Parshas Sh’lach (2023)
Over the last several decades there seems to have occurred a massive proliferation of news and information made available through internet platforms. Podcasts which have become extremely popular seem to cover the gamut of all types of special interest topics and new sources of reporting and opinions seem to pop up with frequent regularity. In other words there seems to be overwhelming amounts of information, opinions, and ideas being offered and consumed by humanity all around the globe.
There is a particular popular phrase that describes how certain information or ideas are quickly and hugely disseminated. This phrase is “going viral”. Very often if a specific person generates information of any type that ‘goes viral’ it can bring them enormous rewards. They may become ‘instantly’ famous which may provide monetary benefits. They may become an overnight ‘influencer’ which then provides them opportunities for both money and ‘influence/power’.
Let’s now notice the words; viral, influence, influenza, and the flu. It’s amazing to realize how the widespread distribution of ideas is verbally compared to the widespread distribution of illness and disease. Additional to these words is the word contagious. In fact the word contagious is etymologically derived from
Middle English - contaminating, communicable," borrowed from Anglo-French & Late Latin; Anglo-French, borrowed from Late Latin contāgiōsus, from Latin contāgiō "contact, CONTAGION".
Thus it seems that massive spreading of ideas and diseases are conceptually linked. A striking aspect to this observation is that diseases are generally considered best avoided but ideas and information seemingly cut both ways. In other words is it not good that useful and true and good information be widely and quickly shared? If so why does society mostly associate the massive sharing of good information with disease and contagions?
Another example how modern society uses a word that makes ideas popular but most often in a negative sense is the word meme.
One Merriam Webster definition of the word Meme-
: an idea, behavior, style, or usage that spreads from person to person within a culture
An interesting quote-
Memes (discrete units of knowledge, gossip, jokes and so on) are to culture what genes are to life. Just as biological evolution is driven by the survival of the fittest genes in the gene pool, cultural evolution may be driven by the most successful memes.
— Richard Dawkins
Though there are definitely ‘Good’ memes most of us are more familiar with negative memes such as those that depict racial biases and mean prejudices. It is well documented how the nazis used memes to foment antisemitism and tragically that methodology occurs today as well. So why is it that although good ideas and inspirational messages can go ‘viral’ most often we are more familiar with negative memes and contagions?
The famous story of the spies in this week’s Parsha concretely depicts how negative speaking goes viral and then wreaks massive and immediate havoc and damage by contagious speaking.
Imagine for a moment that you are a Jew that left Egypt and that after hundreds of years of horrible suffering to your people you are not only redeemed but you are told that you will be brought to a national homeland that is your ‘Promised Land’. You then experience innumerable miracles and inspirational events such as the Splitting of the Red Sea and the Sinai Revelation. You are then traveling through a desert knowing that you are heading into your Promised Land when you are suddenly given a negative and harsh report from a group of ten of your leaders about the dangers of this Promised Land.
This report is counterbalanced by the positive reporting of two other of your leaders and certainly your main leader and prophet is on the side of the TWO leaders. Do you quickly decide to absorb and accept the NEGATIVE reporting or do you decide or lean towards the POSITIVE reporting? As we know the Jews decided in a matter of hours that the TEN leaders were correct and that entering the Promised Land was indeed UNTENABLE. WHY?? Of course this devastating decision on the part of the Jewish People is literally the spark that ignited the deaths of the first generation of Jews that left Egypt, the destruction of both Holy Temples, and innumerable exiles and persecutions including the Spanish Inquisition and of course more recently the Holocaust just 80 years ago.
The Torah in its account of the Sin of the Spies actually teaches us the technology of how to create contagious speech. We will discover that it IS possible to spread BOTH negative AND POSITIVE information though it is certainly EASIER to create negative idealogical contagions than positive ones. Additionally we will learn the methodology to create both positive and negative contagious speech.
As an entry point to our entire above discussion let us briefly analyze the sentences that detail the initial report by the spies presented to the people upon their return from spying the Promised Land and the immediate reaction of the Jewish People.
(B’Midbar 13:26 - 14:2
They went straight to Moshe and Aharon and the whole Israelite community at Kadesh in the wilderness of Paran, and they made their report to them and to the whole community, as they showed them the fruit of the land.
This is what they told him: “We came to the land you sent us to; it does indeed flow with milk and honey, and this is its fruit.
However, the people who inhabit the country are powerful, and the cities are fortified and very large; moreover, we saw the Anakites there.
Amalekites dwell in the Negeb region; Hittites, Jebusites, and Amorites inhabit the hill country; and Canaanites dwell by the Sea and along the Jordan.”
Calev hushed the people before Moses and said, “Let us by all means go up, and we shall gain possession of it, for we shall surely overcome it.”
But the other men who had gone up with him said, “We cannot attack that people, for it is stronger than we.”
Thus they spread calumnies among the Israelites about the land they had scouted, saying, “The country that we traversed and scouted is one that devours its settlers. All the people that we saw in it are of great size;
we saw the Nephilim there—the Anakites are part of the Nephilim—and we looked like grasshoppers to ourselves, and so we must have looked to them.”
The whole community broke into loud cries, and the people wept that night.
All the Israelites railed against Moshe and Aharon. “If only we had died in the land of Egypt,” the whole community shouted at them, “or if only we might die in this wilderness!”
Let us notice the progression of the negative report in a brief listing.
1. They present the amazing fruit of the land.
2. They say the land indeed flows with milk and honey.
3. The people of the land however are powerful and they dwell in fortified cities.
4. We have known enemies (Amalek and others) all along the route that would gain us entry into the land.
5. Calev quiets the crowd and states we the Jewish People can surely go up and take possession of the land.
6. The other spies say “We CANNOT attack the people for they are stronger than us”.
7. THEN the other spies speak negatively about the LAND. “The country that we traversed and scouted is one that devours its settlers. All the people that we saw in it are of great size: we saw the Nephilim there—the Anakites are part of the Nephilim—and we looked like grasshoppers to ourselves, and so we must have looked to them.”
Here is a Rashi commentary that teaches us that contagious speech is real and that it can be either negative OR positive.
(B’Midbar 14:36)
SENT TO SEARCH THE LAND] RETURNED AND MADE THE WHOLE CONGREGATION MURMUR AGAINST HIM —
This meant: “the men whom Moses sent and who, when they returned (וישבו) from searching the Land, made the whole congregation murmur against him by making them utter an evil report, — those men died.
Wherever the phrase הוציא דבה occurs it denotes instructing to speak — that people teach their way of speaking to a person that he may speak it (cf. Rashi on 23:31). Similar is, (Song 7:10) “causing the lips of those who are asleep to speak." (דובב)
There may be one (a דבה, “an utterance”) for good, or there may be one for evil: and it is for this reason that it states here, “[even those men] that made the people utter evil speech about the Land”, because, as I have stated, there is a דבה which may be termed good (Rashi).
Thus we see clearly that Rashi is telling us that these 10 spies intentionally crafted a type of speech that would make it easy to CAUSE the listeners to speak SAME speech that they heard. This IS creating CONTAGIOUS speech!!
The takeaway we find is that the true menace of Lashon Hara can extend beyond the negative words. People enjoy turning gossip into easily digestible sound bites with memorable punch lines. Slander which is taught in such a repeatable way can spread very far, very fast.
We can now take a closer look at the methodology behind crafting viral, negative speech from the words of the spies.
They started by grabbing attention to distract from the primary positive goals of the nation. In other words the Jewish People were currently poised and ready to attain their primary crucial goal of attaining the Promised Land. The ten spies DISTRACTED the people from their true goal and mission.
This was done by showing off the incredible fruits of the land, effectively attracting everyone’s attention so they would be more suggestible to the negative messaging they were about to hear.
Next, the spies established their personal credibility by describing the Land as, “flowing with milk and honey.” Thus the people no longer had any reason to suspect bad intentions behind the coming slander.
The spies then instigated fear in the people by describing the fortifications and the powerful people. This provoked an anxiety which led the people to hope for a way out of their responsibility to go up and claim the Land.
The spies proceeded to entirely remove this responsibility from the people by insisting that the Jews CANNOT attack the nations in the Land or they would be crushed. Now the people had gone from eagerly heading towards their goal to feeling no obligation to attempt at such a fearful and insurmountable obstacle.
Then the spies criticized the Land itself, and crafted memes and catchphrases which could be spread to discourage any hope for the task. They said the Land DEVOURS its settlers, that every person was a GIANT, that the spies had appeared as GRASSHOPPERS even to themselves.
This is how negative speech becomes contagious. With these carefully organized and articulated statements, the spies turned around the attitude of the entire nation WITHIN A FEW HOURS! In the internet age we certainly must understand these methods and be especially vigilant to stay focused on our goals, and not fall prey to the demagoguery, pandering, and sound bites which are proliferating fear, hatred and other negative sentiments.
It is also important to note that the reason this form of negative speech becomes so successful is because it eliminates responsibility to the subject at hand from anyone who is willing to accept this slanderous report. It can literally change how entire cultures, or even the whole world, view reality, with a tremendous destructive power.
When we just believe the memes, we are refusing to acknowledge our ability to fulfill our missions, instead of trusting in HaShem and putting in the hard work to reach our goals. Anyone looking to shirk their responsibilities will instantly latch onto this way of thinking and thus feel no obligation to explore their potential.
More than just refraining from engagement is spreading unwholesome messages, we can actually use a similar but inherently OPPOSITE method to create healthy and viral content.
1. We begin by establishing a mission and sense of purpose, such as the goal of entering the Holy Land and all we intended to achieve therein.
2. We then speak of the positive rewards, such as a Land flowing with milk and honey, suggesting freedom and security. This is not so much to distract from the difficulty and work for the endeavor, but to actually make the work appealing.
3. We must ALWAYS keep the mission front and center with reminders as to our goal, and the self-fulfillment, dignity and freedom from negatively it brings.
4 We must create catchphrases and memes that capture our goal, rewards, fulfillment, and dignity that we will experience upon achieving our mission.
This is why the commandment of tzitzis immediately follows the story of the spies. They represent the mitzvos, which are our responsibility and mission to make the world a better place. We must wear them with a sense of purpose and be proud of the dignity we feel as we proceed towards fulfilling our purpose.
In fact, the tzitzis are a meme which reference not following our eyes and hearts which naturally seek out the negativity. We can only avoid it by instead seeking out the dignity and fulfillment provided by a life lived in consonance with our truest goals. By internalizing the great rewards within our reach, we can make even this positive mindset contagious.
The Torah here goes out of its way to describe in detail how negative contagious speech is created and the terrible destruction it is capable of. On the flipside, we are given tzitzis to symbolize the exact opposite type of message.
This is why Egypt is mentioned within this commandment. If we follow this negative way of thinking, we are really still in bondage in Egypt. We are still imprisoned in the slave mindset, which means no responsibility for the long-term goals of our master, instead scraping by every day as best we can. However, if we can remain focused on our primary goals we will be free to enter Eretz Yisrael.
We must always be on the lookout for people trying to influence us with the tempting poison of viral negativity. When they grab our attention, when they establish themselves as credible people, when they plant legitimate fears in our hearts, we are totally susceptible to falling victim to this ravaging influenza of negative thinking.
On the other hand, if we can steadfastly remain focused on our true responsibilities, on the objectives we want to achieve, on the good it will bring, and on the fulfillment it engenders, we will bring a positive energy into our lives. And by speaking about it, and even designing catchphrases and memes to remind us of what we really want to accomplish, we can create tremendously powerful and truly GOOD contagious speech.
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