Even before he fully takes in and evaluates a new situation, he has already made up his mind about it.
Parshas Shelach, which falls out this week in Eretz Yisrael, serves as an appropriate lead-in to the impending start of Chodesh Tammuz, when the Three Weeks begin. The parshah recounts the sin of the Meraglim, who returned on Tishah B’Av with a negative report about the Land of Israel. Because Bnei Yisrael accepted their false claims and cried needlessly, Hashem decreed that future generations would also be required to mourn and cry on Tishah B’Av (Taanis 29a). It should therefore come as no surprise that Chazal find a link between this parshah and Megillas Eichah, which we read on Tishah B’Av.
The first perek in Eichah is written as an acrostic, with each successive pasuk beginning with the next letter of the alef-beis. Although the second, third, and fourth chapters follow a similar pattern, there is one notable exception. Even though the letter ayin comes before pei in the alef-beis, in these three perakim, the pasuk beginning with the letter pei precedes the pasuk that starts with ayin. The Gemara (Sanhedrin 104b) cryptically explains that this is because the Meraglim sinned by placing their mouths (pei, like the word peh) before their eyes (ayin also means eye). What does this mean?
Rav Moshe Shapira explains that in any encounter, a person finds what he is looking for. Even before he fully takes in and evaluates a new situation, he has already made up his mind about it. Not surprisingly, he then gathers evidence to support his conclusion, a phenomenon known as self-fulfilling prophecy. In this case, the Meraglim had already decided that they did not want to live in Eretz Yisrael, so they interpreted everything they saw there through a negative lens and returned with a report distorted by their biases.
Bnei Yisrael were punished with an additional year of wandering in the Midbar for each day of the Meraglim’s journey (Bamidbar 14:34). Why were they punished for the entire trip and not just for the lone day on which the spies came back and spoke critically about Eretz Yisrael? Rav Chaim Shmuelevitz explains that their sin was not limited to the day of their return. They sinned on each day of their expedition by twisting everything they experienced along the way.
The Arizal writes that each month of the calendar is kabbalistically linked to an area we are supposed to rectify during that month. He says our mission in Tammuz is to work on re’iyah, sight — not just what we look at, but also how we view things. It is not a coincidence that parshas Shelach comes to teach us this lesson now, as it revolves around the tragic events caused by the Meraglim’s desire to find things to disparage wherever they looked, which led to the period of mourning that begins in Tammuz.
Like the Meraglim, we also interpret events based on our biases. Two people can go to the same simchah but emerge with vastly different impressions, one raving about the radiant chassan and kallah and beautiful flowers, while the other complains about the limited smorgasbord and late start. The former was excited to attend and enjoyed the experience, but the latter was pressured to go and not surprisingly homed in on the flaws.
We see an example of this in parshas B’haalosecha. Although the Jews in the Midbar received mahn to eat every day, there were still people who complained about it because five tastes that are harmful to nursing women were denied to them (Rashi, Bamidbar 11:5). An entire kosher supermarket was delivered fresh to them each morning, but they only focused on what was missing. The problem was not with the mahn, but with them. Rav Pam said that such people are angry and bitter their entire lives, always fixated on what they are lacking instead of the myriad blessings in their lives.
In contrast, the Chovos Halevavos (Shaar Hakeni’ah 6) tells the story of a pious man who was walking with his students when they passed the putrid carcass of a dog. Most of them were repulsed, but the wise teacher remarked, “How white are its teeth.”
Although there is no mitzvah of dan l’kaf zechus on a rotting dog, the teacher’s comment was not intended for the benefit of the dog, but for his students — to teach them the importance of always looking for the good. Indeed, the Hebrew word chacham, spelled ches-kaf-mem, is said to be an acronym for chetzi kos malei, a half-full cup; the wise person always sees his cup as half full, an attitude that gives him a wonderful quality of life.
The power of our perspective is illustrated by the following story. After World War II, Rav Eliezer Silver visited DP camps to give chizuk to survivors. One day, he was organizing a minyan for Minchah, but one man refused to join. He explained that when he was in a concentration camp, one of his fellow prisoners had managed to smuggle in a siddur and rented it out in exchange for food rations. When this man saw that a frum person could use his siddur in this manner, he resolved that he would never daven again.
Rav Silver responded that rather than focusing on the man with the siddur, he should instead look at how many Yidden were willing to give up their precious supply of food so that they could daven properly. The man took the message to heart, joined the minyan, and began davening once again.
On Yom Kippur, we begin Kol Nidrei with the pasuk (Tehillim 97:11) “Ohr zarua latzaddik ul’yishrei lev simchah,” which tells us that those who are upright of heart have joy. Rav Hutner notes that the Targum on this pasuk translates this expression as teritzei liba, hinting that happiness is found in people whose hearts are full of teirutzim, always explaining away unpleasant developments and judging others favorably.
Toward the end of Maggid at the Pesach Seder, we sing Dayeinu. Despite its uplifting tune, many of the lines don’t seem to make sense. If Hashem had done X but not Y, we say that it would have been enough, but in fact, if He had not done Y, we all would have died and wouldn’t be here today. How can we say Dayeinu about that?
One approach is to go line by line to come up with an explanation for each statement, but Rabbi Zev Smith gives a beautiful answer that resolves them all at once. Who wrote Dayeinu? The Abudraham says that Dayeinu is a continuation of what precedes it in the Haggadah, which is the dispute about how many makkos struck the Egyptians in Mitzrayim and how many at the Yam Suf. The last of the three opinions we quote there is that of Rabi Akiva. The Abudraham writes that Dayeinu is a continuation of Rabi Akiva’s words.
Rabi Akiva was famous for always seeing the cup as half full, whether it was his laughter upon seeing a fox emerging from the destruction on Har Habayis (Makkos 24a), finding cause for joy in the suffering of his teacher Rabi Eliezer (Sanhedrin 101a), or viewing his own gruesome execution as an opportunity to love Hashem b’chol nafshecha (Berachos 61b).
Now that we know that Rabi Akiva is the author of Dayeinu, all the questions about how we would have perished with X but not Y go away, because Dayeinu is the ultimate expression of the positive lens through which Rabbi Akiva viewed the world.
There is a sefer called Ohr Zarua that was written in the 13th century by a rav in Vienna named Rav Yitzchok ben Moshe. In the introduction to the sefer, he writes that he was uncertain about the proper way to spell the name Akiva: ayin, kuf, yud, beis — then what? Is the last letter an alef or a hei? The Taz (Even Ha’ezer 129) says that his question was not theoretical. It pertained to writing Akiva in a get, in which it is crucial that the names be spelled correctly.
Rav Yitzchok asked for Heavenly guidance, and he had a dream in which he saw the pasuk “Ohr zarua latzaddik ul’yishrei lev simchah.” Examining the last letter in each word, ohr ends with a reish, zarua ends with an ayin, latzaddik with a kuf, ul’yishrei with a yud, lev with a beis, and simchah with a hei, which combine to spell “R’ Akiva.” He interpreted this as a Divine message that he should spell Akiva with a hei at the end, and this episode was so meaningful to him that he decided to commemorate it by titling his sefer Ohr Zarua.
Rav Hutner noted that the Targum on this pasuk translates yishrei lev as teritzei liba. Who was the greatest embodiment of this approach, with a heart full of teirutzim for all the kashes that came up in his life? Rabi Akiva. How appropriate it is that this pasuk teaches us how to spell his name, as it contains the very essence of his outlook on life.
Rav Leib Lopian points out that although the words nega and oneg contain the same letters — gimmel, nun, and ayin — they are in fact opposites; nega connotes affliction while oneg means pleasure. The only difference between them is the location of the letter ayin.
Shlomo Hamelech writes in Koheles (2:14), “Hechacham einav b’rosho” — the wise person places his eyes in front. This can also be read as telling us to focus our eyes on other people’s strengths and talents, which correspond to their front. By placing the ayin at the beginning of the word, we will be happy people whose lives are blessed with joyful oneg. If we instead put the ayin at the end, always looking at other people’s shortcomings and weaknesses, our lives will be a nega, full of affliction and suffering.
The Meraglim sinned by seeking the bad in every encounter along their journey. Let us learn from their mistakes and resolve to look for the good in every life situation and in everyone we meet, which will become a self-fulfilling prophecy for a life full of oneg. —
Originally from Kansas City, Rabbi Ozer Alport graduated from Harvard and learned in Mir Yerushalayim and Beis Yosef Novardok. He currently lives in Flatbush, where he writes the weekly Parsha Potpourri series, and he is a popular speaker whose shiurim are available on TorahAnytime.
