14 Jul PARSHAS DEVARIM: CAREFUL CONSIDERATION OF CHINUCH CONCESSIONS

The idea was good in
my eyes. (1:23)
Parashas Devarim
begins with Moshe
rabbeinu reviewing
the main events that
occurred in the 39 years since the Jewish
People left Har Sinai. In recalling their
request to send meraglim to reconnoiter
Eretz Yisrael before proceeding to the
Land, Moshe castigates them for the
disorderly manner with which they made
their request, but he concedes that “the
idea was good in my eyes.”
The Talmud (Sotah 34b) deduces from
Moshe’s statement — “The idea was
good in my eyes” — that he felt that it
was a good idea to send meraglim, but
Hashem did not. Hashem was aware that
sending spies would end in disaster, and
He did not want them to go.
This is difficult to understand. If Hashem
knew that the meraglim would end up
poisoning the minds of the nation against
Eretz Yisrael, why did He agree that they

could go? Hashem should have told
Moshe, “Tell them that I am G-d, I call
the shots, and I said ‘NO!’”?
Rabbi Mottel Katz, the late Rosh
Yeshivah of Telz in Cleveland, Ohio,
deduces an important lesson in chinuch
from this incident.
There are times that children want to do
something that their parents deem
inappropriate. Our parental instincts tell
us to lay down the law and prohibit them
from doing what they want to do. We
reason to ourselves that we are required
to be mechanech our children, and
sometimes this means that we have to
say, “No.”
But is it always right to say no?
We learn from the meraglim, says Rabbi
Katz, that there are times that we have to
concede, even if we know that what our
children want to do is wrong!
Hashem realized that the people simply
were not ready to accept His denial of
their request. Had Moshe returned from
Hashem with a negative response, they

would have thought to
themselves, “How are we
supposed to go and fight
against a country without
sending spies? Everyone
knows that you do not
fight without intelligence
information.”
Had Klal Yisrael been on
a high-enough spiritual
level to accept Hashem’s
refusal, He would have said no. But
Hashem realized they were not ready to
accept His decision wholeheartedly, so
He did not refuse their request.
Sometimes, notes Rabbi Katz, chinuch is
all about conceding. We have to know
when our children are able to accept a
“no,” and when they are just too set on
doing what they intend to do to accept
our refusal.
This concept is actually mentioned
clearly in the Talmud (Yevamos 65b) as
well: “Just as it is a mitzvah to say words
that will be accepted, it is also a mitzvah
not to say words that will not be
accepted.”
Rabbi Motel Katz adds a personal
anecdote that is so incredible that, had
I not seen it myself in his notes and
confirmed the authenticity of the notes
with his son, I would never have
included it here. The incident that he
describes, while not dated, must have
occurred in the late 1940s or early 50s.
“One day, the boys came over to me in
yeshivah and asked me to change the
yeshivah schedule for one night,”
writes Rabbi Katz. “They wanted to
daven Maariv earlier than we regularly
did.
“When I asked them why they wanted
to daven early, they explained that
there was a heavyweight championship
bout being fought in New York that
night, and they wanted to listen to the
match on the radio. If we would daven
at the regular time, they would miss
the fight.”
“Of course, the very request was
inappropriate, not to mention the
questionable propriety of yeshivah
students listening to a fight between
two humans trained to beat each other
until one of them could no longer
stand up.”
“I realized that if I refused, the boys

simply would not understand why I
refused. Having grown up in America,
they were accustomed to the finest, most
respectable citizens flying in from all
over the country to view these matches.
They considered watching or listening to
the radio broadcast of two adults
pummeling each other a perfectly normal
means of recreation.”
“I decided,” concludes Rabbi Katz, “that
since these boys would not begin to
understand why I was refusing their
request, it would be better to allow them
to daven early and listen to the match.”
I am sure that this was probably one of
many difficult dilemmas Rabbi Katz had
to face. He had learned in Telz back in
Europe. What would his Roshei Yeshivah
have thought of such a request?
Rabbi Mordechai Gifter often related his
memories of his arrival in Telz and
finding that the only thing that existed
there was Torah. How difficult it must
have been for a person who had been
privy to witness such exalted devotion to
Torah to permit his students to end their
studies early for a heavyweight
championship match.
But this was a new world. The student
body of Telz at the time was culled from
various small communities throughout
the United States; many of them had
attended public elementary schools in
their youth. They could not be expected
to fully appreciate the value of Torah.
Of course, there are many cases in which
parents and mechanchim have to say no.
But in this case, Rav Motel learned from
the best Teacher. If Hashem permitted
Klal Yisrael to do something that He
knew was wrong when He realized they
could not accept His refusal, then the
Rosh Yeshivah of Telz had to find it in
himself to do the same.
And so, dear parents, must we.