In this week's parsha we read about the episode of the spies which Moshe sent into the Land of Israel. Ten of the spies sinned by speaking disparagingly about the Land of Israel and this ended up causing the entire generation of the desert to sojourn in the desert for 40 years. 

The commentators discuss what exactly was the sin of the spies. They were instructed to spy out the land and report back and on the surface it seems that they were just fulfilling their mission. In the exchange between the ten spies, Calev (who along with Yehoshua were the two spies that didn't sin) attempted to calm the people and strengthen them as they were to face the powerful inhabitants that were in the Land. The spies stated that the inhabitants were large and powerful, the situation seemed hopeless for Bnei Yisroel to conquer the Land and the nation was in despair. Calev responded by saying "let's go up and conquer".

The Piascesner Rebbe, who was one of the great Torah luminaries during WWII (if I am not mistaken, he authored a number of books while he was in the Warsaw Ghetto), questions Calev's response. The other spies just claimed that there was an impossible situation facing the nation, instead of Calev answering in a rational and logical way, by maybe offering some alternative method or strategy to overcome the inhabitants of the Land, he simply says "let's go and conquer". The Piascesner Rebbe explains that there are two levels of emunah and bitachon, faith and trust in G-d. One level is when we trust in G-d but we are still looking for some natural way of solving the problem or the issue. When a person is G-d Forbid sick so he has faith in G-d that maybe treatment X will help or Dr. Y will have a solution. This person has faith as long as he sees some natural (even if it is not very probable) solution, once all of the natural solutions have been exhausted, and there is no other he may lose faith. This is when it is the hardest to have trust, when a person see's no way out. (In some aspects this situation might be easier because a person can't do anything else so their trust and faith is almost like a last resort, but such a person probably had very little faith to begin with). Calev saw no natural way to overcome the inhabitants of the Land, but he knew that Hashem Promised them the Land and commanded them to go and conquer it, he had absolute faith that Hashem would do "His Part" so the correct response was "let's go conquer", we need to believe in Hashem even though we see no viable option. The highest level of trust is when we so no natural option, G-d doesn't need natural or viable options to bring our salvation and this is the level of trust we must all strive to reach.    

Shabbat Shalom,

Heath