And when the Israelites were in the wilderness, it happened that they found a man collecting sticks on the day of the shabbat. And the ones who found him collecting sticks brought him to Moses and Aaron and the whole community. And they put him in custody, because it had not been explained what should be done to him. Then God said to Moses: “The man must definitely be put the death. The whole community must stone him with stones outside the camp.” And the whole community took him outside the camp and stoned him with stones, and he died, as God had commanded Moses. (Numbers 15:32-26)

shabbat (שַׁבָּת) = day of rest, “sabbath” in English.  (From the verb shavat, שָׁבַת = cease, stop.)

Every time I read this week’s Torah portion, Shelakh-Lekha (Numbers 13:1-15:41), this story makes me wince. True, the man is doing labor on Shabbat, and is therefore in violation of one of the “Ten Commandments”:

Remember the day of the shabbat to sanctify it. Six days you may work and you may do all your work. But the seventh day is a shabbat for God, our God; you must not do any work: you, or your son, or your daughter, your male slave or your female slave or your immigrant who is inside your gates. (Exodus 20:8-10)

But what is the penalty for working on Shabbat? Earlier in the book of Exodus, Moses explains that God is providing extra manna on the sixth day because on Shabbat there will be none. Yet some Israelites go out and look for manna to gather on Shabbat anyway. God says:

“How long will you keep refusing to observe my commands and my decrees? See that God gave you the shabbat; therefore he is giving you on the sixth day food for two days. Each man in his spot; do not go out! Each [must stay] in his place on the seventh day!” (Exodus 16:28-29)

This is like a parent saying “I told you not to do that! How long will it take before you listen to me? Don’t do it again!” The Israelites obey the next time, and nobody dies.

But in this week’s portion in Numbers, God pronounces the death sentence for someone who goes out to collect firewood on Shabbat. The punishment does not seem to fit the crime.

The rejection of Canaan

At the beginning of  this week’s Torah portion, the Israelites camp within sight of the ridge that separates the desert of Paran from Canaan. Moses follows God’s instruction to send twelve scouts north to explore the land before the people march in and take it over. He tells the scouts to report back on the population, whether their towns are walls, what the soil is like, and whether there are woodlands. He finishes by asking them to bring back some fruit.¹

The scouts return carrying pomegranates, figs, and a gigantic cluster of grapes. When they give their report, the Israelites are alarmed to hear that there are large fortified cities in Canaan.² Then the scouts go outside their instructions and give their own opinions on whether the Israelites will be able to conquer the land God promised to give them. Caleb says yes, but ten other scouts say no. (The twelfth, Joshua, is silent at this point.) The people despair and throw a tantrum, yelling that they would rather die or go back to Egypt than take one step into Canaan. Then everyone sees the glory of God appear as cloud and fire.

And God said to Moses: “How long will this people reject me? And how long will they lack faith in me, despite all the signs that I made in their midst?” (Numbers 14:11)

This is when God decrees that the Israelites must stay in the wilderness for forty years, until the whole generation that left Egypt as adults has died—except for Caleb and Joshua, the two scouts who trusted God. (See my post Shelach-Lekha: Fear and Kindness.)

Then Moses spoke these words to all the Israelites, and the people mourned very much. And they they got up early in the morning and headed up to the top of the highland, saying: “Here we are, let us go up to [attack] the place that God said, because we were wrong.” Then Moses said: “Why are you crossing the word of God? It will not succeed! Do not go up, because God is not there in your midst.” (Numbers 14:39-43)

But the Israelites go anyway, and the Amalekites and Canaanites come down from the hills and soundly defeat them.

The Punishment for Defiance

Even when they realize they did the wrong thing, and should have entered Canaan when God wanted them to, the Israelites do not apologize and wait for God’s next instruction. Instead, they try to erase their bad behavior by staging a replay in order to trigger God into rescind the 40-year delay. And when Moses, God’s prophet, warns them that they have lost God’s support, they defy him and keep going. They are punished for their defiance.

Then the narrative is interrupted for some rules about offerings to God, including the offerings people should make if they discover they have inadvertently failed to obey anything of God’s commands. Next comes a statement about deliberately disobeying a divine command.

But the soul, native or immigrant, who acts with a high hand, it is reviling God. And that soul, nikhretah from among its people. Because it has held in contempt the word of God and broken [God’s] command, hicareit ticareit; that soul’s sin is in it. (Numbers 15:30-31)

nikhretah (נִכְרְתָה) = it is cut down, cut off, eliminated. (A form of the verb karat, כָּרַת = cut off, cut down.)

hicareit ticareit (הִכָּרֵת תִּכָּרֵת) = it must definitely be cut down, cut off, eliminated. (An infinite absolute form of the verb karat.)

Immediately after this comes the example of the man collecting wood on Shabbat.

The implication is that the wood collector knows what day it is, and is deliberately defying the commandment not to work on Shabbat. Therefore he deserves the punishment of being karat.

But it is not clear whether he should be cut off from the community through shunning or exile, or cut down by execution. So the people place him in custody, and God tells Moses that the sentence is death by stoning.

Rest on Shabbat, or die!

I am not surprised that the Talmudic rabbis spent a lot of time figuring out what counts as the kind of work that is prohibited on Shabbat.³ They arrived at a definitive list of 39 categories of forbidden work, and ever since then rabbis have been determining whether a new activity (usually enabled by new technology) falls into one of those categories.

We do not know whether anyone was actually executed for working on Shabbat. According to source criticism, the story of the wood collector appears to be inserted by the P source, and may  express a Levitical ideal rather than a reality. But members of strictly observant Jewish communities can still be shunned for disobeying the commandment about Shabbat, and in that sense they are cut off, though not cut down.

I am more interested in the spirit than the letter of the law. Shabbat is supposed to be a day of rest, and also, since the last temple fell in 70 C.E., a day of prayer and pleasure in God’s creation. Besides attending services, reading Torah, and taking a nap, Jews are encouraged to enjoy candlelight, wine, good food, and sex with one’s spouse on Shabbat.

Among the activities the Talmud identifies as prohibited on Shabbat are writing, and doing anything agricultural. Yet what if I am inspired with new insights when I am reading prayers or Torah, and I want to take notes so I will not forget them?  Or what if weeding my garden is, for me, a peaceful and meditative break from work that fills me with appreciation for God’ creation?

What if I have no intention of defying God when I go off by myself to engage in the meditative activity of collecting sticks?

1. Numbers 13:17-20.
2. Numbers 13:28.
3. The 39 categories are listed in Mishnah Shabbat, circa 200 C.E., based on the activities the Israelites did to build the sanctuary for God in Exodus 31. Talmud Yerushalmi, Yoma 8, exempted activities necessary to save a person’s life even if they would otherwise be forbidden on Shabbat.

The Israelites start whining that they want to go back to Egypt only a few days after they leave Mount Sinai in last week’s Torah portion, Beha-alotkha.¹

Then the riffraff who were among them felt a craving and they wept again, and the Israelites also wept, and said: “Who will feed us meat?  We remember the fish that we ate in Egypt at no charge, the cucumbers and the melons and the leeks and the onions and the garlic.  And now our throats are dry.  There is nothing but the manna before our eyes!”  (Numbers 11:4-6)

In this week’s Torah portion, Shelach-Lekha (“Send for yourself”), they camp at Kadesh-Barnea on the border between the Wilderness of Paran and Canaan.  Moses sends twelve men to scout out the land God promised them, and they return after forty days with mixed reviews.  All twelve scouts agree that Canaan is indeed a land “flowing with milk and honey”, and they bring back samples of the gigantic fruit.  But only two of the scouts, Caleb and Joshua, are in favor of continuing with God’s plan to capture the country.

Caleb hushed the people toward Moses, and he said: “We must certainly go up and we must certainly take possession of it, because we are certainly able to do it!”  But the men who had gone up with him said: “We will not be able to go up against those people, because they are stronger mimenu.”  (Numbers 13:30-31)

mimenu (מִמֶּנּוּ) = than us; than him/it (i.e. God).

Do the ten frightened scouts mean that the people already living in Canaan are stronger than the Israelites, or stronger than God?  Either way, the scouts go among the Israelites and exaggerate.

“And there we saw the giants, the Anakites from the giants, and we were like grasshoppers in our own eyes, and so we were in their eyes!”  (Numbers 13:33)

The Israelites cry in despair all night.

And they said, each man to his brother, “Let us appoint a leader and return to Egypt!”  (Numbers 14:4)

Once again they think they would be better off in Egypt, the land where they were enslaved and the pharaoh tried to kill all their newborn sons.

Both Moses and God lose their tempers. After all, God rescued them from Egypt using Moses as a prophet, and God has fed them manna the whole trip.

Near the end of the Torah portion Shelach-Lekha, God decrees that the people must not enter Canaan until 40 years have passed since their exodus from Egypt.  By that time, the  generation of slaves will have died in the wilderness.  Then only Caleb, Joshua, and the Israelites who are currently under age 20 will cross the border and get a share of the land.

Is the 40-year delay a terrible punishment?  Or an act of mercy?

Click on this link to read my 2014 blog post answering this question:  Shelach-Lekha: Courage and Kindness.

And may we all remember not to make judgments about who is strong and who is weak, who is actually cowardly and who merely resists change.

1. See my post Beha-alotkha: Cloud over Paran.

The Israelites are camped in the Wilderness of Paran.  Canaan, the land God chose for them, lies just over the ridge.  Moses gets God’s permission to send twelve scouts into Canaan to gather information in Shelach-Lekha (“Send for yourself”), this week’s Torah portion.¹

They return with giant fruits, including a grape cluster so big it takes two men to carry.

And they brought back word to them and to the whole assembly, and they showed them the fruits of the land.  And they gave an account, and they said: “We came into the land where you sent us, and indeed it flows with milk and devash, and this is its fruit.”  (Numbers/Bemidbar 13:26-27)

devash (דְבַשׁ) = honey, syrup.  (The bible uses the same word for honey from bees and syrup from dates or figs.)

Moses has been calling Canaan a land flowing with milk and devash all along.²  Now the scouts confirm it.  The Talmud explains the phrase by claiming that when Rami bar Yechezkeil went to the village of Benei-berek he saw goats dripping milk from their udders as they grazed under fig trees dripping syrup.³  Both kinds of dripping indicate a land of abundance.

But in this week’s Torah portion, a fertile land is not enough.

“However, the people dwelling in the land are powerful, and the cities are fortified and very big, and also we saw the offspring of the giant Anak there.”  (Numbers 13:28)

Alarmed, the Israelites start grumbling against their leader, Moses.  This is what ten of the twelve scouts want, since they themselves are afraid to try conquering an armed and fortified land.  But Caleb, one of the two scouts who are in favor of carrying out God’s plan, hushes the people and says:

“We should definitely go up, and we will get possession of [the land], for we can definitely conquer it.”  (Numbers 13:30)

Caleb forgets to mention the reason for his confidence: God’s backing.

The men who had gone up with him said: “We cannot overcome [those] people, since they are stronger than us.”  Then they brought out slander of the land that they had scouted to the Israelites, saying “The land that we crossed and scouted is a land that is eating up those who live in it!  And all the people that we saw in it were men of unusual size!  … and we looked like grasshoppers to ourselves, and so we would look to them.”  (Numbers 13:30-33)

Obviously the land is not eating up the people who currently live in it, since they are growing extra-large fruits and can afford to build fortified cities—and the land itself is flowing with milk and devash.

Next the ten pessimistic scouts, who at first reported seeing some very large men, say that every man in Canaan is gigantic.

The Israelites are too upset to notice that these claims are merely slander.  They cry out loud all night, and tell each other that they would rather have died in Egypt than come all this way only to be defeated by the Canaanites.

When they assemble again, they are ready to stone Moses and Aaron.  The two optimistic spies, Caleb and Joshua, pull themselves together and remind the people:

“If God is pleased with us, then [God] will bring us to that land and give it to us, a land that is flowing with milk and devash.  Only do not rebel against God, and do not be afraid of the people of the land, because they will be our dinner.  Their protection has deserted them, but God is with us.  Do not be afraid!”  (Numbers 14:8-9)

This Caleb and Joshua emphasize that the land is sweet, worth conquering, and that God is protecting them.

Then the whole assembly said to pelt them with stones.  But the glory of God appeared at the Tent of Meeting to all the Israelites.  And God said to Moses: “How long will this people reject me?  And how long will they have no faith in me, despite all the signs that I have made in their midst?”  (Numbers 14:10-11)

Moses talks God out of killing all the Israelites and starting over again.  But God does decree that the people will not be allowed to enter Canaan until all the men age 20 and over have died, except for Caleb and Joshua.

What is wrong with these people?  Don’t they remember how God drowned a whole army of Egyptians to save them at the Reed Sea?  Are they so used to seeing the glory of God appear in a pillar of cloud and fire that they don’t take it seriously anymore?  Why don’t they believe God will deliver the land of Canaan to them, as promised?

Ethical objections are not an issue; the bible does not consider the morality of starting an unprovoked war against Canaan’s inhabitants and subjugating everyone they do not kill.  So why do the people refuse to cross over into Canaan?

One explanation is that the Israelites remember all the times God smote them, as well as the times God saved them.  In the book of Exodus, after the Levites kill 3,000 men who they suspect of worshiping the golden calf, God afflicts many of the survivors with a plague.⁴

Shortly after they leave Mount Sinai, the people complain about the food and whine that they are tired of manna.  God blankets the ground with quail, then kills everyone who starts to eat the birds.⁵

How can the Israelites count on a God who keeps killing them?  Even if they are careful not to rebel by making another golden calf or complaining about the manna, they are bound to make some other error, and then they will find themselves facing the Canaanites without God’s protection.

I think this is a reasonable fear.  Yet if they reject God and do not march ahead into Canaan, what will happen to them?  If God lets them return to Egypt, they will face execution or enslavement.  Surely it would be better to risk death or enslavement in Canaan, where there is a chance that God will aid them and they can settle down in a land of milk and devash.

It is hard to grow up and take on a new life, a life in which we are responsible for something we do not know yet how to do.  When we are children, someone else feeds us and guides us and takes care of our needs.  When the Israelites are slaves in Egypt, their parent-figure is the Pharaoh.

Then they are adopted and rescued by God.  The Israelites develop an adolescent relationship with God, grumbling and rebelling occasionally as they look forward to the promised land, the way teenagers look forward to adulthood.

Suddenly it is time to leave home and make our own place in a world of strangers—giants we cannot hope to compete with.  The promised land of adulthood is both exciting and frightening.

Most people take a deep breath, take the risk, and cross over the ridge into Canaan.

But life takes more than one deep breath.  As an adult, I keep facing another ridge to climb, another new land to enter.  I never know whether I am strong enough to do the next thing that I have never done before.  I never know whether inspiration or luck will be on my side.

Yet when the new land is important, and there is no good alternative, the best you can do is to cross that ridge whether you have faith in God or not.  Otherwise, you will be stuck in the wilderness until you die.  And if you survive to get a second chance at crossing over, you should take it.

May each of us be blessed with the courage to go forward, and may our rewards be sweeter than devash.

1. See the first part of my post Shelah-Lekha: Reminder for more details.
2. Exodus 3:8, 3:17, 13:5, and 33:3; Leviticus 20:24.
3. Talmud Bavli, Ketubot 111b.
4. Exodus 32:28, 32:35
5. Numbers 11:4-6, 11:31-34.

You say you’re bored, hanging around in the wilderness for forty years before God finally lets us move into the promised land?

When I was your age, I was angry at the men who got us stuck here.

We’d finally marched right up to the border of Canaan.  The land of our ancestors was just over the ridge—and we’d never seen it.  Moses announced that God said:  “Send men for yourself, and let them scout out the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the Children of Israel.  Send one man from each ancestral tribe, each one a leader.” (Numbers/Bemidbar 13:2)

Then he started naming the scouts.  I couldn’t believe it when Moses said:  “For the tribe of Judah, Kaleiv son of Yefuneh.”  (Numbers 13:6)

kaleiv (כָּלֵב) = dog; a proper name (Caleb in English).

Was I really a leader?  Me, the dog?

My father named me Kaleiv.  And in case you’re thinking about a shepherd’s best friend, let me tell you, we Israelites never used dogs that way.  Or at all.  For us, a dog was a scavenger in the streets, or worse; not fit to enter a decent person’s house.¹

My father used to beat me.  So did our Egyptian owner.  When I was old enough, I ran away for good.  I was a real kaleiv then, a scavenger in the streets of the city of Ramses.

I found a cellar under a half-built warehouse to sleep in.  One night a bunch of slaves met there and talked about the latest plague.  They didn’t notice me curled up in the far corner.  They thought all the plagues were caused by their own god, the God of Israel.  And they used other names for this god, names I’d heard from my father.  He used to drone on about how things used to be a few hundred years ago, back when our people were free.  Useless talk, I’d always thought.

But this time when I heard the names of our God, I came out of my dark corner.  I was desperate.  They saw me and they froze.  I told them my genealogy, so they’d know I was a Hebrew too, from the tribe of Judah.  Then I asked if I could join them.  My voice shook.  But they actually welcomed me.

One of them became my friend:  Joshua.  He told me everything he knew about God and Moses and Aaron.  We both decided to pledge our service to God and follow Moses out of Egypt.

When we found out that God was about to send the final plague, the Death of the Firstborn, Joshua brought me home.  His father painted the door frame with lamb’s blood, and the angel of death skipped past us.²  In the morning I left Egypt with them.  Along with thousands of other Hebrew slaves, and some folks who just wanted to follow us and our God.

Even with the pillar of cloud and fire to guide us,³ our first week of traveling was a mess.  We were all right when we were walking.  But once we stopped for the night—imagine thousands of ex-slaves, waiting to be told what to do.  Joshua helped; he was a good organizer.  And I did what I could to help Joshua.

Moses noticed.  He made Joshua his battle general and personal attendant.  When he picked the twelve scouts to check out Canaan, he named Joshua for the tribe of Efrayim, some popular young men for the other tribes, and for Judah—me.  Kaleiv.  The dog.

I was going on a dangerous adventure for God and Israel!  What I liked about our God was that you never knew what would happen next.

Turns out it wasn’t so dangerous.  We were on foot, with no swords, so nobody stopped us.  Once we got north of the desert, we just strolled along, munching on fruit.  Sometimes we had to scramble off the road to make way for a troop of soldiers: tall men, with swords and shiny armor around their necks.  I said we were like grasshoppers compared to them, and everybody laughed.  I wondered where the soldiers and the people living in the cities would go after we moved in.

On the way back, I picked some huge pomegranates and figs and grapes.  I figured the sight of them would perk up the folks who were always complaining about manna.

When we walked into camp, everybody cheered.  Then they all gathered in front of the Tent of Meeting to hear our report.  The first few scouts to speak didn’t sound very enthusiastic.  And Joshua was in a difficult position, being Moses’ favorite.  So I got brave and said: “We should definitely go up and take possession, because we can definitely conquer it!”  (Numbers 13:30)

But the other scouts said: “We won’t be able to go up against those people, because they’re stronger than us!”  (Numbers 3:31)

I wanted to say that it didn’t matter how strong they were, because God was on our side.  But I couldn’t get a word in.  The other scouts were babbling that all the Canaanites were giants.  Even worse, they said: “We looked like grasshoppers to ourselves, and so we must have looked to them!”  (Numbers 3:33)

My own joke, and nobody was laughing this time.  All the people started milling around, screaming and sobbing.  Even Moses couldn’t call the assembly back to order.

In the morning the men came to Moses and said: “If only we’d died in the land of Egypt!  Or if only we’d died in this wilderness!  Why is God bringing us to this land to fall by the sword?  Our wives and our children will be carried off!  Wouldn’t it be better to go back to Egypt?”  And they said to each other: “Let’s pick a leader and go back to Egypt.”  (Numbers 14:2-4)

Moses and Aaron fell on their faces, but it didn’t do any good. Then I heard a loud rip.  Joshua was tearing his robe like he was in mourning.  So I did too, even though it was my only clothing.  Somehow that made the men quiet down.  I glanced at Joshua.  He nodded at me.  So I said: “If God is pleased with us, then He will bring us into this land and give it to us—a land that is flowing with milk and honey.  Just don’t rebel against God!”  (Numbers 14:8-9)

And Joshua added: “God is with us!  Don’t be afraid of them.”  (Numbers 14:9)

They didn’t believe us.  They picked up stones to throw at us.  But then the glory of God burst out like fire all around the Tent of Meeting, and everybody ran.  Except Moses, who walked right through the fire and went inside to talk to God.

I waited with my fists clenched.  Why did people have to be such idiots?

When Moses finally came out, he said God had forgiven the people.  But we all had to stay in the wilderness for 40 years, while the men who rebelled died one by one.  No man who was over age 20 would live to enter the promised land, except Joshua and me.⁴

Forty years.  It took me one year just to get over being angry about it.  Why did I have to wait, just because other Israelites didn’t trust God?

Joshua told me God was being kind.  The men were so upset they actually wanted to die in the wilderness.  And instead of striking them dead then and there, God let each one live to the age of 60, mostly here in the oasis of Kadeish-Barnea, a particularly comfortable spot of wilderness.⁵  I didn’t think a bunch of cowards deserved such kindness.

Then it occurred to me that we were all brave when we left Egypt.  A slave at least has food, a place to sleep, a familiar routine.  But we chose to leave everything we knew, and head toward a land we couldn’t imagine, following God—even though we’d only seen God’s harsh side.  We risked everything that day, changed our whole lives.

Maybe one big change was all some folks could manage.

For me, change was easier; staying in the same place was hard.  But that was my job now, to wait here with everybody else.  So I decided to change myself.  I learned how to live quietly.  How to cheer up folks who are getting old and regretful.  How to teach you young folks.  How to stir dates into my manna porridge.  How to make friends with a woman.  I got married, and we had a daughter,⁶ so I have even more to appreciate.

And you know what?  Sometimes I’m bored, too.  But I’ve been counting the years.  It’s almost time to go.  And I’m not a young dog anymore.  At the end of a long walk, I’m worn out and limping.  How can I help conquer Canaan when I’m in my sixties?

Now I’m the one who’s afraid.  I wish I could just keep living in this oasis with my friends and family.  But I have to change again.  If I didn’t, I’d let down God.

I don’t know what will happen in the promised land.  But I know I want to walk in smiling.

1. See Robert Alter, The Five Books of Moses, W.Norton & Co., New York, 2004, p. 373, footnote on Exodus 11:7.
2. Exodus 12:21-23.
3. Exodus 13:20-22.
4. Numbers 14:28-35.
5. Kadeish-Barnea was an oasis about 50 miles southwest of Beersheva, close to the southern border of Canaan. The people encamp there two years after the exodus from Egypt, and the scouts depart from there (Deuteronomy 32:32:8).  “The place becomes the Israelites’ chief base for the next thirty-eight years, until the time of conquest.” (W. Gunther Plaut, The Torah: A Modern Commentary, Union of American Hebrew Congregations, New York, 1981, p. 1109, footnote on 13:26.)  In the 7^th century B.C.E. the Kingdom of Judah built a fort at the oasis, then on a major trade route.  (Israel Finkelstein and Neil Asher Silberman, The Bible Unearthed, Simon & Schuster, Inc., New York, 2001, p. 268.)
6. Caleb marries off and gives land near Hebron to his daughter Akhsah in Joshua 15:13-19.