"Why So Many Don't Make Aliya?" - Parshat Shlach | Rabbi Ari Shvat | Beit Midrash

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Jewish tradition teaches that the sin of the spies was not merely a historical event but a recurring national failing that has accompanied the Jewish people throughout history (Ta'anit 29a). While many explanations have been offered, King David's interpretation seems particularly significant: "They despised the beloved Land" (Tehilim 106:24). The punishment—that the generation would not enter the Land of Israel—was therefore a natural consequence of the sin itself: they did not want the Land, and thus they did not enter it.
According to the Rosh (Rabbeinu Asher, Yevamot 64a), even Avraham Avinu may have faltered here. Avraham was in the Land at age seventy but later left, requiring Hashem to command him again five years later: "Go forth from your land." The Midrash similarly teaches that many Israelites preferred remaining in Egypt, even in slavery, rather than journeying to the Promised Land. Most perished during the plague of darkness. Yet remarkably, even those who left Egypt repeated the same mistake in the episode of the spies.
Even after failing twice, G-d had to surprisingly urge Yehoshua to bring the people into the Land despite their reluctance (Rashi Devarim 31, 7). The pattern resurfaced in the days of Ezra and Nehemiah, when the majority of Jews, including many leading figures, chose to remain in exile rather than return to rebuild the Second Temple (Yoma 9b).
Throughout Jewish history, prominent rabbis such as the Ya'avetz, the Vilna Gaon, and the Ohr HaChaim lamented that even Jews who were meticulous about other commandments often neglected the mitzvah of settling the Land of Israel, a mitzvah described by the Sages as "equal in importance to all the others combined" (Tosefta, Av.Z. 5, 2).
R. Yehudah Halevi's Kuzari (ii, 24), when challenged about his personally living outside the Land, the learned rabbi admits: "Indeed, you have found the source of my shame." Likewise, Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik, despite criticizing American Jews for not making Aliyah ("Kol Dodi Dofek"), openly confessed his own failure to do so, acknowledging his sin towards Eretz Yisrael & personal blame without excuse (Ish Al HaEdah, p. 251). Rabbi Yissachar Teichtal, in Eim HaBanim Semeichah (p. 167), similarly describes a puzzling indifference—and even opposition—to the Land among respected rabbinic leaders in Europe.
One might have hoped that the final and eternal return to Zion would be different, that Jews would finally make Aliyah joyfully. Yet the Sages already warned (Rashi, Dvarim 30, 3) that the ingathering of the exiles would be extraordinarily difficult, as though God Himself would need to "drag" each Jew individually home to Israel.
The answer to this constant weakness, I believe, lies in a deeper understanding of the spies, ourselves and the Land.
The rabbinic midrashim apparently present contradictory portraits of the spies. 1 One source describes them as righteous men when they departed; another claims they were already corrupt. Kabbalists explain that they preferred the spiritual atmosphere of the wilderness, where they could devote themselves to Torah study without worldly concerns. They feared that life in the Land would require engagement with work, army, politics, and material reality. But other sources suggest the exact opposite: that they preferred the comforts of ordinary life and were intimidated by the intense spiritual demands of the Land of Israel.
Even the famous giant fruits of the Land are interpreted differently. Some traditions say the 10 spies brought them to emphasize the Land's excessive materialism, while others maintain that Yehoshua and Calev brought them to demonstrate that the Land excelled not only spiritually but also materially.
These conflicting traditions point to two OPPOSITE fears. Some viewed the Land as too physical; others saw it as too spiritual.
I recall from my non-Zionist relatives who avoided Aliyah claiming Israel was too secular, while conversely, many secular Jews avoided it because it was the "Holy Land" and therefore, in their minds, belonged to the religious! In short, the Land of Israel often "falls between the cracks," so whatever one's outlook, one can find a reason to reject her!
The deeper truth, however, is that the Land of Israel embodies a unique harmony between the spiritual & physical. Here, the sacred and the mundane are not enemies but partners. A physical land but also holy.
This, I believe, is both the CHALLENGE and the SECRET of the Land of Israel. Its uniqueness lies precisely in its ability to unite heaven and earth. It testifies that there is one Creator who fashioned both this world and the next, the sacred and the ordinary. In such a place, even figs and stones possess holiness.
The punishment of the spies is now obvious. Those who fail to appreciate the Land's complexity and harmony, by simplistically seeing either black or white, and pessimistically focusing just on what they DON'T want, are simply unprepared for it, and will inevitably not make Aliyah, doomed to stay in the exile.
Only the partnership represented by Yehoshua and Calev (the positive spies) provides the proper perspective: Yehoshua, from Ephraim, associated with practical nation-building; and Calev, from Yehudah, associated with spiritual leadership. Together they embody the religious-Zionist synthesis necessary to understand the harmony and secret of Eretz Yisrael & monotheism.
Rabbi Ari Shvat (Chwat)

^ 1.
ב"ר טז, ה, מובא ברש"י, במדבר יג, ג; סוטה לה ע"א; ראו מגן אברהם, או"ח תקפ, ב; מהר"ל בחידושי האגדות על סוטה לד ע"ב; פירוש עקידת יצחק; שפת אמת, פ' שלח; זוהר, קס ע"א.

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