Witnessing the birth of a new idea is a little like watching the birth of a galaxy through the Hubble Space Telescope. We can witness just such an event in a famous rabbinical commentary to a key verse in this week’s parsha. The way to see it is to ask the question: what is the Hebrew word for freedom? Instinctively,…
This week’s sedra begins with a strange command: When you take a census [literally, “when you lift the head”] of the Israelites to determine their number, each one is to give to the Lord an atonement offering for his life when they are counted, so that they will not be stricken by plague when they are counted. Exodus 30:12 Evidently, it…
…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…
Framing the epic events of this week’s sedra are two objects – the two sets of Tablets, the first given before, the second after, the sin of the Golden Calf. Of the first, we read: “The Tablets were the work of God; the writing was the writing of God, engraved on the Tablets.” These were perhaps the holiest object in…
…God as shachen, a neighbour, intimate, close, within the camp, in the midst of the people. Yet for all this, we wonder why the Torah has to go on at such length in its details of the Mishkan, taking up the whole of Terumah and Tetzaveh, half of Ki Tissa, and then again Vayakhel and Pekudei. After all, the Mishkan…
…they were told a third time in last week’s parsha of Ki Tissa, which contained the command of Shabbat. They’ve learned this three times. They know about Shabbat. So why is Moshe Rabbeinu telling them this week, in Parshat Vayakhel, before talking about building the Mishkan, why now does he repeat the commandment of keeping Shabbat? Well, the conventional explanation,…
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…
…with the strength-in-depth they need to flourish in the long run. The classic instance of the principles articulated by Burns, Rees-Mogg and Collins is the transformation that occurred between Ki Tissa and Acharei Mot, between the first Yom Kippur and the second, between Moses’ heroic leadership and the quiet, understated priestly discipline of an annual day of repentance and atonement….
…We Make (Covenant & Conversation, Terumah) The Sabbath: First Day Or Last? (Covenant & Conversation, Ki Tissa) The Duality of Jewish Time (Covenant & Conversation, Emor) Renewable Energy (Covenant & Conversation, Beshallach) Short Quotes from Rabbi Sacks on the Topic Shabbat is the greatest tutorial in liberty ever devised. A Letter in the Scroll, p. 136 “The Sabbath is Judaism’s…
A Weekly Reading of the Jewish Bible I Believe is a personal and intimate demonstration of how Rabbi Sacks came to see the world through listening attentively to the Torah and its message for the present and all times. This is the latest book in the Covenant & Conversation series of themed books, written by Rabbi Sacks on the weekly Torah portion. The…