Yeshayahu Leibowitz

The last part of the weekly Torah portion of naso (Numbers 4:21-7:89), which is the longest portion in the Torah, is an elaborate and long description of the inauguration of ohel mo’ed, the “Tent of the Meeting” (the tabernacle)—the “place” where Moses “hears” the voice of God and receives the instructions.

Let’s remind ourselves: the first time we hear about the Tabernacle is in the Torah portion of trumah, which opens with God’s instruction to Moses:

וְעָשׂוּ לִי מִקְדָּשׁ וְשָׁכַנְתִּי בְּתוֹכָם:

“They shall make me a tabernacle, and I will dwell within them.” (Exodus 25:8)

As a number of Hassidic rabbis commentators remarked: “within them” should be understood as “within each and every one of them.” Thus, the construction of the tabernacle can also be interpreted as opening up a sacred space within oneself for God to dwell within (or, rather, for realizing that God has been dwelling within all along).

The very last verse of this week’s portion seems to echo this understanding. It says:

וּבְבֹא מֹשֶׁה אֶל אֹהֶל מוֹעֵד לְדַבֵּר אִתּוֹ וַיִּשְׁמַע אֶת הַקּוֹל מִדַּבֵּר אֵלָיו מֵעַל הַכַּפֹּרֶת אֲשֶׁר עַל אֲרֹן הָעֵדֻת מִבֵּין שְׁנֵי הַכְּרֻבִים וַיְדַבֵּר אֵלָיו:

When Moses went into the Tent of the Meeting to speak with Him, he would hear the Voice speaking to him from above the cover that was on top of the Ark of the Pact between the two cherubim; thus He spoke to him. (Numbers 7:89)

The key words here are “speaking to him”, which in Hebrew are middaber eilav. From the context one would assume that “speaking to him” means God speaking to Moses, as indeed most translators have assumed.

But that is not what the Hebrew says. As Rashi points out, middaber (מִדַּבֵּר), while spelled the same as medaber (מְדַבֵּר), is in a grammatically different form—the reflexive form of hitpa’el. This means that the “him” in the expression “the Voice speaking to him” is not Moses, but God himself.

Here are Rashi’s own words:

מדבר. כמו מתדבר, כבודו של מעלה לומר כן, מדבר בינו לבין עצמו ומשה שומע מאליו:

“…speaking to him: Heb. מִדַּבֵּר. [This form] is [grammatically] the same as מִתְדַּבֵּר [the reflexive form, meaning] “speaking to himself.” It is out of reverence for the Most High to express it in this manner. [God] speaks to Himself, and Moses hears it spontaneously.”

One of Israel’s preeminent Judaic scholar and teachers, the late Professor Yeshayahu Leibowitz, noted in response: “This not an acoustic event, in which a voice [or a sound, kol] reaches Moses, but rather a process within Moses’ consciousness, who… hears God speaking to Himself within Himself.” And he also points out that with this radical interpretation of the text, Rashi preempts Maimonides’ theory of prophecy by about two hundred years.

Indeed, the tabernacle is that sacred space within where a prophet can “hear” the voice of God. And we are all called to do that. Moses said, “Would that all of Y‑H‑V‑H’s people were prophets, and Y‑H‑V‑H put His spirit upon them.” (Numbers 11:29). We each are called to erect that sacred space, that Tent of the Meeting, within ourselves.

Thus, the construction of the Tabernacle can be seen as a meditative process. We create the sacred space within oneself through loosening our grip on our thoughts, loosening our grips on the inner noise, letting everything be and just BE—thereby giving that kol dmama daka, the “sound of subtle silence” (also known as “still small voice”) to be heard.

What a perfect subject of contemplation before Shavu’ot.

* * *

Leibowitz points out that the only translator of the Bible who noted this grammatical form of middaber and translated correctly was Martin Luther. In his German Bible he translated it as “redend zu sich” (speaking to himself). Leibowitz wonders, could Luther have been familiar with Rashi?

And another German teacher, although much earlier than Luther, who understood God’s speech as an something that occurs within one’s consciousness was Meister Eckhart (1260 – 1327). See previous mention, on the commentaries of both Acharey Mot and Beshalach.

The Ark of the Covenant

As practically all of the book of Leviticus, this week’s Torah portion, acharey mot (Leviticus Ch. 16-18), lists numerous rules regarding how Aharon, the chief priest, is to conduct himself while he is in the Tent of the Meeting (another name for the Tabernacle).

For the Hassidic rabbis, these are just codes for how one should conduct oneself during prayer. The “Tent of the Meeting” is not a physical place for them; it is the deeper realms of one’s consciousness. Entering the Tent of the Meeting (ohel mo’ed) is entering that place within oneself, where one meets one’s Maker.

Here is how Rabbi Benjamin Ben Aharon from Zlositch, author of Torey Zahav (תורי זהב), interpreted one of these instructions. The text says:

וְכָל אָדָם לֹא יִהְיֶה בְּאֹהֶל מוֹעֵד בְּבֹאוֹ לְכַפֵּר בַּקֹּדֶשׁ עַד צֵאתוֹ וְכִפֶּר בַּעֲדוֹ וּבְעַד בֵּיתוֹ וּבְעַד כָּל קְהַל יִשְׂרָאֵל:

No person shall be in the Tent of Meeting [the Tabernacle] when he comes in to atone for the holy, until he goes out. He shall make atonement for himself and his household…. (Leviticus 16:17)

Rabbi Benjamin Ben Aharon from Zlositch writes:*

In the book Duties of the Hearts** [hovot halevavot, by the 11^th century Rabbi Bahya ibn Paqquda] we are told that a person should regularly practice lone meditation [hitbodedut [התבודדות, separated from other people. You should reach the state that even when surrounded by a thousand people, you are able to maintain your attachment to God. Nothing should divide you or separate you from that attachment (Sha‘ar Heshbon ha-Nefesh 3).

Thus I interpret our verse…. We know that before praying you should be stripped of your corporeal self. Your thought should cleave to the exaltedness of God, as though you were standing in the upper worlds among angels, rather than surrounded by people. When you forget that you are among people, you are able to pray with great intensity, without any false motives. This is [what is meant by] No person shall be in the Tent of Meeting. That refers to the synagogue or house of study, the place where people gather to pray. No person shall be there in your thought; you should be so stripped of physical selfhood that you forget you are standing among people. As you come in to atone for the holy: the time of prayer, which takes the place of atoning sacrifices. Until he goes out: from the beginning to the end of prayer. He shall make atonement for himself and his household: prayer of this sort is surely pure.

Thus I also interpreted the sages’ saying “In a place where there is no man, try to be a man” (Mishnah, Pirkey Avot 2: 5). When you stand in that place of teshuvah, strive to be more than an ordinary man; enter the upper realms, where there is no other person. Before you perform a mitsvah, set your mind to be attached above, as though there were no person present….

* * *

The Hassids were not the only mystics that took ancient stories of entering the tabernacle or the temple to mean entering one’s own Holy of Holies. A story that I told earlier in this blog is fit to be told here, since this we are approaching the holiday of Passover, even though it is coming from the New Testament. The story comes from the Gospel of Luke:

Now every year his parents went to Jerusalem for the festival of the Passover.  And when he was twelve years old, they went up as usual for the festival.  When the festival was ended and they started to return, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem, but his parents did not know it. Assuming that he was in the group of travelers, they went a day’s journey. Then they started to look for him among their relatives and friends. When they did not find him, they returned to Jerusalem to search for him. After three days they found him in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. And all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers. (Luke 2:41-47)

Commenting on this story, Meister Eckhart, the great 14^th century mystic who deserves, in my eyes, to be called “a Christian Hassid”, had an interpretation of this story that reminds one of the Hassids.

For Eckhart, this story is a metaphor for one’s search for God. When one lives unconsciously, one is so self-absorbed that one does not know whether or not one is connected to God. This is symbolized by the fact that “the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem, but his parents did not know it” (the parents, in this story, symbolize the seekers).

As life progresses, one notices that something is missing, but thinks that the solution is near, and one is bound to stumble upon it sooner or later in the natural course of one’s life. “Assuming that he was in the group of travelers, they went a day’s journey.”

It does not take long for an introspective soul to realize that one has to look deeper. One may not be ready for a radical change yet—one still looks for God in the familiar—but the intensity of one’s search increases. “Then they started to look for him among their relatives and friends.”

When that fails, one decides to be much more focused and serious. One starts devoting all of one’s energy to the search, engaging in prayer, meditation, and holy practices. This, Meister Eckhart says, is what is meant by the fact that the parents returned to the holy city, to Jerusalem, and looked for boy Jesus within its walls. But even after three days of constant searching in the holy city, they could not find him. In other words, holy, religious pursuits in themselves are no guarantee for finding God.

Where do they find God eventually? In the temple, which for Eckhart is a metaphor for the deepest level of Self, the deepest level of one’s consciousness. When one finally steps into that inner realm, one realizes that God has been there all along, teaching.

* * *

Happy Passover!

—————————–

*Green, Arthur; Leader, Ebn; Mayse, Ariel Evan; Rose, Or N. (2013-07-09). Speaking Torah, Vol. 1: Spiritual Teachings from around the Maggid’s Table (Kindle Locations 5327-5336). Jewish Lights Publishing. Kindle Edition.

**חובות הלבבות

Copyright © 2014 Igal Harmelin-Moria
(Copyright does not pertain to illustrations)

Ancient mosaic from Lower Galilee

On the face of it, the weekly Torah portion of metzora (Leviticus Ch. 14 & 15) deals with the role of the priests in purifying physical impurities of all kinds, especially skin impurities and diseases (metzora means “lepper”). But the real message of this portion is best told with the help of a story from the midrash (the allegorical commentaries on the Torah).

The midrash* tells that a peddler was going around the lower Galilee region of ancient Israel, calling out for people to buy his elixir of life. Wherever he went, he attracted attention. Rabbi Yanai, one of the most prominent figures of the time (3^rd century C.E), was studying Torah in his luxurious living room when he was distracted by the commotion caused by the man.

After hearing what the excitement was about , he invited the peddler into his house and asked to buy his merchandise. “You don’t need it”, said the peddler, “It’s not for the likes of you.” Rabbi Yanai insisted, so the peddler showed him a verse from the Psalms:

מִי-הָאִישׁ, הֶחָפֵץ חַיִּים, אֹהֵב יָמִים, לִרְאוֹת טוֹב.
נְצֹר לְשׁוֹנְךָ מֵרָע וּשְׂפָתֶיךָ, מִדַּבֵּר מִרְמָה.

Who is the man who is eager for life,
Who desires years of good fortune?
Guard your tongue from evil,
Your lips from deceitful speech. (Psalm 34, 13-14)

Rabbi Yanai commented: “I have been studying this verse all my life, and until this peddler came, I did not realize how literally it should be taken.”

It seems obvious to me, that the kind of life that the Psalm and midrash are referring to is not biological life. We all know that there are some truthful people who never speak ill of others whose life is short, and some dishonest people whose life is long and even comfortable. Rather, it is the quality of life that they are referring to. Life that is infested with evil speech and deceit is not a life worth living.

What does this story have to do with the Torah portion, which deals exclusively with how to diagnose, isolate, and treat leprosy and other external impurities? Because leprosy has been connected by the sages to speaking ill of others. This connection is established in the book of Numbers, the next book in the Torah. We are told that Miryam, Moses’ sister, was speaking ill of her brother, and that she was punished by incurring leprosy on the spot (Leviticus 12). The sages, using a play on words, equated the Hebrew word metzora (מצרע) with motzi shem ra (מוציא שם רע).

And perhaps just as the “life” that is referred to in the story above is not biological life, but the internal dimension of life, so also the leprosy that is spoken off here is not physical leprosy, but an allegorical one. The result of speaking ill of others, then, is that your life is seriously ill—your soul becomes full of blemish.

It is interesting that one way in which a was treated was banishment. He or she could not come into the town, city, or camp with the rest of the people. This could also be understood allegorically, because a person who is in the habit of speaking ill of others isolates him- or herself from the sense of community, from being together with others. Outwardly, physically, he or she may be with others; but internally, he or she has banished themselves.

Speaking ill of others is probably the hardest “sin” to avoid. I have met very few people in my life who are genuinely saintly in this manner, and the sweetness and love the radiates form them is palpable (and very implicating!). That saintliness can feel to others that it’s too much, and they need to challenge it, to see if it’s really true.

It reminds me of a story that I’ve told once before on this blog. Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, the famous guru who founded Transcendental Meditation, told about an Indian saint who was known for his insistence on only seeing the positive in every situation. A group of young men took him upon themselves to expose him to utterly negative situation, in which he would not have anything good to say.

Inviting him to accompany them to a function, they made sure to pass through an alley where a rotten carcass of a cat run over by a car was lying in the middle of the road. When one of the men pointed to the carcass with disgust, the saint smiled and said: “Look at the beautiful, pearly white teeth of the cat”.

That men found the elixir of life. He was definitely not a metzorah, not a lepper.

———————

* Midrash Rabah Vayikra, 16:2

Copyright © 2014 Igal Harmelin-Moria
(Copyright does not pertain to illustrations)

]]> http://igal.fogbound.net/2014/04/06/on-the-weekly-torah-portion-of-metzora/feed/ 0 http://igal.fogbound.net/2014/03/25/on-the-weekly-torah-portion-of-tazria/ http://igal.fogbound.net/2014/03/25/on-the-weekly-torah-portion-of-tazria/#respond Wed, 26 Mar 2014 01:08:17 +0000 http://igal.fogbound.net/?p=460

The grave of the Maharal of Prag

At the beginning of this week’s Torah portion, tazria, we are told this regarding a new baby boy:

וּבַיּוֹם הַשְּׁמִינִי יִמּוֹל בְּשַׂר עָרְלָתוֹ:

On the eighth day, the flesh of his foreskin shall be circumcised. (Leviticus 12:3)

Is there a significance to this number eight, to doing this on the eighth day? It turns out there is. According to the great 16^th century rabbi Yehudah Livai of Prag (the Maharal of Prag), everything that pertains to the supernatural intervention of the divine in the world is associated with the number eight.

Just look at last week’s Torah portion, shemini. The word shemini means “eighth”, and the portion is called thus because it opens with the words:

וַיְהִי בַּיּוֹם הַשְּׁמִינִי

It was on the eighth day (Leviticus 9:1).

The eight day of what? It was the eighth day of the consecration of the mishkan, the tabernacle. it was only on that day that God’s presence, the shekhinah, finally entered the mishkan and the purpose for which it was created could be served.

The miraculous nature of eight is also highlighted in the story of Hanukah. Eight days was the time needed before the new oil could arrive to enable the inauguration of the temple, and a very small amount of oil that was found in the temple itself miraculously lasted until the new oil arrived.

Incidentally, the Hebrew word for oil, shemen (שמן), comes from the same root as the Hebrew word for eight, shmone (שמנה). Indeed, oil is used throughout the Bible to signify the miraculous world of the eighth day. In fact, the word Massiah (משיח), the one who brings about the new world of perfection, means “the one anointed with oil.”

This connection between oil and eight is also alluded to with regards to Jacob’s eighth son, Asher. When Jacob blesses his sons before his death, here is what he says to Asher:

מֵאָשֵׁר שְׁמֵנָה לַחְמוֹ וְהוּא יִתֵּן מַעֲדַנֵּי מֶלֶךְ:

Asher’s bread shall be rich with oil and he shall yield royal dainties. (Genesis 49:20).

Similarly, before Moses parts from the people of Israel, here is how he blesses the tribe of Asher:

וּלְאָשֵׁר אָמַר בָּרוּךְ מִבָּנִים אָשֵׁר יְהִי רְצוּי אֶחָיו וְטֹבֵל בַּשֶּׁמֶן רַגְלוֹ:

And of Asher he said: Most blessed of sons be Asher, may he be the favorite of his brothers, may he dip his foot in oil. (Deuteronomy 33:24)

But the Messiah is connected to the eighth day more directly. The Babylonian Talmud tells us that the Messiah will come after the seventh day—i.e., on the eighth day.* It is not surprising that this symbolism did not escape the Christians, as the gospel tells us that Jesus’ resurrection occurred on Sunday, a day after the seventh day.

The symbolism of “beyond seven” as the emergence of the new world also has to do with the number fifty. For example, later in the book of Leviticus, we will read of the command to celebrate the 50^th year, the yovel (the source of the English word Jubilee), which is a year in which everything is started anew. Here is how it is described:

וְסָפַרְתָּ לְךָ, שֶׁבַע שַׁבְּתֹת שָׁנִים–שֶׁבַע שָׁנִים, שֶׁבַע פְּעָמִים; וְהָיוּ לְךָ, יְמֵי שֶׁבַע שַׁבְּתֹת הַשָּׁנִים, תֵּשַׁע וְאַרְבָּעִים, שָׁנָה…. וְקִדַּשְׁתֶּם, אֵת שְׁנַת הַחֲמִשִּׁים שָׁנָה, וּקְרָאתֶם דְּרוֹר בָּאָרֶץ, לְכָל-יֹשְׁבֶיהָ; יוֹבֵל הִוא, תִּהְיֶה לָכֶם, וְשַׁבְתֶּם אִישׁ אֶל-אֲחֻזָּתוֹ, וְאִישׁ אֶל-מִשְׁפַּחְתּוֹ תָּשֻׁבוּ.

You shall count off seven weeks of years—so that the period of seven weeks of years gives you a total of forty-nine years… and you shall hollow the fiftieth year. You shall proclaim liberty throughout the land for all its inhabitants. (Leviticus 25:8,100)

Notice also the symbolism of Pentecost, the holiday in which the Torah was given out. The people of Israel spent seven weeks, or 49 days, in the desert, and on the 50^th day, the first day of the 8^th week, they received the Torah, an event which is celebrated by the Jewish holiday of Shavu’ot, or pentacost.

Interestingly, Moses’ successor, Joshua, who is the one who actually took the people of Israel from the desert into the world of the Holy Land, is called “Ben Nun”, the son of Nun (pronounced “noon”). Nun is also the name of the 14^th letter of the Hebrew alphabet, which has the numerical value of 50. Thus, it is the son of 50 who ushers in the new world.

Readers of this blog will remember that when writing about the weekly portion of mishpatim, I focused on the symbolism of forty. The number forty (forty years or forty days) is used in the Torah to designate a period of time that precedes an event of monumental importance (e.g., the forty days of the flood, or Moses’ ascent to Mt. Sinai to receive the Torah).

It took forty years to sojourn through the desert; now it is up to the son of fifty, Joshua Ben Nun, to accomplish the purpose for which the forty years were a prelude to.

And here we see another relationship between 50 and 8. The book of Joshua tells us, that only those who left Egypt were circumcised, but during the sojourn in the desert, nobody was circumcised. After crossing the Jordan, Joshua, the son of fifty, is commanded to administer the circumcision of all the people under his command, that which normally takes place on the eighth day of a boy’s life.

Thus we are brought full circle to the beginning of this Torah portion, with its commandments on circumcision.

* * *

But what about the number seven, the Shabbat? The seventh day symbolism seems to be different. It stands for completion, for fulfillment, for rest, for unity. It stands as the culmination of diversity and activity. However, it is still part of the cyclical nature of time. Six days, followed by the seventh; and another cycle of six days, followed by the seventh.

The world of the seventh day is the world of rest, of not doing any work, not moving and not fixing anything, in contrast to the world of the six days which is the world of action. But the world of the eighth day is the world that is more than the sum of all the parts, a new emergence that transcends and includes the world of the seven. In this world, the separation between that which is holy and that which is not holy no longer applies. As Isaiah put it:

כִּי מָלְאָה הָאָרֶץ דֵּעָה אֶת יְהוָה כַּמַּיִם לַיָּם מְכַסִּים.

For the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of Y-H-V-H as the waters cover the sea. (Isaiah 11:9)

* * *

And there is a practical takeaway. Note that the name for the eighth son, Asher, shares the same root with, and is spelled identical to, the Hebrew word osher (אשר), which means “bliss” or “happiness”. Notice also that the Hebrew word to anoint (למשח) is very close etymologically to the Hebrew root to be happy (לשמח).

We are being told something important here. Yearning for the Messiah is not fulfilled by passive waiting, but by embracing happiness. Not the frivolous, intoxicated, wild happiness that depends on things outside ourselves, but on the joy that is our very nature, the bliss of being grounded within ourselves. It is the joy that deeply knows that however challenging and imperfect the world is, all is well as wisely put. That we always have the choice to embrace the higher, most enlightened perspective.

As we are commanded—

וְהָיִיתָ אַךְ שָׂמֵחַ:

And you shall be always only happy. (Deuteronomy 16:15)

Here is a very active, practical, and direct way of ushering in the world of the eighth day.

————–

*Tractate Sanhedrin 97a; tractate Megilah 17b

Copyright © 2014 Igal Harmelin-Moria
(Copyright does not pertain to illustrations)

וַיִּקְרָא אֶל מֹשֶׁה וַיְדַבֵּר יְהוָה אֵלָיו מֵאֹהֶל מוֹעֵד לֵאמֹר:

He called to Moses; Y-H-V-H spoke to him from the Tent of Meeting. (Lev. 1:1)

Those familiar with the Torah and/or readers of this blog will remember that this portion follows many chapters in Exodus in which the text dealt mainly with the construction of the mishkan (the tabernacle, here referred to as “the Tent of Meeting”). As mentioned repeatedly in this blog, the Hassidic viewpoint is that the tabernacle is principally an internal structure, an inner sacred space within each person, and it’s up to each of us to “erect” this structure so that God can be realized as dwelling within.

According to this interpretation, therefore, when the Torah says that “Y-H-V-H spoke to him [Moses] from the Tent of Meeting”, it is a voice that Moses, who serves as a metaphor for each one of us, hears from within himself.

This is hinted at by an “anomaly” in the actual text of the Torah scroll. The first word of this Torah portion (and therefore, of the book of Leviticus), vayikra (ויקרא), ends with the letter aleph (א). This letter has the numerical value of 1, and stands for “The one without a second”–the one and only, i.e. God. But in this case, the letter is written smaller than other letters, almost like a superscript:

In the commentary on the first portion of the Torah, bereshit, I mentioned that there are a few places in the Torah scroll in which the letters are written differently, e.g., larger, smaller, or turned at an abnormal angle. These “abnormalities” are neither typos nor decorative devices. Rather, they are used to highlight or amplify important metaphysical points.

The fact that the word vayikra, which means “He [God] called”, ends with a small aleph, highlights the fact that the voice of God that one hears is not a dramatic voice from outside through “cosmic loudspeakers” but rather a “still, small voice” that one hears from within.

And indeed, one of the early Hassids, Rabbi Menachem Nachum of Chernobyl, explains this in his book Meor Eynayim. He says that the small aleph indicates that He, the Master of the world, reduces Himself in order to be present in the soul of every human, to guide us towards Himself, towards aleph, towards the One.

* * *

The word vayikra, which is translated here as “He called”, is from the root kara, which means “to read”, “to call out”, and “to proclaim”. It is identical to the same root in Arabic, qara (or kara; the use of K in Hebrew transliterations vs. Q in Arabic ones is due to differences in pronunciation).

Interestingly, the first word that was revealed to Muhammad and that started his mission was the word iqra (اقْرَأْ), which means to call out (or proclaim) as well as to read. In today’s traditional Qur’anic arrangement, this is the opening words of surah 96, but it is nevertheless understood as the first word of Allah that was revealed to the Prophet.

* * *

In traditional Jewish religious education, the first text that young students of the Torah are exposed to soon after learning the alphabet is the book of vayikra. This is because this book is almost entirely devoted to the worship of God in the tabernacle (hence its Latin name, Leviticus, i.e., pertaining to the Levites, the priestly class, and their duties). This was thought of as the purest of subjects and therefore appropriate for beginning Torah study.

Copyright © 2014 Igal Harmelin-Moria
(Copyright does not pertain to illustrations)

Towards the end of this portion, after describing the completion of the work, we are told:

וַיְכַס הֶעָנָן אֶת אֹהֶל מוֹעֵד וּכְבוֹד יְהוָה מָלֵא אֶת הַמִּשְׁכָּן: וְלֹא יָכֹל מֹשֶׁה לָבוֹא אֶל אֹהֶל מוֹעֵד כִּי שָׁכַן עָלָיו הֶעָנָן וּכְבוֹד יְהוָה מָלֵא אֶת הַמִּשְׁכָּן:

Then the cloud covered the tent of meeting, and the glory of Y-H-V-H filled the tabernacle. Moses was not able to enter the tent of meeting because the cloud settled upon it, and the glory of Y-H-V-H filled the tabernacle. (Exodus 40:34-35)

But in previous portions we were told that the construction of the tabernacle was not so that God could be dwell in it, but rather in them, i.e. the Israelites. How is it that here we are told that God’s presence fills the tabernacle itself? This is also peculiar given the statement of Solomon, the builder of the first temple:

הִנֵּה הַשָּׁמַיִם וּשְׁמֵי הַשָּׁמַיִם לֹא יְכַלְכְּלוּךָ אַף כִּי הַבַּיִת הַזֶּה אֲשֶׁר בָּנִיתִי:

Even heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain you, much less this house that I have built! (1 Kings 8:27)

As mentioned in the commentaries on the last few portions, one way of understanding the tabernacle is as a metaphor for an individual. The Hebrew word for tabernacle, mishkan, means “dwelling place”, and according to this interpretation, constructing a mishkan means creating a space within oneself for God’s presence, the shekhinah (a word that comes from the same root as mishkan) to dwell within oneself. The physical body can be seen as the tabernacle housing the shekinah.

When we are told that Moses could not get into the tabernacle when God’s presence filled it, we are told that in order to make one’s body the tabernacle, one’s individuality has to take the back seat. When the individuality takes the driver’s seat, then God’s presence (metaphorically represented by the cloud) moves away.

This comment about how the mishkan was used comes at the end of five weekly portions dedicated to its construction. It suggests to us that the whole purpose of these five portions is to instruct one regarding the proper mode of worship, through bitul (ביטול)– the surrender of the individuality in order for God to take over and for one’s body to become a living, breathing, walking and talking tabernacle.

As St. Paul says in his epistle to the Corinthians: “Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?” (1 Corinthians 3:16)

In our age, the age of the individual, such a bitul, such a surrender of one’s individuality, may sound very scary, or at least alien. It would take a long discussion to show that it does not refer to the surrender of one’s free will or personality. I am traveling through Israel at the moment, and don’t have time to explore this topic in detail, but look forward to doing so in future posts.

Copyright © 2014 Igal Harmelin-Moria
(Copyright does not pertain to illustrations)

As mentioned earlier, ancient lore considered the tabernacle to be a mirror of the structure of the human psyche as well as the structure of the universe. The art of creating the tabernacle, then, is a mirror of, or a commentary on, the primordial act of creation spoken of in Genesis, on one hand, and the nature of human creativity on the other.

We are told that the artisan who was charged with overseeing the construction of the temple was called Bezalel (בצלאל). The name itself reveals to us the ideas of the Torah about the creative process. The name Bezalel means “in God’s shadow”, an image that in Biblical idiom means “shielded by God”. For example, we are told in the Psalms:

מַה יָּקָר חַסְדְּךָ אֱלֹהִים וּבְנֵי אָדָם בְּצֵל כְּנָפֶיךָ יֶחֱסָיוּן:

How precious is your faithful care, O God! Mankind shelters in the shadow of your wings. (Psalm 36:8)

In addition to his revealing name, the Torah informs us, on a number of occasions, that Bezalel’s skills were a result of a gift of profound wisdom granted to him by God:

וַיְמַלֵּא אֹתוֹ רוּחַ אֱלֹהִים בְּחָכְמָה בִּתְבוּנָה וּבְדַעַת וּבְכָל מְלָאכָה:

[God] has endowed him with a divine spirit of wisdom, understanding, and knowledge of every kind of craft. (Exodus 35:31)

What is that special wisdom the Bezalel received? The Jewish tradition tells as the God created this world by means of speech: God commands vayahi or (ויהי אור), “let there be light,” light indeed manifests, because the letters of the Torah, the letters of the Hebrew Alphabet, are said to contain within them the fundamental vibrations of the universe, and the divine creative wisdom is combining these letters in such a way that the words represent the vibrational quality of the object which they represent. Said differently: the word used by the Torah for an object (e.g., or for light) are not arbitrary symbols, but contain the essence of the object portrayed.

Ancient lore has it, that the special wisdom afforded to Bezalel was the very skill with which God has created the universe: the skill to create through the combinations and permutations of the letters of the alphabet. Later traditions attributed this knowledge to saintly rabbis, such as the Maharal of Prague, Rabbi Judah Loew, the legendary creator of the Golem (Incidentally, the Maharal’s father was called Bezalel).

Judaism is not alone in considering letters, the fundamental components of speech, as the primordial energies that lie at the basis of physical creation. The Hindu mythology relates to the texts of the Veda as the speech of Brahma, the creator. Like the Torah in Judaism, the Hindus consider the fundamental vibrations of the Veda to be the blueprint through which creation has come about. They also believe that the words of the Veda are not arbitrary symbols, but that each word contains the vibratory essence of the object to which they refer.

And just like in the Jewish tradition, the Vedic notion is that the knowledge of those fundamental energies can be created not just for the creation of the universe but also for specific acts of artistic creativity. For example, in the Mahabharata, and enormous Indian epic about the war between the clans of the lunar dynasty, the magical palace of the Pandavas is said to have been constructed through mantras, Vedic sounds, by Vishwakarman, the architect of the Gods.

How are we to understand this in our day and age? I believe that the text offers us profound commentary about human creativity. The letters of the alphabet are quantified values of the fundamental Energy-and-Intelligence that created the universe, which is beyond any quantification. This idea is particularly clear in the Hebrew tradition, since the Hebrew letters are also—or some would say primarily—numbers. As expressions of divine intelligence, they are quantified expressions of that which cannot be quantified, cannot be expressed.

While some may understand the story of Bezalel to be about an ancient figure in the desert, I prefer to see in it a universal commentary about how we create. Bezalel is each and every one of us, when we harness our creative potential. That creativity, which we personalize, is not really ours. Its source is mysterious. Read some of the descriptions of creative people about their moments of creative inspirations and they sound remarkably similar to the descriptions of mystics of all traditions about their insights into the deepest nature of reality.

One of the takeaways of the Torah portion of vayakhel is that human creativity is divine and should be harnessed for what the Torah sees as the purpose of life—to make every corner of the Earth sing the glory of heaven. This Torah portion reminds us that this is our task.

Copyright © 2014 Igal Harmelin-Moria
(Copyright does not pertain to illustrations)

In a nutshell: after the people of Israel received, collectively, a revelation of God’s voice, including the Ten Commandments, they signed on the dotted line by famously declaring na’aseh ve-nishma’ (נעשה ונשמע) “We will do and listen” (Exodus 24:7). The midrash takes these words to signify their complete trust, since the word na’aseh, “we will do”, preceded the word nishma’, “we will listen”: they committed themselves to obey the Torah even before they heard it fully.

But when Moses goes up the mountain to receive the word of God for them and stays a while, the following happens:

Aaron yields to the pressure. He collects the golden earrings from everybody and fashions a golden statue of a calf. Almost instantly, the Israelites start worshipping this idol, saying:

אֵלֶּה אֱלֹהֶיךָ יִשְׂרָאֵל אֲשֶׁר הֶעֱלוּךָ מֵאֶרֶץ מִצְרָיִם:

This is your god, O Israel, who brought you out of the land of Egypt!
(Exodus 32:4)

As a school kid, I found this story incomprehensible. How could they do it? In the four months that have passed since the exodus from Egypt, the Israelites witnessed dozens of miracles, each of which, on its own, should have knocked any doubt even out of the worst cynic: the ten plagues; the parting of the Red Sea for the Israelites and the drowning of the pursuing Egyptian forces; the manna and the quails to feed them and the water from the rock to quench their thirst; the “cosmic GPS”—the pillar of light to guide them by night and the pillar of smoke by day; and to top it all off, the collective experience of the revelation of the Ten Commandments, the first of which is the ban on worshipping any idols.

Over the years, I have come to relate to this story as a metaphor for the perils of the spiritual path that many committed spiritual practitioners are familiar with. Anyone who has had a “peak experience”, a moment of clarity in which the screens that normally veil one’s perception lift from one’s eyes and one gazes directly at Truth face to face, knows how one’s sense of self momentarily changes. One’s existential doubts, anxiety and neurosis dissolve in a moment; trust, love, surrender and freedom take over and one is convinced that life will never be the same.

In very rare cases, such an experience leads to a profound and permanent transformation. In most cases, however, the experience fades, and one finds oneself in a predicament—one has fallen deeply in love, but the object of one’s love is nowhere to be found. And for someone new on the path, this can cause a kind of panic, a strong desire to retrieve the clarity of the initial experience and an almost frantic exploration of ways in which that experience could be stabilized.

I am reminded of the first years of starting to meditate. At first, meditation was its own reward. Soon, within months, we (new meditators) kept our ears opened to see if there was anything that we could do to hasten out “spiritual growth.” Maharishi, we notice, wore coral beads; should we wear coral too? Should we be vegetarians? Should we be celibate? Golden calves come in various shapes and forms. The Tibetan teacher Chögyam Trungpa called this spiritual materialism.

What is the moral of the story? For a spiritual aspirant, it is that of patient commitment. Don’t draw conclusions about the nature of ultimate reality based on your emotional experience, even if it is a peak emotional experience. The ultimate reality is One; it is beyond good or bad, pleasant or unpleasant. As long as our interpretation of our closeness to God is based on the quality of our experience, we are still in the land of mitzrayim (מצרים), Egypt, which means the duality of boundaries.

* * *

As I said, this Torah portion continues to deal with the construction of the temple. Readers of the previous two entries of this blog will remember, that I have emphasized the need to understand the tabernacle not as a physical structure outside oneself, but rather as a “structure” that we create within our consciousness for the shekhina (the divine presence) to dwell within us (the Hebrew word lishkon, to dwell, comes from the same root as shekhinah, which is also the root of the word mishkan, the Hebrew name for the tabernacle).

Here is what Rabbi Ephraim of Sudilkov, the grandson of the founder of Hassidism, the Baal Shem Tov, wrote in his in his commentary on this week’s Torah portion, ki tisa:

בודאי לא לחנם נכתב מעשה המשכן וכל כליו בתורתנו הקדושה אלא כדי להורות לנו הדרך האיך הוא בכל אדם שיוכל לבנות משכן וכלים להשראת השכינה בקרבו כי זה היה כל מעשה המשכן כמו שכתוב (שמות כה, ח) ועשו לי מקדש ושכנתי בתוכם. בתוכו לא נאמר, אלא בתוכם ממש.

Surely, the story of the tabernacle and all its tools was not written in our Sacred Torah except for one purpose: to instruct us regarding the way in which every person could build within themselves a tabernacle and tools for inspiring the shekhinah [to dwell] within them. This was the whole story of the tabernacle. As the Torah tells us (in Exodus 25,8): “They will build me a sanctuary, and I will dwell within them.” It does not say “[They will build me a sanctuary, and I will dwell] within it”, but literally “within them.”
(From Degel Machane Ephraim, commentary on ki tisa).

And if we apply this mode of interpretation to the story of the golden calf, we may conclude that under the momentary pressure of doubt, the Israelites regressed to relying on their animal nature as a source of ultimate meaning and happiness.

The Torah does not deny our animal nature or advise us to suppress it. Quite the opposite: it seeks to incorporate it into our spiritual life. But just like in the story of Jacob and Esau, the important message is who gets seniority. Jacob, which stands for our spirituality, has to be senior; Esau, the hunter, cannot be the ultimate good. Likewise, the mistake here is taking the golden calf and referring it as the God that “brought you out of the land of Egypt”. There is only one ultimate reality.

Copyright © 2014 Igal Harmelin-Moria
(Copyright does not pertain to illustrations)

In last week’s parashah (weekly Torah portion), terumah, we learnt that the Tabernacle may not be a physical structure at all, but a structure in consciousness. The text says:

וְעָשׂוּ לִי מִקְדָּשׁ וְשָׁכַנְתִּי בְּתוֹכָם:

And they shall make me a sanctuary, and I will dwell within them. (Exodus 25:8)

This idea is echoed in this week’s parashah. At the end of very long and detailed instructions regarding the clothing of the high priest, the ornaments of the menorah, specific of offerings and other matters, the text states:

וְשָׁכַנְתִּי בְּתוֹךְ בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל וְהָיִיתִי לָהֶם לֵאלֹהִים:

I will dwell within the Israelites and I will be their God. (Exodus 29:45)

That is to say, the relationship with God is defined by this act of “dwelling within them”. This is elaborated in the next verse:

וְיָדְעוּ כִּי אֲנִי יְהוָה אֱלֹהֵיהֶם אֲשֶׁר הוֹצֵאתִי אֹתָם מֵאֶרֶץ מִצְרַיִם לְשָׁכְנִי בְתוֹכָם אֲנִי יְהוָה אֱלֹהֵיהֶם:

And they shall know that I, YHVH, am their God who brought them out from the land of Egypt that I might dwell within them, I YHVH their God. (Exodus 29:46)

Readers of this blog will remember, that the Exodus from Egypt has been explained as a metaphor for the liberation of the soul from boundaries in duality to freedom in unity (see commentary on the weekly Torah portion of shemot). Now the text combines this metaphor with another—the one about building a mishkan. Again, it is not a physical structure. It is a sacred space that one “erects” within oneself so that God can dwell within.

This verse tells us, that the only reason the people of Israel were liberated from Egypt is so that they can build a mishkan and God can dwell within them. In other words, liberation is not a “free lunch;” it has to be reciprocated by service, by one’s commitment to be empty enough so that a mishkan is erected within oneself and the shekhinah can dwell within one. With that reciprocity established, people shall “know that I, YHVH, am their God.”

* * *

This Torah portion starts with another form of reciprocity. In the first verse of the parashah Moses is commanded to light a lamp (candle) of perpetual light in the tabernacle:

וְאַתָּה תְּצַוֶּה אֶת בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל וְיִקְחוּ אֵלֶיךָ שֶׁמֶן זַיִת זָךְ כָּתִית לַמָּאוֹר לְהַעֲלֹת נֵר תָּמִיד:

You shall instruct the Israelites to bring you clear oil of beaten olives for lighting, for kindling lamps of perpetual light. (Exodus 27:20).

One may ask: what need does God have for our light? Many commentators throughout the ages wondered about that, referring to a quote from the Psalms:

בְּאוֹרְךָ נִרְאֶה אוֹר:

By your light do we see light. (Psalm 36:10)

Does the source of all light need us to light candles for him?

The commentators seem to agree that it is all about reciprocity. Maimonides, who takes the light to be symbolic of our mental faculties, explains how the “light by which we see light”, that divine spark of intelligence that allows us to see God, is also the light through which God sees us. (Guide to the Perplexed, Part 3, Chapter 52).

Said differently, the degree to which the light of God shines on humans depends on the degree to which humans recognize God.

A similar idea about the reciprocity of the relationship with the divine was brought up by the Hadith Qudsi:

Allah has declared: I am close to the thought that My servant has to Me, and I am with him whenever He recollects Me. If he remember Me in himself, I remember him in Myself, and if he remembers Me in a gathering, I remember him better than those in the gathering do, and if he approaches Me by as much as one hand’s length, I approach him by a cubit, and if he approaches my by a cubit, then I draw nigh to him by two hands’ length. If he takes a step towards me, I run towards him. (Musnad-e Ahmad Hanbal)

At the end of the 18^th century, Rabbi Yisrael Hofstein, known as the Koznitzer Maggid, wondered about it. In his ‘Avodath Yisrael he gives up any attempt to understand it, and just expresses his wonder:

We cannot penetrate Your secret, why it is that You should desire to hear Torah or prayer out of our mouths. The same is true of the candles. “In Your light we see light,” yet You command us to kindle lights. “Thought cannot grasp You at all” (Tikkuney Zohar 17a); no one can understand the secret of this matter. All we have is “the revealed things for us and our children” (Deut. 29: 28) to do. Amen.

The Koznitzer Maggid recognizes, with great awe, the incomprehensible, ungraspable fact that there is indeed a reciprocal relationship here, and is awed by that fact.

And this is how Arthur Green, who quotes the Koznitzer Maggid in his Speaking Torah, writes about this passage:

The confession of undiminished astonishment is rare in a literature that is so used to providing answers and explanations. In the end, we are being told here, they are all worth nothing. All we can do is stand before the mystery—and go on living and following God’s word in this strange world.

Copyright © 2014 Igal Harmelin-Moria
(Copyright does not pertain to illustrations)

A few verses into the portion, the Torah specifies the effect of building the mishkan:

וְעָשׂוּ לִי מִקְדָּשׁ וְשָׁכַנְתִּי בְּתוֹכָם:

And they shall make me a sanctuary, and I will dwell among them. (Exodus 25:8)

The verse seems to suggest, that the tabernacle, the mishkan, will enable God to dwell (lishkon) among the people of Israel. But that is absurd: God confined to a tent? And does that mean that before the construction, God is not able to dwell among them?

As King Solomon said in his prayer after completing the construction of the first temple:

הִנֵּה הַשָּׁמַיִם וּשְׁמֵי הַשָּׁמַיִם לֹא יְכַלְכְּלוּךָ אַף כִּי הַבַּיִת הַזֶּה אֲשֶׁר בָּנִיתִי:

Even heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain you, much less this house that I have built! (1 Kings 8:27)

And as the prophet Isaiah declared:

כֹּה אָמַר יְהוָה הַשָּׁמַיִם כִּסְאִי וְהָאָרֶץ הֲדֹם רַגְלָי אֵי זֶה בַיִת אֲשֶׁר תִּבְנוּ לִי וְאֵי זֶה מָקוֹם מְנוּחָתִי:

Thus says YHVH: Heaven is my throne and the earth is my footstool; what is the house that you would build for me, and what is my resting place? (Isaiah 66:1)

But the verse may be saying something else. Firstly, the Hebrew word for “among them” is betocham,( בְּתוֹכָם), which means “within them.*” And it does not say betocho (בתוכו), which would mean “within it”, referring to the mishkan; it says within them, referring to the people of Israel.

The mishkan spoken of here is primarily a structure within the psyche. Each one of the people of Israel was enjoined on building a space within themselves, open themselves up in such a way so as to allow the divinity within them to shine through, to occupy the psyche. And then, God will dwell within them, within each and every one of them.

Some midrash commentaries support this understanding. We are told by the midrash hagadol that the structure of the mishkan parallels the structure of the cosmos as well as the structure of the human. It is not talking about the physical structure of the human, but the interior one: the one that is made of 248 limbs and 365 tissues, which parallel the 248 positive mitsvoth (commandments), the “do’s”, and the 365 negative mitzvoth, the “don’ts”.

Thus, the mishkan is truly an interior structure that comes into being when one lives according to YHVH’s will. And then YHVH is found to be dwelling in that structure. Even if an exterior, physical mishkan exists, it was only a sensory representation of the internal structure.

This is very reminiscent of the ideas of sacred architecture of both the Hindu and the Buddhist traditions: both model their temple according to their understanding of the human psyche, with the idea that the structure of the temple mirrors both the structure of the psyche and the structure of the universe.

According to these traditions, the actual physical experience of walking into the temple, from its outer boundaries into its sanctum, is said to be a mirror of the process of meditation, through which one realizes the divine Self within. Said differently, the structure of the temple points one to the fact that through meditation one creates this structure within one’s consciousness.

This Torah portion further describes the function of the mishkan:

וְנוֹעַדְתִּי לְךָ שָׁם וְדִבַּרְתִּי אִתְּךָ מֵעַל הַכַּפֹּרֶת מִבֵּין שְׁנֵי הַכְּרֻבִים אֲשֶׁר עַל אֲרֹן הָעֵדֻת אֵת כָּל אֲשֶׁר אֲצַוֶּה אוֹתְךָ אֶל בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל:

There I will meet with you, and I will impart to you—from above the cover, from between the two Cherubim that are on top of the Ark of the Pact—all that I will command you concerning the people of Israel. (Exodus 25:22)

These words are addressed to Moses, but Moses is a metaphor for each and every one of us. For each of us to “hear the voice of God” within us, we need to construct this structure within ourselves, to created that sacred space within us through meditation so that we can be in tune with our deepest interiority—which is not different from the interiority of the universe.

* * *

This Torah portion is the first of five that deal entirely with the details of the construction of the mishkan. In fact, from now until the end of the book of Exodus, the Torah deals with nothing else.

Professor Yeshayahu Leibowitz, in his book “Seven Years of Talks on the Weekly Torah Portions,” points out that the number of verses that the Torah devotes to the construction of the mishkan is 450; in contrast, the number of verses that the Torah devotes to the “construction” of the world in the book of Genesis is 31.

And that reveals the status and purpose of the Torah. It is not a book about cosmology, neither is it a book about history. It is a book that aims primarily at providing a map through which human awareness can align itself with the divinity within. And it is in this light that everything in this text should be interpreted and understood.

—————————–

*See a similar comment in the commentary on vayigash

Copyright © 2014 Igal Harmelin-Moria
(Copyright does not pertain to illustrations)