe gives one exception, Caleiv. But Caleiv was not the only person
who survived to enter the land. Elazar, Aharon's son was the Kohen Gadol at
the death of his father, and he survived in the land through all the wars of conquest.
Then there's another guy, Caleiv's compatriot on the spy mission, Yehoshua. But
he isn't mentioned until two verses later. What's more, with Caleiv we are given a reason,
but with Yehoshua, no reason is given. Why are these two treated differently? Did they
not both act in pretty much the same manner at the incident of the spies?
Rav Hirsch is even more confused about this, saying that verses 37 (about Moshe) and
38 (about Yehoshua) are "in brackets", with the main theme of the story jumping from our
verse right to verse 39. He explains that Yehoshua's faithfulness was so well known that
nothing further needed to be said, but that with Caleiv we needed it pointed out to us.
Ibn Ezra understands that each of these two deserves special recognition on his own.
Caleiv comes first because his actions in defending the land against the other spies were
stark and preceded those of Yehoshua. Ramban believes just the opposite, that Moshe
intended to honor Yehoshua with the appointment to succeed himself, but in order to do
that felt a need to first honor Caleiv sort of as an introduction.
Various other verses in our parsha mention just Caleiv or just Yehoshua, each in some
specific context. Is there a contextual aspect to our verses too? The context here is that
these two out of all the others of the generation will be going into the land. Even Moshe
does not get this. Caleiv and Yehoshua did not both earn it exactly the same way, but
both did earn this reward. Perhaps our verses are teaching that there is more than one
way to achieve, or perhaps it teaches that the way may differ from person to person.
We should not assume that there is only one way to reach God.