" I am about to wrap my body in Tzitzit (fringes commanded to be added to a fourcornered garment in this week's Torah reading), so that my soul , my 248 limbs and 365 fibers be wrapped in the light of Tzitzit , which numerically equals 613 , the number of the Lord's commandments . And just as I cover myself with a Talit (prayershawl) in this world , so may I merit rabbinical garb and a beautiful Talit in Gan Eden (Paradise)".
So begin the morning prayers , with the donning of the Talit and this prayer to wrap body and soul in Tzitzit . But why the idea of wrapping ( tit’teif ) and what is the connection to Gan Eden ? And why is this Mitzva mentioned in the Torah after the story of the Spies?
The Slonimer Rebbe in Netivot Shalom explains that one is wrapping ( l’hitateif ) one’s entire body in the Talit starting with the head ( with its “ eyes that see” ;Rashi, Bamidbar 15,39 ), continuing down to the heart (“ which desires “; Rashi again ) and then finally the trunk and legs. “ For the eyes and heart are the Spies ( Meraglim ) of the body “ (Rashi) .
In the name of Midrash Rabba (Bamidbar 17, 6 ), the Slonimer Rav ( page 82 ) quotes an analogy: “These Tzitzit 
These Tzitzit threads are like the lifeline that the Captain of the ship throws to a drowning sailor.
threads are like the lifeline that the Captain of the ship throws to a drowning sailor ; the rope ties the man to his ship , and are his literal lifeline . As the Bible says : ‘ And all you that are linked to the Lord your God, live( Devarim 4,4) ‘ “ .
The Parsha of Tzitzit is also read during our prayers, and it is placed in the prayerbook just after the Shema, which its famous declaration :“ The Lord is One (echad ) ”. The Slonimer explains that the word “echad ” is composed of the Hebrew letters “ aleph” , numerically one, representing “one ” Talit ; “ Chet ”, numerically eight, symbolizing the eights strings mandated for the Tzitzit; and “ daled ”, numberically four, representing the four corners of the Earth , over which the One God rules. The sky-blue ( techeilet ) strand in the Tzitzit represents the “ end ”( from the root word chaf-lamed-heh ), symbolizing the horizon of those four corners of the globe, “ the limits of human perception.
With the techeilet Man can enter the realm of the supernatural ”( Rav S. R. Hirsch, Bamidbar , pages 267-268 ). That this blue string is “ blue like the sky , and the sky is blue like the Almighty’s heavenly throne ” is no accident . The sky appears blue because all the components of white light are scattered by the many particles (dust, etc.) in our atmosphere. Blue light, however, scatters more, so it shines through, thus making the sky look blue. The message is that to maintain the “ kesher”, the knotted lifeline ( symbolized by Tzitzit ) to the One, a Jew must not be side-tracked by the multitude of details of this physical world, but stay focused on the “Blue light ” of the Lord’s Throne . This is the “light” of Tzitzit mentioned in the opening to the morning prayers .
Rav Hirsch also notes that the very word Tzizit comes from a root meaning to “sprout , blossom or protrude from" ( thus the High Priest , the Kohen Gadol, wore a Tzitz –a headplate on his forehead, with the words “Holy to the Lord ” emerging from it and from his head ). Tzitzit thereby symbolize what Rav Matis Weinberg calls “ an emergent phenomenon ” (see my “Cheesecake : King of Foods ”, 6/08/08 , on this Judaism site ). Rav Weinberg explains that the only way to escape from this physical world of cause-and –effect is through these emergent phenomena (since the Almighty does not show up on Mt. Sinai every day). For example, the brain is but a collection of billions of physical neurons. A human personality cannot be found in these neurons, no matter how hard one tries to look. But from the function of these neurons, beyond the horizon of their physical limitations, emerges a human personality. Similarly, Tzitzit and its techeilet (blue string) symbolize the way to emerge beyond the purely physical, being a daily, continually connecting lifeline to Life beyond “what our eyes see”.
This is the connection to the episode of the Spies of the Desert .We have an earlier episode of spies, in which Joseph accuses his brothers of being Meraglim , spies . As I have previously explained ( “ Imagining Chanuka “ , 12/21/08 ), Yosef was accusing them of being tied ( again,Tzitzit) to a view of this world as a merely physical entity . Like the brothers, the Spies of the Desert could not see Life and this Universe in any terms other than cause-and effect mechanics. As far as the Spies in our Torah reading were concerned, it was fine to live a spiritual life of desert hermits under the direct protection of a Divine cloud. It was unthinkable to them that a “normal” nation, in all its physical aspects (economy, culture, government, military, police, education, etc.) could function on a daily basis composed of spirituality. They could not envision Torah as a blueprint of Creation, including human, ongoing, progressive, evolving Creation, in a physical world. By failing to tie the blue strand to the white , the Spies forfeited entry into Eretz Yisrael , the Land of Israel (in contrast, in next week’s reading, Korach will insist on tzitzit with only the blue color, and will forfeit life itself) .
Modern Israelis have the same challenge as the generation of the Desert . There is no place for Spies in this Land: neither for purely spiritual humans who see no place for Jewish policemen, soldiers, garbage-collectors, farmers, accountants, etc.; nor for people who see only as far as the physical horizon that includes those functionaries, but not beyond it. Am Yisrael needs both Joseph the physical, and Judah the religious "Yid", both Joshua the general and Caleb the spiritual scholar, for only thus can they make a double team that “ yachol nuchal ( from the same root as techeilet ) lah ”(Bamidbar 13,30)--we will overcome the enemy--and can successfully form the Nation of Israel in its Land.
And that would be Gan Eden.