Комментарий к Бамидбар 32:7

ולמה תניאון means AND WHY WILL YE TURN ASIDE AND WITHHOLD their heart from passing over? — because they will think that you are afraid to pass over on account of the prospect of war and the strength of the cities and the peoples.

?ולמה תניאון, what is the point in your undermining the resolution and morale of your brethren? You are repeating what the spies in the last generation did!

ולמה הניאון "and why do you turn the minds, etc.?" Moses said that in addition to his objective arguments he also had a subjective, psychological argument aginst the proposal of these two tribes. How would their action be perceived by their comrades-in -arms? Moses conceded that the arguments of the two tribes may have been sincere, however the effect of such arguments would result in a lowering of the morale of the other tribes. These tribes might consider that the two tribes hid their fear of the Canaanites behind these arguments. Once the other tribes had the feeling that Reuven and Gad were afraid, what was to stop those tribes from becoming afraid also? Fear was what had resulted in the debacle 38 years earlier. Moses accused the two tribes of not considering the effect their attitude would have since Israel had experience in the matter. At that time ten men had succeeded in infecting a whole nation with their own fear when they said that the Canaanites were stronger than they were (Numbers 13,31). As soon as the people would observe that part of their number did not want to cross the Jordan they would have prepared the ground for a repetition of what happened at the time of the spies.

V. 7. נוא ,ולמה תניאון bezeichnet ja das Unterbrechen einer Bewegung (es steht zwischen נוע und נוח — siehe Bereschit). Hier steht es in seiner eigentlichen Bedeutung. Sie und Israel sind im Begriff, in das Land einzuziehen. Da halten sie mit einemmale in Ausführung dieser Absicht inne und bringen auch das Volk dazu, die Ausführung aufzugeben. Dieser doppelte Vorwurf ist durch das קרי und כתיב ausgedrückt.

Why do you dishearten. This refers to a sinful thought between them and their Father in Heaven. About them, Yisroel will say that it is not because of the livestock that they want this, but rather that they are afraid of the war with Canaan, or they do not want to be subject to Hashem’s strong supervision in Eretz Yisroel.

?ולמה תנואון, “and to what purpose do you want to turn away (the hearts)?” This word is read as we spelled it, but is spelled as a transitive word, the letter י appearing in the text instead of the letter ו, before the last letter.

אשר נתן להם השם "which the Lord has given to them?" Here too, Moses referred to the argument of the two tribes that G'd had defeated Sichon and Og and that it was only up to Him to decide who would inherit these lands. He pointed out that there was a basic difference between the status of the lands they wanted and the status of the West Bank. G'd had given the West Bank to the whole Jewish people already in the days of the Patriarchs, something that was not the case with the lands which used to belong to Sichon and Og. Those lands were not included in G'd's promise to Abraham. Sifri section 2 item 299 quotes a Baraitha and writes as follows: "the words לתת לך (Deut. 7,13) "to give to you," exclude the East Bank of the Jordan which you took for yourself." Whereas this interpretation of that verse is only that of Rabbi Shimon while another scholar interprets these words differently, there is no reason to believe that any of the other scholars disagree with Rabbi Shimon on that subject.

We also find a statement in Bamidbar Rabbah 7 that the East Bank of the Jordan is not a suitable place to erect the Temple, nor for the שכינה to settle. We have scriptural proof of this from Joshua 22,19, where it says that "if the land of your inheritance has become defiled (in your eyes i.e. the East Bank of the Jordan), cross over to the land of inheritance of G'd Himself, who dwells there in the Tabernacle and acquire an inheritance amongst us, etc." This tells you very clearly that there is a difference between the lands of Sichon and Og and that of ארץ ישראל proper. Perhaps this is the reason why Moses did not want to give each one of the tribes a share in those lands, and why he preferred that all of the tribes should accept their heritage on the West Bank which is holier. Compare what we have written on Deut. 3,13 on the words ההוא יקרא ארץ רפאים.