The psychological defeatism of the generation of the desert is also reflected in a detail I hadn’t noticed for many years: the spies saw themselves as tiny as insects—but why didn’t they describe themselves as ants, bees, or wasps, insects that the Tora mentions in other contexts? Why did the spies use locusts as a metaphor?
It occurred to me that they compared themselves to locusts because locusts have no sting—in other words, they cannot defend themselves or protect their colony. In a certain way, and quite subtly, they were admitting their numerical strength—let’s remember that the devastating effect of locusts happens only when they arrive in swarms of millions. Still, individual locusts are entirely harmless and vulnerable.
The men of the generation of the desert, Freud might say, saw themselves as locusts because they believed they were incapable of defending themselves—let alone achieving victory!
If we want to analyze it even more subtly, according to the culinary culture of the time, locusts were edible (many species are kosher), and unconsciously, they were describing themselves as food for the enemy.
Caleb and Yehoshua, on the other hand, presented the opposite view when they said, “Lachmenu hem”—the enemy is our bread—meaning: “they’re a piece of cake.”
