Thus, to protect himself against the terrible spiritual illness of slandering the Land, Moshe praises the Land of Israel throughout the Torah portion, stressing over and over again that it is indeed a “good Land.”
The Sages of the Talmud followed Moshe’s example. At the end of tractate Ketubot, it is related that Rav Hanina would clear away debris from the roads of Eretz Yisrael, so that no one would speak derisively against the Land of Israel. When teaching their students, Rav Ami and Rav Asi would move from the shade to the sun, and from the sun to the shade. Rashi explains that they would move into the sun when the shade was too cold, and into the shade when the sun was too hot, so that no one should speak a bad word about the settlement of Eretz Yisrael.
How important it is, then, to view the settlement of Israel in a positive light. Thinking otherwise is a grievous sin.
Of course, a “good eye” is important in looking at everything in life, especially with our families, our wives, our children, and our friends. The Mishna teaches that a “good eye” is the trait of our Forefather, Avraham, and its opposite, the trait of the wicked Bilaam (Avot, 5:19).
But, here, I have to make a personal confession. There is one thing I simply cannot look at with a good eye, and that is the exile. True, until the establishment of the State of Israel, there was a positive value of sorts in the exile, in that via the punishment of galut, and its sufferings, our sins were atoned, in the same way that a sinner must serve time in hell, G-d forbid, in order to be purged of his transgressions. Plus there was to be an educational value in the exile. Our being a persecuted minority among the gentile nations was to teach us to appreciate the importance of our own holy, Jewish Land.
But, tragically, something went wrong. Instead of loathing the exile, many of our brethren fell in love with it, and refuse to leave, even though Hashem has mercifully brought us back to our Homeland with miracles and an incredible national rebirth that has amazed all the world.
What is this tragedy analogous to? To a rebellious child who is sent to sit in the bathroom in punishment for his wayward behavior. Finally, when the door is unlocked, the child announces that he prefers to stay in the bathroom rather than return to live in the house. True, there are sweet smelling soaps and perfumes in the bathroom to camouflage the stink, a marble sink counter, designer spotlights, and a wall-length mirror so that you can watch yourself sit on the can, but it is life in a toilet all the same.
May Hashem cure us of the evil of seeing the settlement of the Land of Israel in a negative light, and may we merit to rectify the sin of the Spies by loving the Land, seeing it with a good eye, and coming to live in its borders in accordance with the will of the Almighty, as stated again and again and again in the Torah. Amen.
