Valuing Who We Are

By Rabbi Moshe Krieger, Yeshivas Bircas HaTorah

In this week’s parsha we learn of the sin of the spies. These spies, who were the leaders of Klal Yisrael, were sent to scout out Eretz Yisrael and report on how to conquer it. Instead, they reported that the nation was incapable of conquering such a land.

This sin is an utter mystery to us. How could such great leaders make such a great error? Rashi makes it clear from the verse that when they initially set out, the spies were all perfectly righteous. Moreover, the Ramban notes that the spies were listed in order of importance, meaning that some of them were greater than Calev and Yehoshua, who are mentioned third and fifth.

These great men had all recently witnessed Hashem’s mighty deeds in Egypt and at Yam Suf. They had declared naaseh venishma at Har Sinai. How could they have said the words ki chazak hu mimenu, which Chazal explain (Sotah 38a) means that the Canaanite nations were stronger than Hashem, chalila?

The Mesilas Yesharim (end of chapter 11) cites the Zohar (158:1) that the heads of the tribes feared that once the Jewish People would settle in Eretz Yisrael, they would lose their positions of importance. They therefore subconsciously found a way in which they thought they could maintain their prestige — by keeping Klal Yisrael away from Eretz Yisrael. The lesson, the Mesilas Yesharim concludes, is the destruction that lust for honor can cause. For the spies, it brought death to themselves and their entire generation. As it states in Pirkei Avos (4), that the lust for honor can take a man out of the world.

The Mesilas Yesharim goes on to say that this was not a problem suffered only by the spies and their generation. Every one of us has a problem with honor, to some extent. The expression “keeping up with the Joneses” lies at the root of a host of negative behaviors that exist only because of our desire for honor. Families find it necessary to have a larger or nicer house, make a larger and more elegant wedding, have a fancier car, etc., and sometimes financing such “needs” brings people to questionable business practices. All this is rooted in the lust for honor.

Rav Chaim Shmuelevitz notes that the desire for honor is a bottomless pit. No matter how much honor a person has, the lust for it can never be quenched. Haman teaches us this. Despite his being second-in-command of the world’s sole super-power, unrivaled in wealth and a figure that all had to bow down before, when one Jew refused to bow, he declared: “All this is worth nothing to me.”

Clearly, the lust for honor is a destructive force that we should try to overcome. How can we?

The Alter of Kelm would say that at the root of people’s desire for honor is their own failure to recognize their self-worth. Since they do not value themselves enough, they turn to others to do so. If one lives with a clear sense of self-worth, nothing can take this away from him. When others fail to notice him, this does not bother him at all. Whoever relies on others to provide him with the honor and validation he needs will never be satisfied.

Rav Shimon Marjanik would instruct his talmidim to work on developing their sense of self-worth. For example, he recommended their giving a shiur to those at a lower level of learning. In addition to the great mitzva of spreading Torah would come the benefit of making them feel important. To others he would advise that they undertake a special chessed project, again, with a side benefit being that this would foster in them a sense of their value and importance.

Of course, feeling self-worth does not mean arrogance. The idea is simply that if one is aware of his own value, he won’t need honor from other people.

Rav Chaim Shmuelevitz would advise people to recognize the emptiness of honor. He would say that honor provides no physical pleasure whatsoever. How foolish it is to seek something that exists only in one’s imagination. Reflecting on the emptiness of honor will help us keep away from it in times of nisayon and curb our desire for it.

Rav Avraham Chaim Brim, one of the greatest talmidei chachamim of our generation, was known already in his youth as “the genius of Yerushalayim,” yet he tried as much as he could to keep away from honor, even davening to Hashem that he not come to the public’s attention. He learned all day and most of night, but whenever people came to his home, he would close his Gemara and open up a Sefer Tehilim, to conceal his zeal in learning.

Later in life, when he gave shiurim, he would often conceal his mastery of Shas and Poskim, saying, “It’s somewhere in the Gemara, I don’t recall which page…” Sometimes he would even say: “I don’t remember the tractate.”

May we build our sense of self-worth and overcome the desire for honor!