Why do I believe in G_d? Because G_d believes in me! And that is what this parshah is all about.
That, and the ghetto. I'll explain...
Moses sends twelve spies to Canaan to check things out. When they arrive, they see a land of milk and honey, abundant with figs, pomegranates and these grapes that are the size of basketballs. Insane!
All this sounds like a lot of fun. But ten of the spies disagree. They tell Moses that the land is inhabited by the children of giants and that the Canaanites are a fierce people that will overtake the puny Hebrews.
Then we have a repeat from Behaalotcha: someone wants to go back to Egypt.
And G_d gets pissed. He decides this group of Hebrews just can't handle Canaan and decides he'll make everyone wander the desert for 40 years until the next generation is ready to take up the task.
See, G_d knows that the current generation will never be able to trust G_d in the way that they need to. They don't believe that their lives are really worth anything and can't live up to any kinds of challenges.
It's like kids living in the ghettos of America. Anyone who grows up middle class or rich thinks that these kids should just go to school and "overcome". From their perspective, some kid with a crack addict mother and a father in jail just needs to "tighten his bootstraps" and get down to work. The old Homeless-To-Harvard treatment.
But it's not that simple. When you grow up in an environment where you have little-to-no self worth, it's damn near impossible to do anything. When no one believes that you are special, that you can accomplish anything, or that life is anything other than a sad struggle to survive, the idea of ever having abundance is too great to grasp. That negative mindset is what holds poor communities back, and it's why G_d was forced to hold back the Chosen People.
It's obvious in the metaphors that are used in this parshah: grapes that are so large it takes two people to carry them, giant monsters, raging, violent masses of Canaanites that are thirsty for the foreign blood of the Hebrews. This is all a huge exaggeration if taken literally. But to a people who are used to being treated like shit, seeing everyone except them with money, power and freedom, it's the simple truth.
People ask me why I believe in G_d. And I tell them that it is because G_d believes in me. G_d trusts me enough to do my own research: to follow my own heart. And when my heart takes me in the wrong direction (as was the case with the wayward, peeing-in-their-pants Hebrews), G_d will point me in another direction, for my own good.
I just hope mine doesn't take 40 years...
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