…such a moment as this? A live-streamed shiur delivered by Rabbi Sacks for Vayakhel-Pekudei (March 2020/5780) Around the Shabbat Table What can we learn from Fred Rogers and the way he utilised the power of speech? Do you think the technology and social media of our age is a positive addition to our lives or mainly destructive? Do you agree…
…לְוַיַּקְהֵל Between Ki Tissa and Vayakhel עוֹלָם מַפְסִיק לְהִתְקַהֵל The world stops congregating לְהִשְׁתַּתֵּק לְהִסְתַּגֵּר Goes quiet, locks itself in יִשְׁמָעֵאל אֱדוֹם וְיִשְׂרָאֵל Ishmael, Edom and Israel בֵּין וַיַּקְהֵל לִפְּקוּדֵי Between Vayakhel and Pekudei אֵין אִישׁ בָּעִיר וּבַשָּׂדֶה Not a person in the city or the country כְּבָר אֵין מוּל מִי לְהִתְנַהֵל Not a soul left to talk…
Finally the long narrative of the construction of the Tabernacle – to which the Torah devotes more space than any other single subject – is at an end. The building, its frame, drapes and sacred furniture, were complete. Moses inspects the finished project. We then read: The Israelites had done all the work just as the Lord had commanded Moses….
Right at the end of the book of Shemot there is a textual difficulty so slight that it is easy to miss, yet – as interpreted by Rashi – it contains one of the great clues as to the nature of Jewish identity: moving testimony to the unique challenge of being a Jew. First, the background. The Tabernacle is finally complete. Its…
A long drama had taken place. Moses had led the people from slavery to the beginning of the road to freedom. The people themselves had witnessed God at Mount Sinai, the only time in all history when an entire people became the recipients of revelation. Then came the disappearance of Moses for his long sojourn at the top of the…
The Torah in Parshat Vayakhel, which describes the making of the Mishkan, goes out of its way to emphasise the role women played in it: The men accompanied the women, and those who wanted to make a donation brought bracelets, earrings, finger rings, and body ornaments, all made of gold. Ex. 35:22 Every skilled woman put her hand to spinning,…
…Ki Tissa, Vayakhel, Pekudei – I didn’t count them up: it’s somewhere between 500-600 verses. In other words, it takes almost twenty times as long to build a shul as to create the universe – the reason being fairly simple. Shuls tend to be put together by a committee! But it is a very striking thing. You will forgive me:…
…three verses of Bereishit ch. 2). The making of the Mishkan takes hundreds of verses (Terumah, Tetzaveh, part of Ki Tissa, Vayakhel and Pekudei) – considerably more than ten times as long. Why? The universe is vast. The sanctuary was small, a modest construction of poles and drapes that could be dismantled and carried from place to place as the…
…need that shock to help them change their lives. VAYAKHEL & PEKUDEI: The highest achievement is not self-expression but self-limitation: making space for something other and different from us. FROM THE BOOK OF VAYIKRA: VAYIKRA: For each of us God has a task. Discerning that task, hearing God’s call, is what gives a life meaning and purpose. TZAV: The more…
The sequence of parsiyhot that begins with Terumah, and continues Tetzaveh, Ki Tissa, Vayakhel and Pekudei, is puzzling in many ways. First, it outlines the construction of the Tabernacle (Mishkan), the portable House of Worship the Israelites built and carried with them through the desert, in exhaustive and exhausting detail. The narrative takes almost the whole of the last third…