My Rebbe, z.t.l., would sometimes ask us, "What does the term Simchat Torah mean?" Not the holiday at the end of Sukkot, but the literal meaning of the words.


"It's the happiness of the Torah," he said, "the feeling of joy the Torah itself experiences when we dance with it and around it and in honor of it. The Torah actually feels joy and exhilaration."


That is why our Torah is called Torat Chayim - "a living Torah". It contains the past, present and future, it gives us life ("ki haym chay'aynu") and it has life.


But the Torah is not the only (seemingly) inanimate object to take on human qualities. The Land of Israel is also

Torah and the Land are only seemingly inanimate.

unique among all the lands of the world in that it, too, can experience the gamut of emotions normally reserved for human beings. One such emotion is joy, as David HaMelech so often expresses in Tehilim: Yis'm'chu hashamayim v'tagel ha'aretz - the earth will rejoice.


But the Land can also feel pain and sadness, and anger. When the Meraglim in our parsha slander Israel - "this is a Land that devours its inhabitants," they conclude - the insult cannot be taken lying down. The Land rises up, as it were, and declares: "These people who spoke evil against me and insulted me - they will not be allowed to set foot on me again, nor will they enjoy the bounty that I produce, nor will they be privileged to build a home on top of me."


And so, a whole generation of almost 600,000 people will wander the desert for 40 years and die before the Land is ready to open its doors again to us. As the word Eretz implies, the Land has a will (ratzon) of its own.


It is one thing to critique and criticize the people who inhabit the Land - the leaders, in particular, are subject to close scrutiny - but it is quite another thing to blame the innocent Land.


This is a message for Jews everywhere, in every generation: be careful not to confuse the Land and those who currently occupy it. The inhabitants may come in all shades of color and quality; they may be exalted or lowly, incredible tzadikim or incompetent bunglers. But the Land has eternal, unfailing holiness in every inch and in every era. And it has no equal anywhere else on Earth.


The name Yisrael is composed of two words: the suffix is El, G-d. Certainly, this Land has an extra measure of G-dliness, and is a place "where HaShem's gaze is always focused." But the prefix is yashar: "straight", "honest", "not crooked".


When we finally get the right match - pure, proud leaders in our pure and perfect Land - we will be a lot further down the road to our total Redemption.