I’d Rather be a Grasshopper
After some time wandering in the desert - it is finally time for the Israelites to start seeing some of that land that was promised to them.
Moses sends out 12 scouts, one from each tribe on a prospecting trip -
To find out what kind of land it is -
Could we make a life there?
What kind of people dwell there
How many people are there - and are they strong? Are their cities fortified?
These are the questions Moses wants them to explore
They go out on a 40-day mission -
And survey the land -
They come back to report that the land is indeed fertile -
- we could make a life there.
It is flowing with milk and honey and is ample with large fruit -
“But,” they added, “the people there are fierce and their cities are strongly fortified and large, and giants live there.
We felt like grasshoppers compared to them, and they saw us that way also.”
We felt like grasshoppers.
We felt small.
And surely - they would see us the same way we saw ourselves.
Inferior. Fragile. Inconsequential.
But, I have to wonder -
What is the power of the grasshopper?
The insect whose high-pitched, rhythmic song we hear in these summer months
Who perch so perfectly on a single blade of grass.
Perhaps we shouldn’t rush to diminish the creature; and in doing so, diminish ourselves.
Because it is also the grasshopper who can become the locust
An adaptation that happens because of stress and hunger -
Become a giant of a creature -
But at its genetic core - it is still a grasshopper -
So I ask - Can we embrace the wisdom of the grasshopper?
The Grasshopper is among the smallest of creatures. In the imagination of the Tanakh, it is one of the four tiniest creatures on earth: - Ants, Badgers, Lizards, and the Grasshopper. - yet - the Book of Proverbs chooses to describe these as the wisest of the wise
Ants -are a folk without power, Yet they prepare food for themselves in summer
Badgers are a folk without strength, Yet they makes their home in the rocks;
Despite the small and vulnerable size of a lizard, it can be found in lofty and secure royal palaces.
The grasshopper have no king, Yet they all march forth in formation;
The power and wisdom associated with the grasshopper is the strength of thick community -
Of marching towards a goal, of organizing towards a purpose
So I’ll ask again, what’s wrong with being a grasshopper
The grasshopper is humble and yet it knows its purpose.
The grasshopper is adaptable - and resilient:
They live on nearly every continent - in nearly every type of climate; in the desert and in the jungle - in the tall prairie grass and in our backyard gardens
The Midrash teaches us not to conflate size with stature; strength with worth; that even the creation of even the smallest of creatures can teach us a lesson - they have value (except maybe the mosquito, which scientist suggest could actually go extinct with no ecological repercussions)
But perhaps - even the mosquito has a purpose (still, yet, undiscovered)
Because, according to our midrash - each creature has a value and a vocation -
“The house fly can heal the sting of a hornet” it teaches -
The gnat is an antidote to the viper’s venom
(I suggest this as an approach to expanding our openness to knowledge of the world, rather than medical advice…)
As the text continues - the animals can teach us -
As Rabbi Yoḥanan teaches in the Talmud - Even if the Torah had not been given, we would nonetheless have learned modesty from the cat, and that stealing is objectionable from the ant, which does not take grain from another ant, and loyalty from the dove, which is faithful to its partner
The stork - is compassionate and merciful towards other birds -
The frog, even, the Midrash tells us, lives by Torah’s laws, helping other aquatic creatures find food - fulfilling the biblical injunction, “If your enemy is hungry, give them bread to eat; and if they are thirsty, give them water to drink."
The grasshopper, the Midrash tells us gives us an insight into what it means to be a creature on this earth.
“All the summer through it sings, until its belly bursts, and death claims it. Though it knows the fate that awaits it, yet it sings on.”
The grasshopper sings.
It knows it will die.
It knows its season will end.
And still, it sings.
Perhaps the sin of the spies is that they demean the creature of the grasshopper
They reject its wisdom and the lessons it can teach us
And they forget that it is the grasshopper who does not need a King to have a community
They forget that it is the grasshopper who knows that if it must - it can become a locust
But that it desires not to consume but to eat just enough - and to spend its time singing
The grasshopper does not desire to become a giant
It wants to step without worrying what it has accidentally crushed beneath its feet
I wonder how I might learn the wisdom of the grasshopper
Of the ant and badger and gnat
The wisdom of being small
What might it be to remember that alone - even as a giant - alone my power is so much more limited than if Ishare it
To share my power not to become powerless - but to remind myself exactly what kind of power I hold
What kind of power we hold- when we stop trying to fight giants, and become giants, ourselves
When we embrace our limited hours on earth
And learn from every creature.