Israel's Journey of Self-fulfillment

Turn you and journey forth and go into the mountains of the Amorites and to all its neighbors, in the plain, in the highland and in the lowland and in the south and by the sea coast, the land of the Canaanites and the Lebanon , as far as the great river, the river Euphrates.           Deuteronomy 1:7

            Alshikh comments that every human being's spiritual roots are connected to the Shechinah, which, as it were, is above the Land of Israel. Therefore, when a Jew is outside the Holy Land, on some level he is separated from his (spiritual) roots and internally divided, and when a Jew reaches Israel, he comes closer to his roots. Thus, a Jew's journey to Israel is a journey towards his spiritual self and his essence.

            Thus, the Torah's wording is "s'oo lachem", which literally means "journey to yourselves", that is, it is to your own selves that you will travel when you journey to the Land, for your spiritual roots are there. For this reason, our verse continues "u'v'ou" ("come"), rather than "lechoo" ("go"), for a Jew's journey to the Land is as one who comes home, who returns to his essence.

            Alshikh offered the same explanation of God’s instructions to Abram: “lech l’cha” (literally “go to yourself”): Abram’s journey to the Land was a journey of self-fulfillment, he could not realize his full spiritual potential until he came into the Land. So it is with Abraham’s descendants.